Cal’s failure to appear at his wedding was never accounted for. The following week we found his shanty deserted. Its simple furnishings and Cal’s boat were gone.
“That ol’ skeesicks ’as got more sense than I ever thought, an’ ’e’s skipped. He’ll be number four in that cemetery lot all right if ’e ever shows up,” declared Sipes as we parted. “She rough-housed me when I didn’t do nothin’, an’ I wouldn’t like to see Cal’s finish if she ever gits to ’im. The feller that ought to marry Hellfirey Smetters is Holy Zeke.”
Perhaps from somewhere out in the darkness, Cal may have studied the group around the fire on the sand. Its light may have reflected the quiet gleam of tigerish ferocity that creeps into the eyes of a woman who is made to wait. He may have been appalled by the prospect of the loss of his much-loved freedom, and recoiled from further contact with a social system which haddiscarded him, or he may have seen his “kitten” in a new light that dissipated illusion.
Anyway, as Sipes declared, “Elvirey’s duck” had “lit out.”
During a visit to Mrs. Smetters late in the fall, she gloomily remarked, “Now ifyouwill tellmewot’s theuse o’ livin’, I’d bevery grateful!”
Bill Saunders
Bill Saunders
Sipesand Saunders had acquired a detachable motor for their boat. Catfish John had obtained it on one of his various trips to the little village at the mouth of the river about fifteen miles away. The disgusted owner had traded it in on his fish account with John, and had thrown in, as a bonus, some gasoline, mixing oil, a lot of damaged small tools, a much-worn book of instructions, and a great deal of conversation. He was careful to impress on John that he wanted no “come back,” and was not responsible in any way for what the contraption might or might not do after it left him. He had just had it “overhauled” by the makers for the third time, and he never wanted to see it again.
John, knowing the great persistence and ingenuity of his friends, and feeling that he was in the way of doing them a favor, put the despised machine in his wagon and departed.
The following morning he drove up the beach to the fish shanty for his supplies.
“Wot’s all this iron fickits?” asked Sipes, as he peered curiously into the wagon.
“That’s a gas motor wot ye stick on the back o’ yer boat. You fill up the tin thing with gasoline an’ some kind of oil, an’ then whirl that wheel wot’s got the little wooden handle on it, an’ ’way she goes an’ runs yer boat, an’ ye don’t ’ave to row, an’ ye c’n go anywheres whar it’s wet. I traded wot a feller owed me fer ’bout fifty pounds o’ fish fer it, an’ if you fellers want it, ye c’n ’ave it if ye gimme the fish.”
“Bill, come ’ere!” yelled Sipes.
The tousled gray head of Bill Saunders appeared in the doorway of the shanty.
“Wot’s doin’?” he asked sleepily.
“Never you mind; you put on yer trowsies an’ come on out ’ere an’ see wot our ol’ friend an’ feller-citizen ’as fetched in.”
Without following Sipes’s instructions implicitly, the disturbed occupant of the shanty came out to the wagon.
“This ’ere little book wot the feller gave me,” continued John, “has got it all in, with pitchersof all the little things in the machine, an’ how to grease it, an’ run it, an’ ev’rythin’ about it. Thar’s a lot o’ figgers in it wot tells wot ye pay fer all the things that gits busted.”
On the cover of the worn book, which the old man produced, was a highly colored picture of a slender youth, gay and debonair, with one of the machines in a canvas carrying bag. He swung it lightly and merrily in his hand as he tripped along toward his boat, which floated in the distance, where soft ripples laved its polished sides with pink water. His derby hat was tilted to a careless angle. On his face was a smile of joyful anticipation. There was no more suggestion of exertion than if the bag contained toy balloons instead of a motor. Nevertheless it required the united efforts of the three weather-buffeted old fishermen to get the machine out of the wagon on to the beach. Such is the contrast between exuberant youth and seasoned maturity.
“I bet that feller with the hard-boiled hat ain’t got the machine in that bag at all,” remarked Saunders, as he studied the scene on the cover. “They’s prob’ly some fellers follerin’ ’im with it that don’t show in the pitcher. I don’t like that cigarettemoustache on ’im; I’ll bet ’e knows durned little ’bout navigation ’ceptin’ with crackers on soup. You leave this thing ’ere an’ me an’ Sipes’ll try ’er out, an’ if it works, we’ll keep ’er. Anyhow we’ll make up the fish yer out an’ you won’t lose nothin’.”
