And what became of the hapless bank book? It was sent to Jim as he had demanded; and we may suppose that he drew the money and spent it. At any rate, when he next made his appearance at the old Squire's, two years later, he had neither book nor money.
Haying time at the old farm generally began on the Monday after the Fourth of July and lasted from four to six weeks, according to the weather, which is often fitful in Maine. We usually harvested from seventy to seventy-five tons, and in the days of scythes and hand rakes that meant that we had to do a good deal of hard, hot, sweaty work.
Besides Addison, Halstead and me, the old Squire had the two hired men, Jim and Asa Doane, to help him; and sometimes Elder Witham, who was quite as good with a scythe as with a sermon, worked for us a few days.
First we would cut the grass in the upland fields nearest the farm buildings, then the grass in the "Aunt Hannah lot" out beyond the sugar-maple orchard and last the grass in the south field, which, since it was on low, wet ground where there were several long swales, was the slowest to ripen. Often there were jolly times when we cut the south field. Our enjoyment was owing partly to the fact that we were getting toward the end of the hard work, and partly to the bumblebees' nests we found in the swales. Moreover, when we reached that field grandmother Ruth was wont to come out to lay the last load of hay and ride to the barn on it.
In former days when she and the old Squire were young she had helped him a great deal with the haying. Nearly every day she finished her own work early—the cooking, the butter making, the cheese making—and came out to the field to help rake and load the hay. The old Squire has often told me that, except at scythe work, grandmother Ruth was the best helper he had ever had, for at that time she was quick, lithe and strong and understood the work as well as any man. Later when they were in prosperous circumstances she gave up doing so much work out of doors; but still she enjoyed going to the hayfield, and even after we young folks had gone home to live she made it her custom to lay the last load of hay and ride to the barn on it just to show that she could do it still. She was now sixty-four years old, however, and had grown stout, so stout indeed that to us youngsters she looked rather venturesome on a load of hay. On the day of my narrative, we had the last of the grass in the south field "mown and making" on the ground. There were four or five tons of it, all of which we wanted to put into the barn before night, for, though the forenoon was bright and clear, we could hear distant rumblings; and there were other signs that foul weather was coming. The old Squire sent Ellen over to summon Elder Witham to help us; if the rain held off until nightfall, we hoped to have the hay inside the barn.
At noon, while we were having luncheon, grandmother Ruth asked at what time we expected to have the last load ready to go in.
"Not before five o'clock," Asa replied. "It has all to be raked yet."
"Well, I shall be down there by that time," she said in a very matter-of-fact tone. "I'll bring the girls with me."
"Don't you think, Ruth, that perhaps you had better give it up this year?" the old Squire said persuasively.
"But why?" grandmother Ruth exclaimed, not at all pleased.
"Well, you know, Ruth, that neither of us is quite so young as we once were—" the old Squire began apologetically.
"Speak for yourself, Joseph, not for me!" she interrupted. "I'm young enough to lay a load of hay yet!"
"Yes, yes," the old Squire said soothingly, "I know you are, but the loads are rather high, and you know that you are getting quite heavy—"
"Then I can tread down hay all the better!" grandmother Ruth cried, turning visibly pink with vexation.
"All right, all right, Ruth!" the old Squire said with a smile, prudently abandoning the argument.
Then Elder Witham put in his word. "The Lord has appointed to each of us our three-score years and ten, and it behooves us to be mindful that the end of all things is drawing nigh," he remarked soberly.
"Look here, Elder Witham," the old lady exclaimed with growing impatience, "you are here haying to-day, not preaching! I'm going to lay that load of hay if there are men enough here to pitch it on the cart to me."
Jim and Asa snorted; Theodora's efforts to keep a grave face were amusing; and with queer little wrinkles gathering round the corners of his mouth the old Squire, who had finished his luncheon, rose hastily to go out.
We went back to the south field and plied our seven rakes vigorously for an hour and a half. Then Asa went to get the horses and the long rack cart. That day, I remember, Jim laid the loads. Halstead helped him to tread down the hay, and Elder Witham and Asa pitched it on the cart. The old Squire had mounted the driver's seat and taken the reins; and Addison and I raked up the scatterings from the "tumbles."
In the course of two hours four loads of the hay had gone into the barn, and we thought that the thirty-three tumbles that remained could be drawn at the fifth and last load. It was then that grandmother Ruth appeared. She had been watching proceedings from the house and followed the cart down from the barn to the south field, resolutely bent on laying the last load. Theodora and Ellen came with her to help tread down the hay on the cart.
"Here I am!" she cried cheerily. She tossed her hayfork into the empty rack and climbed in after it. Her sun hat was tied under her chin, and she had donned a white waist and a blue denim skirt. "Come on now with your hay!"
Elder Witham moistened his hands, but made no comment. Jim was grinning. The old Squire drove the cart between two tumbles, and the work of pitching on and laying the load began. No one knew better than grandmother Ruth how a load should be laid. She first filled the opposite ends of the rack and kept the middle low; then when the load was high as the rails of the rack she began prudently to lay the hay out on and over them, so as to have room to build a large, wide load.
But in this instance there was a hindrance to good loading that even grandmother's skill could not wholly overcome. Much of the hay for that last load was from the swales at the lower side of the field, where the grass was wild and short and sedgy, a kind that when dry is difficult to pitch with forks and that, since the forkfuls have little cohesion and tend to drop apart, does not lie well on the rails of the rack. Such hay farmers sometimes call "podgum."
Fully aware of the fact, the old Squire now said in an undertone to the elder and to Jim that they had better make two loads of the thirty-three tumbles. But grandmother Ruth overheard the remark and mistook it to mean that the old Squire did not believe she could lay the load. It mortified her.
"No, sir-ee!" she shouted down to the old Squire. "I hear your talk about two loads, and it's because I'm on the cart! I won't have it so! You give me that hay! I'll load it; see if I don't!"
"Bully for you, Gram!" shouted Halstead.
It was no use to try to dissuade her now, as the old Squire well knew from long experience. When her pride was touched no arguments would move her.
With the elder heaving up great forkfuls and grandmother Ruth valiantly laying them at the front and at the back of the rack, they continued loading the hay. Jim tried to place his forkfuls where they need not be moved and where the girls could tread them down.
The load grew higher, for now that we were in the swales the hay could not be laid out widely. It would be a big load, or at least a lofty one. Grandmother Ruth began to fear lest the girls should fall off, and, calling on Elder Witham to catch them, she bade them slide down cautiously to the ground at the rear end of the cart. She then went on laying the load alone. As a consequence it was not so firmly trodden and became higher and higher until Jim and the elder could hardly heave their forkfuls high enough for her to take them. But they got the last tumble up to her and shouted, "All on!" to the old Squire, who now was nearly invisible on his seat in front. Grandmother Ruth settled herself midway on the load to ride it to the barn, thrusting her fork deep into the hay so as to have something to hold on by. We could just see her sun hat and her face over the hay; she looked very pink and triumphant.
Carefully avoiding stones and all the inequalities in the field, the old Squire drove at a slow walk. I surmise that he had his fears. It was certainly the highest load we had hauled to the barn that summer.
The rest of us followed after, glad indeed that the long task of haying was now done, and that the last load would soon be in the barn. Halfway to the farm buildings the cart road led through a gap in the stone wall where two posts with bars separated the south field from the middle field. There was scanty space for the load to pass through, and in his anxiety not to foul either of the posts the old Squire, who could not see well because of the overhanging hay, drove a few inches too close to one of them, and a wheel passed over a small stone beside the wheel track. The jolt was slight, but it proved sufficient to loosen the unstable "podgum." The load had barely cleared the posts when the entire side of it came sliding down—and grandmother Ruth with it! We heard her cry out as she fell, and then all of us who were behind scaled the wall and rushed to her rescue. The old Squire stopped the horses, jumped from his seat over the off horse's back and was ahead of us all, crying, "Ruth, Ruth!"
There was a huge heap of loose hay on the ground, fully ten feet high, but she was nowhere to be seen in it. Nor did she speak or stir.
"Great Lord, I'm afraid it's killed her!" Elder Witham exclaimed. Jim and Asa stood horrified, and the girls burst out crying.
The old Squire had turned white. "Ruth! Ruth!" he cried. "Are you badly hurt? Do you hear? Can't you answer?" Not a sound came from the hay, not a movement; and, falling on his knees, he began digging it away with his hands. None of us dared use our hay-forks, and now, following his example, we began tearing away armfuls of hay. A moment later, Addison, who was burrowing nearly out of sight, got hold of one of her hands. It frightened him, and he cried out; but he pulled at it. Instantly there was a laugh from somewhere underneath, then a scramble that continued until at last grandmother Ruth emerged without aid of any sort and stood up, a good deal rumpled and covered with hay but laughing.
"It didn't hurt me a mite!" she protested. "I came down light as a feather!"
"But why didn't you answer when we called to you?" the elder exclaimed reprovingly. "You kept so still we were scared half to death about you!"
"Oh, I just wanted to see what you would all do," she replied airily and still laughing. "I was a little afraid you would stick your forks into the hay, but I was watching for that."