The fish for John’s peddling trip were carefully sorted out and recorded by Sipes, with a stubby pencil, on the inside of the shanty door where the accounts were kept. The nets had been lifted in the early morning and the supply was abundant. When John had sold the fish the proceeds were to be divided equally.
After John and his aged horse “Napoleon” had left with the slimy merchandise, the old shipmates sat down and considered the apparatus.
To this primitive coast, torn by the storms and yellowed by the suns of thousands of years, where elemental forces had ruled since the beginning, had come a strange and misfitting thing. It seemed an unhallowed and discordant intrusion into the Great Harmonies. Somehow we can, in a measure, be reconciled, poetically, to the use of steam, without great violence to our worship of the grandeur of nature’s forces, but there isno poetry in a gasoline engine. It is a fiend that wars upon things spiritual. Its dissonant soul-offending clatter on the rivers that flow gently through venerable woods, and out in the solitudes of wide and quiet waters is profanation.
Utilitarianism and ideality clashed when the motor touched the beach, but these things did not disturb Sipes and Saunders, engaged in the contemplation of the machine, as bewildered savages might gaze upon a fragment of a meteor that had dropped out of the sky from another world.
After a while they lugged it to the shanty. “I could ’a’ carried it alone if I’d ’a’ had one o’ them darby hats on!” declared Sipes.
They spent long hours over the book of instructions, and the light in the shanty burned far into the night. They carefully and repeatedly examined the various parts in connection with the text. There were some words which they did not understand, but they finally felt that they had mastered the problem.
Saunders remarked, as they turned into their bunks, “I guess we got ’er, Sipes. We’ll pour in the juice an’ start ’er up in the mornin’. Then we’ll buzz off on the lake an’ look at the nets.”
“She oughta have a name on ’er, like a boat,” suggested Sipes. “S’pose we call ’er the ‘Anabel,’ er sump’n like that?”
“‘Anabel’ ain’t no kind of a name fer anythin’ o’ this kind. I seen that name on a sailboat once’t that didn’t make no noise at all, an’ this thing will. Wot’s the matter with ‘June Bug’?”
“All right,” said Sipes, “‘June Bug’ she is, now let’s go to sleep.”
Loud snores resounded in the shanty, and the “June Bug” spent the night on the floor near the stove. Fortunately there was no leak in the gasoline tank or fire in the stove.
With the coming of dawn the old cronies hastily prepared breakfast. The lake was calm and everything seemed propitious for the initial voyage with the June Bug. That deceptive bit of machinery was carefully carried to the big flat-bottomed boat, and, after an hour of hard work, was securely attached to the wide stem. The gasoline tank was filled to the top, the batteries adjusted, the spark tested, and every detail seemed to tally with the directions. Sipes gave the fly-wheel a couple of quick turns. The motor responded instantly. The propeller ran in theair with a cheerful hum, and the regular detonations of the little engine awoke the echoes along the shore.
With shouts of boyish glee the old shipmates pushed the big boat over the rollers on the sand and down into the water. There was much discussion as to which should run the engine and steer. Sipes produced a penny and, by flipping it skilfully, won the decision.
“I don’t s’pose they’s any use takin’ the oars, but I’ll put ’em in,” he observed as he threw them into the boat.
Saunders complacently took his place forward. Sipes gave the boat a final shove and jumped in. He pushed it well out with one of the oars, and turned and looked with pride on the wonderful labor-saving device on the stern. It seemed too good to be true.
“Say, Bill, to think that us fellers c’n go hundreds o’ miles out’n the lake, if we want to, an’ ev’rywhere else, an’ let this dingus do all the work. We c’n set an’ smoke an’ watch the foam, an’ listen to the hummin’ o’ the Bug. I’ve heard fellers go by way out b’yond the nets with them choo-choo boats, but I never seen wot did itbefore. Gosh! but this is fine. Now all we gotta do is to touch ’er off an’ away we go!”
The old man’s single eye beamed with enthusiasm, as he grasped the handle and made the prescribed turns. The result was a couple of pops and some coughing sounds somewhere in the concealed iron recesses.
“Guess she’s coy, an’ I didn’t give ’er enough. I’ll whirl ’er some more.” His efforts were again ineffectual.
“Lemme try ’er,” pleaded Saunders.
“Not on yer life! You keep off. You don’t know nothin’ ’bout machines. She’ll be all right in a minute. Gimme that book!”
The boat drifted sideways for some time while Sipes studied the directions and puttered over the parts with various tools.