The old Squire was so relieved, so overjoyed, to see her on her feet unhurt that he had not a word of reproach for her. All he said was, "Ruth Ann, I'm afraid you are growing too young for your age!"
The truth is that grandmother Ruth was dreadfully chagrined that the load she had laid had not held together as far as the barn; and it was partly mortification, I think, that led her to lie so still under the hay.
She wanted to remount the cart and have the hay pitched up to her; but as it was getting late in the afternoon, and as there was no ladder at hand, Jim and Asa hoisted Addison up, and he succeeded in rebuilding the load so that we were able to take it into the barn without further incident.
We could hardly believe that the fall had not injured grandmother Ruth, and as a matter of fact Theodora afterwards told us that she had several large black-and-blue spots as a result of her adventure. The old lady herself, however, scouted the idea that she had been in the least injured and did not like to have us show any solicitude about her.
The following year, as haying drew to a close, we young folks waited curiously to see whether she would speak of going out to lay the last load. Not a word came from her; but I think it was less because she felt unable to go than it was that she feared we would refer to her mishap of the previous summer.
For a month or more the old Squire had looked perplexed. Two of his lifelong friends were rival candidates for the senatorship from Maine, and each had expressed the hope that the old Squire would aid him in his canvass. Both candidates knew that many of the old Squire's friends and neighbors looked to him for guidance in political matters. Without seeming to express personal preference, the old Squire could not choose between them, for both were statesmen of wide experience and in every way good men for the office.
The first was Hannibal Hamlin, who had been Vice-President with Abraham Lincoln in 1861-1865: "Uncle Hannibal," as we young people at the farm always called him after that memorable visit of his, when we ate "fried pies" together. He had been Senator before the Civil War, and also Governor of Maine; now, after the war, in 1868, he had again been nominated for the senatorship under the auspices of the Republican party.
The other candidate, the Hon. Lot M. Morrill, had been Governor of Maine in 1858, and had also been United States Senator. I cherished a warm feeling for him, for he was the man who had so opportunely helped me to capture the runaway calf, Little Dagon.
Politically, we young folks were much divided in our sympathies that fall. My cousins Addison and Theodora were ardent supporters of Uncle Hannibal, whereas I, thinking of that calf, could not help feeling loyal to Senator Morrill. Hot debates we had! Halstead alone was indifferent. At last Ellen declared herself on my side and thus made a tie at table. I never knew whom the old Squire favored; he never told us and was always reluctant to speak of the matter.
It was a very close contest, and in the legislature was finally decided by a plurality of one in favor of Mr. Hamlin. Seventy-five votes were cast for him, seventy-four for Mr. Morrill, and there was one blank vote, over which a dispute later arose.
Earlier in the season, when the legislators who were to decide the matter at Augusta were being elected, both candidates made personal efforts to win popular support. Thus it happened that Uncle Hannibal on one of his visits to his native town that year, promised to give us a little talk. Since there was no public hall in the neighborhood, the gathering was to be held at the capacious old Methodist chapel.
There had been no regular preaching there of late, and the house had fallen into lamentable disrepair. The roof was getting leaky; the wind had blown off several of the clapboards; and a large patch of the plaster, directly over the pulpit, had fallen from the ceiling.
Fall was now drawing on, with colder weather, and so, on the day of Uncle Hannibal's talk, the old Squire sent Addison and me over to the chapel to kindle a fire in the big box stove and also to sweep out the place.
We drove over in the morning—the meeting was to begin at two o'clock—and set to work at once. While we were sweeping up the débris we noticed insects flying round overhead. For a while, however, we gave them little heed; Addison merely remarked that there was probably a hornets' nest up in the loft, but that hornets would not molest any one if they were left alone. But after we had kindled a fire in the stove and the long funnel had begun to heat the upper part of the room, they began to fly in still greater numbers. Soon one of them darted down at us, and Addison pulled off his hat to drive it away.
"I say!" he cried, as his eyes followed the insect where it alighted on the ceiling. "That's no hornet! That's a honeybee—and an Egyptian, too!"
We quickly made sure that they were indeed Egyptian bees. They were coming down through the cracks between the laths at the place where the plaster had fallen from the ceiling.
"Do you suppose there's a swarm of bees up there in the loft?" Addison exclaimed. "I'll bet there is," he added, "a runaway swarm that's gone in at the gable end outside, where the clapboards are off."
He climbed up on the high pulpit and with the handle of the broom rapped on the ceiling. We immediately heard a deep humming sound overhead, and so many bees flew down through the cracks that Addison descended in haste. We retreated toward the door.
"What are we going to do when Senator Hamlin and all the people come?" I asked.
"I don't know!" Addison muttered, perplexed. "That old loft is roaring full of bees. We've got to do something with them, or there won't be any speaking here to-day."
We thought of stopping up the cracks, but there were too many of them to make that practicable. To dislodge the swarm from the loft, too, would be equally difficult, for the more we disturbed the bees the more furious they would become.
At last we thought of the old Squire's bee smoker with which he had sometimes subdued angry swarms that were bent on stinging.
"You drive home as fast as you can and get the smoker and a ladder," Addison said, "and I'll stay here to watch the fire in the stove."
So I drove old Nance home at her best pace. When I got there I looked for the old Squire to tell him of our trouble, but found that he had already driven to the village to meet Senator Hamlin and the other speakers of the afternoon. Grandmother and the girls were too busy getting ready for the distinguished guests, who were to have supper with us, to give much heed to my story of the bees. So I got the smoker, the box of elm-wood punk and a ladder about fourteen feet long, and with this load drove back at top speed to the meetinghouse.
Addison had eaten his share of the luncheon that we had brought, and while I devoured mine he pottered with the smoker; neither of us understood very well how it worked. There are now several kinds of bee smokers on the market; but the old Squire had contrived this one by making use of an old-fashioned bellows to puff the smoke from out of a two-quart tin can in which the punk wood was fired by means of a live coal. The nose of the bellows was inserted at one end of the can; and into a hole at the other end the old gentleman had soldered a short tin tube through which he could blow the smoke in any direction he desired. In order not to burn his fingers he had inclosed both bellows and can in supporting strips of wood; thus he could hold the contrivance in one hand and squeeze the bellows with the other.
As we were unfamiliar with the contrivance, we both had to climb the ladder—one to hold the can and the other to pump the bellows. We lost so much time in getting started that when at last we were ready to begin operations people had already begun to arrive. They asked us all sorts of questions and bothered us a good deal, but we kept right on at our task. The smoker was working well, and we felt greatly encouraged. Those rings of black vapor drove the bees back and, as the smoke rose through the cracks, prevented them from coming down again.
We were still up that ladder by the pulpit, puffing smoke at those cracks, when the old Squire and Uncle Hannibal arrived, with Judge Peters and the Hon. Hiram Bliss. The house was now full of people, and they cheered the newcomers; there was not a little laughter and joking when some one told the visiting statesmen that a swarm of bees was overhead.
"Boys," Uncle Hannibal cried, "do you suppose there's much honey up there?"
He asked the Squire whether Egyptian bees were good honey gatherers, and laughed heartily when the old gentleman told him what robbers they were and how savagely they stung.
"Judge!" Uncle Hannibal cried to Judge Peters. "That's what's the matter with our Maine politics. The Egyptians are robbing us of our liberties!"
That idea seemed to stick in his mind, for later, when he began his address, he referred humorously to several prominent leaders of the opposing party as bold, bad Egyptians. "We shall have to smoke them out," he said, laughing. "And I guess that the voters of this district are going to do it, and the boys, too," he continued, pointing up to us on the ladder.
He had refused to speak from the pulpit, and so stood on the floor of the house—in what he described as his proper place; the pulpit, he said, was no place for politics.
After so many years I cannot pretend to remember all that Uncle Hannibal said; besides, my attention was largely engrossed in directing the nozzle of the smoker at those cracks between the laths. Addison and I were badly crowded on the ladder, and the small rungs were not comfortable to stand on. Now and then, in spite of our efforts, an Egyptian got through the cracks and dived down near Uncle Hannibal's head.
"A little more smoke up there, boys!" he would cry, pretending to dodge the insect. "I thought I heard an Egyptian then, and it sounded a little like Brother Morrill's voice!"
The great buzzing that was going on up in the loft was plainly audible below. Now and again Uncle Hannibal cocked his ear to listen, and once he cried, "The Egyptians are rallying! We are going to have a hard fight with them this year. Don't let them rob us!"
When the old Squire introduced the next speaker, Judge Peters, Senator Hamlin remarked that Peters was a hard stinger himself, as many a criminal had learned to his cost. And when the Hon. Hiram Bliss was introduced, Uncle Hannibal cut in with the remark that we need make no mistake on account of Mr. Bliss's name, for when he got after the Egyptians they would be in anything except a blissful state of mind. He also jocosely bade Mr. Bliss not to talk too long.
"We must get that honey," he said, laughing heartily. "I'd much rather have some honey than hear one of your old dry speeches!"
During Mr. Bliss's address we boys were wondering whether Senator Hamlin really intended to try to get that honey. We were inclined to think that he had merely been joking; but Mr. Bliss had no sooner sat down than Uncle Hannibal was on his feet.
"Now for that honey!" he cried with twinkling eyes. "I feel sure there's enough up there for every one to have a bite."
"How are you going to get it?" some one said.
"Why, go right up and take it!" he exclaimed. "You know, my friends, that all through the Civil War I had the misfortune to be Vice-President, which is about the most useless, sit-still-and-do-nothing office in this country. All those four years I wanted to go to the front and do something. I wanted to be a general or a private with a gun. The war is past, thank God, but I haven't got over that feeling yet, and now I want to lead an attack on those Egyptians! Back there over the singers' gallery I think I see a scuttle that leads up into the loft. Come on, boys, and fetch a bucket or two, or some baskets. Let's storm the fort!"
The crowd was laughing now, and men were shouting advice of all sorts. Uncle Hannibal was already on his way to the singers' gallery, and Addison, hastily thrusting the smoker into my hands, got down from the ladder and ran to help our distinguished visitor. Others followed them up the back stairs to the gallery; but the old Squire, seeing what was likely to happen, came to my assistance on the ladder. Taking the smoker into his own hands, he worked it vigorously in order to send as much smoke as possible up into the loft.
But on pushing up the scuttle the opening was found to be no more than fifteen inches square; and Uncle Hannibal was a two-hundred-pound man with broad shoulders. He mounted the singers' bench, but he could barely get his large black head up through the hole.
"Ah!" he cried in disgust. "Why didn't they make it larger? Just my luck. I never can get to the front!"
Grabbing Addison playfully by the shoulder he said, "I will put you up."
But at first Addison held back. "They'll sting me to death!" he protested.
"Wait!" Uncle Hannibal cried. "We will rig you up for it!" And leaning over the front rail of the gallery, he shouted, "Has any lady got a veil—two or three veils?"
Several women gave their veils, which Uncle Hannibal tied over Addison's hat; then the Senator put his own large gloves on Addison's hands. By that time the gallery was full of people—all laughing and giving advice. A man produced some string, and with it they tied Addison's trouser legs down and fastened his jacket sleeves tight round the wrists. Then Uncle Hannibal lifted him up as if he had been a child and at one boost shoved him up through the scuttle hole. When Addison had got to his feet in the loft, the Senator passed him a wicker lunch basket and a tin pail.
Tiptoeing his way perilously over the scantlings, laths and plaster, Addison made his way back to the rear end of the meetinghouse. The honeycombs were mostly on a beam against the boards of the outer wall. The punk smoke was so dense up there that he could hardly get his breath. The bees, nearly torpid from the smoke, were crawling sluggishly along on the underside of the roof, and offered no resistance when Addison broke off the combs.
With his basket and pail well filled, he tiptoed back to the scuttle and handed the spoils to Uncle Hannibal, who instantly led the way down the back stairs and outdoors.
"We have despoiled the Egyptians!" he cried. "I didn't do much myself, but a younger hero has appeared. Now for a sweet time!" And he passed the pail and basket round.
There was as much as twenty pounds of honey, and every one got at least a taste. The old Squire and I had now stopped puffing smoke, and we joined the others outside. To this day I remember just how Uncle Hannibal looked as he stood there on the meetinghouse platform, with a chunk of white, dripping comb in his hand. He took a big bite from it; and I said to myself that, if he took many more bites like that one, there would not be much honey left for the old Squire and me. But we got a taste of it, and very good honey it was.
Our victory over the Egyptians, however, was not yet complete. Either because the smoke was now clearing up, or because they smelled the honey that we were eating, they began to come round to the front end of the house, where they hovered over the people and darted down savagely at them. Outcries arose; men and women tried frantically to brush the insects away. Horses out at the sheds began to squeal. More bees were coming round every moment—the angriest bees I have ever seen! They stung wherever they touched. Judge Peters and Mr. Bliss were fighting the insects with both hands; and Uncle Hannibal, too, was pawing the air, with guffaws of laughter.
"The Egyptians are getting the best of us!" he cried. "We had better retire in as good order as we can—or it will be another Bull Run!"
Retreat was clearly the part of discretion, and so the whole gathering streamed away down the road to a safe distance. In fact, there was a pretty lively time before all of the people had unhitched their teams and got away. But in spite of many bee stings it had been a very hilarious meeting; and it is safe to say that all who were at the Methodist chapel that afternoon wanted Uncle Hannibal for Senator.
The old Squire drove home with his guests to supper; Addison and I gathered up our brooms and bee smoker and followed them.
At supper Uncle Hannibal asked us to tell him more about those Egyptian bees, of which he had never heard before; and after the meal he went out to see the colonies in the garden. He walked up to a hive and boldly caught one of the bees between his thumb and forefinger. Holding it fast, he picked up a pea pod for it to sting, so that he could see how long a stinger it had.
"Ah, but that is a cruel chap!" he said. "You'll have to use brimstone, I guess, to get those Egyptians out of the meetinghouse."
In point of fact, brimstone was what two of the church stewards did use, a few weeks later, before there were services at the chapel again; but they did not find much honey left.
For two years our young neighbor Catherine had been carrying on a little industry that had proved fairly lucrative—namely, gathering and curing wild herbs and selling them to drug stores in Portland. Her grandmother had taught her how to cure and press the herbs. One season she sold seventy dollars' worth.
Catherine took many long jaunts to gather her herbs—thoroughwort, goldthread, catnip, comfrey, skullcap, pennyroyal, lobelia, peppermint, old-man's-root, snakehead and others of greater or less medicinal value. She soon came to know where all those various wild plants grew for miles round. Naturally she wished to keep her business for herself and was rather chary about telling others where the herbs she collected grew.
She had heard that thoroughwort was growing in considerable quantity in the old pastures at "Dresser's Lonesome." She did not like to go up there alone, however, for the place was ten or eleven miles away, and the road that led to it ran for most of the distance through deep woods; a road that once proceeded straight through to Canada, but had long since been abandoned. Years before, a young man named Abner Dresser had cleared a hundred acres of land up there and built a house and a large barn; but his wife had been so lonely—there was no neighbor within ten miles—that he had at last abandoned the place.
Finally Catherine asked my cousin Theodora to go up to "Dresser's Lonesome" with her and offered to share the profits of the trip. No one enjoyed such a jaunt better than Theodora, and one day early the previous August, they persuaded me to harness one of the work horses to the double-seated buckboard and to take them up there for the day.
It was a long, hard drive, for the old road was badly overgrown; indeed we were more than two hours in reaching the place. What was our amazement when we drew near the deserted old farmhouse to see a "daguerreotype saloon" standing before it: one of those peripatetic studios on wheels, in which "artists" used to journey about the country taking photographs. Of course, card photographs had not come into vogue then; but there were the daguerreotypes, and later the tintypes, and finally the ambrotypes in little black-and-gilt cases.
Those "saloons" were picturesque little contrivances, not much more than five feet wide by fifteen feet long, and mounted on wheels. On each side was a little window, and overhead was a larger skylight; a flight of three steps led up to a narrow door at the rear. The door opened into the "saloon" proper, where the camera and the visitor's chair stood; forward of that was the cuddy under the skylight, in which the photographer did his developing.
The photographer was usually some ambitious young fellow who, after learning his trade, often made and painted his "saloon" himself. Frequently he slept in it, and sometimes cooked his meals in it. If he did not own a horse, he usually made a bargain with some farmer to haul him to his next stopping place in exchange for taking his picture. When business grew dull in one neighborhood, he moved to another. He was the true Bohemian of his trade—the gypsy of early photography.
The forward wheels of this one were gone, and its front end was propped up level on a short piece of timber; but otherwise the "saloon" looked as if the "artist" might at that moment be developing a plate inside.
On closer inspection, however, we saw that weeds had sprung up beneath and about it, and I guessed that the wagon had been standing there for at least a month or two; and on peeping in at the little end door we saw that birds or squirrels had been in and out of the place. All that we could make of it was that the photographer, whoever he was, had come there, left his "saloon" and gone away—with the forward wheels.
We gathered a load of herbs and drove home again, much puzzled by our discovery. The story of the "daguerreotype saloon" at Dresser's Lonesome soon spread abroad, but no one was able to furnish a clue to its history. Of course all manner of rumors began to circulate; some people declared that the owner of the "saloon" must be a naturalist who had journeyed up there to take pictures of wild animal life; others thought that the photographer had lost his way and perished in the woods.
When Willis Murch passed along the old road in October that fall, the mysterious "saloon" was still standing there; and lumbermen spoke of seeing it there during the winter. That next August, a year after we had first discovered it, Catherine and Theodora again went up to Dresser's Lonesome to gather herbs; and still the "daguerreotype saloon" was there.
It was Halstead who carried the girls up on that trip. The weather had been threatening when they started, and showers soon set in; rain fell pretty much all the afternoon, so that the girls were badly delayed in gathering their herbs. When Halstead declared that it was high time to start for home, Catherine proposed that they stay there overnight and finish their task the next day. The roof of the old farmhouse was now so leaky that they could find no shelter there from the rain; but Catherine suggested that the deserted "daguerreotype saloon" would be a cosy place to camp in.
Theodora did not like the idea very well, for the region was wild and lonely, and Halstead thought he ought to return to the farm.
"Why, this old saloon is just as good as a house!" Catherine said. "We can fasten the door, and then nothing can get in. And we have plenty of lunch left for our supper."
At last Theodora reluctantly agreed to stay. Promising to return for them by noon the next day, Halstead then started for home. After he had gone, the girls gathered a quart or more of raspberries, to eat with their supper. When they had finished the meal, they made, with the sacks of herbs, a couch on the floor of the "saloon," and Catherine fastened the door securely by leaning a narrow plank from the floor of the old barn against it.
For a while the girls lay and talked in low tones. Outside everything was very quiet, and scarcely a sound came to their ears. All nature seemed to have gone to rest; not a whippoorwill chanted nor an owl hooted about the old buildings. Before long Catherine fell peacefully asleep. Theodora, however, who was rather ill at ease in these wild surroundings, had determined to stay awake, and lay listening to the crickets in the grass under the "saloon." But crickets make drowsy music, and at last she, too, dropped asleep.
Not very much later something bumped lightly against the front end of the "saloon" outside; the noise was repeated several times. Oddly enough, it was not Theodora who waked, but Catherine. She sat up and, remembering instantly where she was, listened without stirring or speaking. Her first thought was that a deer had come round and was rubbing itself against the "saloon."
"It will soon go away," she said to herself, and did not rouse her companion.
The queer, bumping, jarring sounds continued, however, and presently were followed by a heavy jolt. Then for some moments Catherine heard footsteps in the weeds outside, and told herself that there must be two or three deer. She was not alarmed, for she knew that the animals would not harm them; but she hoped that they would not waken Theodora, who might be needlessly frightened.
But presently she heard a sound that she could not explain; it was like the jingling of a small chain. Rising quietly, she peeped out of one of the little side windows, and then out of the other. The clouds had cleared away, and bright moonlight flooded the place, but she could not see anywhere the cause of the disturbance. Whatever had made the sounds was out of sight in front; there was no window at that end of the "saloon."
Still not much alarmed, Catherine stepped up on the one old chair of the studio and cautiously raised the hinged skylight. At that very instant, however, the "saloon" started as if of its own accord and moved slowly across the yard and down the road!
The wagon started so suddenly that Catherine fell off the chair. Theodora woke, but before she could speak or cry out Catherine was beside her.
"Hush! Hush!" she whispered, and put her hand over her companion's mouth. "Don't be scared! Keep quiet. Some one is drawing the old saloon away!"
That was far from reassuring to Theodora. "Oh, what shall we do?" she whispered in terror.
Catherine was still begging her to be silent, when a terrific jolt nearly threw her off her feet. In great alarm the girls sprang to the little rear door to get out and escape.
But as a result probably of the rocking and straining of the frail structure, the plank that Catherine set against the door had settled down and stuck fast. Again and again she tried to pull it away, but she could not move it. Theodora also tugged at it—in vain. They were imprisoned; they could not get out; and meanwhile the old "saloon" was bumping over the rough road.
"Oh, who do you suppose it is?" Theodora whispered, weak from fear. "Where do you suppose he is going with us?"
"We must find out. Hold the chair steady, Doad, if you can, while I get up and look out."
She set the chair under the skylight again, and then, while Theodora held it steady, climbed upon it—no easy matter with the vehicle rocking so violently—and tried to raise the skylight. But that, too, had jammed. At last, by pushing hard against it, she succeeded in raising it far enough to let her peer out over the flat roof.
There, in the moonlight, she saw a strange-looking creature,—a man,—who rolled and ambled rather than walked; he was leading a white horse by the bit, and the horse was dragging the "saloon" down the road. The man was a truly terrifying spectacle. He seemed to be a giant; his head projected far forward between his shoulders, and on his back was what looked like a camel's hump! His feet were not like human feet, but rather like huge hoofs; and the man, if he was one, wabbled forward on them in a way that turned Catherine quite sick with apprehension. All she could think of was the picture of Giant Despair in her grandmother's copy of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress.
Unable to imagine who or what he could be, Catherine stood for some moments and stared at him, fascinated. All the while Theodora was anxiously whispering:
"Who is it? Who is it? Oh, let me see!"
"Don't try to look," Catherine answered earnestly, as she leaped to the floor. "Doad, we must get out if we can."
She threw herself at the door again and tried to pull it open; Theodora joined her, but even together they could not stir it.
Meanwhile the "saloon" swayed and jolted over the rough road; to keep from pitching headlong from side to side the girls had to sit down on the sacks. Their one consoling thought was that, if they could not get out, their captor, whoever he was, could not get in.
They were a little cheered, too, when they realized that the wagon was apparently following the road that led toward home. But when they had gone about three or four miles and had come to the branch road that led to Lurvey's Mills, they felt the old "saloon" turn off from the main road. With sinking hearts they struggled again to open the door, until, weak and exhausted, they gave up.
Theodora was limp with terror at their plight. Catherine, more resolute, tried to encourage her companion; but as they jogged and jolted over the deserted road for what seemed hours, even her own courage began to weaken.
At last they came to a ford that led across a muddy brook. As the horse entered the water, the forward end of the rickety old "saloon" pitched sharply downward. The prop that had held the door fast loosened and the door flew open!
Needless to say, the girls lost little time in getting out of their prison. Before the "saloon" had topped the other bank, they jumped out and ran into the alder bushes that bordered the stream.
Their captor was evidently not aware of their escape, for the "saloon" kept on its course. As soon as it was out of sight the girls waded the brook and, hastening back to the fork of the road, took the homeward trail.
About four o'clock in the morning grandmother Ruth heard them knocking at the door. They were still much excited, and told so wild and curious a story of their adventure that after breakfast the old Squire and Addison drove over to Lurvey's Mills to investigate.
Almost the first thing they saw when they reached the Mills was that old "daguerreotype saloon," standing beside the road near the post office, and pottering about it a large, ungainly man—a hunchback with club feet.
A few minutes' conversation with him cleared up the mystery. This was the first he had heard that two girls had ridden in his "saloon" the night before! His name, he told them, was Duchaine, and he said that he came from Lewiston, Maine.
"Maybe you've heard of me," he said to Addison, with a somewhat painful smile. "The boys down there call me Big Pumplefoot."
Unable to do ordinary work, he had learned to take ambrotypes and set up as an itinerant photographer. But ere long his mother, who was a French Canadian, had gone back to live at Megantic in the Province of Quebec; and in June the year before he set off to visit her. Thinking that he might find customers at Megantic, he had taken his "saloon" along with him; but when he got to Dresser's Lonesome he found the road so much obstructed that he left the "saloon" behind, and went on with his horse and the forward wheels.
An accident had laid him up at Megantic during the winter and spring, but later in the season he started for Maine. On the way down the old road from Canada he got belated, and had not reached Dresser's Lonesome with his horse and wheels until late at night; but as there was no place where he could put up, and as the moon was shining, he had decided to hitch up to his "saloon" and continue on his way to the Mills.
Thus the mystery was cleared up; but although the explanation was simple enough, Theodora and Catherine were little inclined to laugh over their adventure.
That was the year noted for a celestial phenomenon of great interest to astronomers.
We were taking breakfast rather earlier than usual that morning in August, for a party of us had planned to go blackberrying up at the "burnt lots."
Three or four years before, forest fires had burned over a large tract up in the great woods to the north of the old Squire's farm. We had heard that blackberries were very plentiful there that season; and now that haying was over, Addison and I had planned to drive up there with the girls, and Catherine and Thomas Edwards, who wished to go with us.
So far as Addison and I were concerned, the trip was not wholly for blackberries; we had another motive for going—one that we were keeping a profound secret. One afternoon late in the preceding fall we had gone up there to shoot partridges; and Addison, who was much interested in mineralogy, had come across what he believed to be silver in a ledge.
Every one knows that there is silver in Maine. Not a few know it to their sorrow; for there is nothing more discouraging than a mine that yields just a little less than enough to pay running expenses. But to us boys Addison's discovery suggested the possibilities of vast fortunes.
Addison felt very sure that it was silver, but we decided to say nothing to any one until we were certain. All that winter, however, we cherished rosy hopes of soon being wealthy. At the first opportunity we meant to make a quiet trip up there with hammer and drill to obtain specimens for assay, but for one reason or another we did not get round to it until August, when we planned the blackberrying excursion.
While we were at the breakfast table that morning there came a thundershower, and a thundershower in the early morning is unusual in Maine. The sun had risen clear, but a black cloud rose in the west, the sky darkened suddenly, and so heavy a shower fell that at first we thought we should have to give up the trip.
But the shower ceased as suddenly as it had begun, and the sun shone out again. Ellen, who had gone to the pantry for something, called to us that there was a bright rainbow in the northwest.
"Do come here to the back window!" she cried. "It's a lovely one!"
Sure enough, there was a vivid rainbow; the bright arch spanned the whole northwestern sky over the great woods.