“I’ll jolly ’er up with the screw-driver an’ monkey-wrench, an’ she’ll feel better.” He tinkered and cranked for nearly an hour, during which time Saunders offered many ill-received suggestions. Then came a torrent of invective.
“You got too many whiskers to swear like that,” remarked Saunders, “you’ll burn ’em.”
“Never you mind, I’m watchin’ ’em! The manwot ’ud make a thing like this, an’ take good cash money fer it, er even fish, oughta be cut up an’ sizzled!” he declared. “The skin’s all offen my hands, an’ I wish the devil wot built this gas bug ’ud ’ave to keep ’is head in hot tar ’til she went. Come ’ere, Bill, an’ start ’er up. You seem to know so much about it.”
They exchanged places and Sipes glared maliciously at the rebellious motor from the bow. Saunders put his pipe in his pocket, produced a chunk of “plug twist,” and bit off a large piece. He stowed it comfortably and considered the problem before him. After a couple of hours of fruitless efforts the profanity in the boat became unified and vociferous. The ancestors of the makers of the motor, and those of the man who had it last, as well as the undoubted destiny of everybody who had ever had any connection with it, were embraced in sulphuric execration. John was, in a way, excepted. He “meant well,” but he was “a damned old fool.”
After this general vituperation the old sailors rested for a while and rowed back. The constant cranking had turned the propeller a great many times. The boat had made erratic headway andwas quite a distance from shore. They landed, pulled the boat out on the sand with the windlass, and retired to the shanty for lunch and consultation.
Saunders strolled out a little later, with a piece of cold fried fish in his hand, and looked the motor over again. He gave the fly-wheel a careless turn and the engine started off gayly. Sipes heard the welcome sound and ran out, spilling his coffee over the door step. Lunch was discontinued, and the boat was re-floated. There was more cranking, but no answering vibrations. With more profanity the craft was restored to its berth on the sand, and another retreat made to the shanty.
“The Bug’ll run all right on land,” declared Sipes, “an’ we’ll turn the propeller so’s the edges’ll be fore an’ aft, an’ belay it. We’ll bend a rim on it an’ fasten some little truck wheels on the bottom o’ the boat. Then we’ll run the ol’ girl up an’ down on the hard sand ’long the edge o’ the water. We won’t go in the lake at all ’til we git ’er well het up, an’ then we’ll turn ’er in sudden an’ cut them lashin’s. She won’t know she’s in an’ ’way she’ll go.”
For many days the old shipmates struggledwith the obstinate mechanism. It once ran for an hour without a break and they were jubilant. “Some gas bug that!” Saunders exclaimed joyfully, but just then it sputtered and stopped. They were quite a ways out, and the oars had been forgotten. Fortunately there was a light in-shore breeze and they drifted to the beach about two miles from home.
The oars were finally procured and the day closed with everything snug and tight at the shanty.
“I bet we ain’t got the right kind o’ gasoline,” declared Sipes. “They’s lots o’ kinds. This ’ere wot’s in the Bug ain’t got no kick to it. We got too much oil mixed in it, an’ we gotta git s’more.”
When John came again the many troubles were related to him. He knew nothing of motors, but offered to get some more gasoline when he went to the village, and to bring the former owner of the motor over to see if he could suggest anything.
“You jest fetch that feller,” said Sipes, “an’ we’ll take ’im out fer a nice little spin on the lake, an’ we’ll go where it’s deep.”
When the new gasoline came there was muchmore tinkering and study of the directions. Resignation alternated with hope. Sometimes the motor would run, but more often it refused. John finally took it to the village and it was shipped to the makers. A carefully and painfully composed letter was put in the “pustoffice.” The long-delayed answer was that the machine needed “overhauling,” which would cost about half as much as a new one.
“The money that them pie-biters makes ain’t sellin’ motors, but overhaulin’ ’em,” declared Sipes. They sell one o’ them bum things an’ git their hooks in an’ git a stiddy income from it long as you’ll stand fer it.”
It was decided, after much discussion, to send the money “fer the overhaulin’.” Several months elapsed. The machine came back too late to be of further use that season, and was carefully stowed away for the winter.
“She’ll prob’ly need another ‘overhaulin’’ in the spring ’fore she’ll go, an’ them fellers’ll want to nick us ag’in an’ keep ’er all next summer,” said Saunders. “If they charged by the days they kep’ ’er instid o’ by the job, we’d be busted. They’ll bust us anyhow, an’ it might as well beall at one crack. The Bug’s goin’ to stay in the house now, where she won’t git wet. She ain’t goin’ out on the vasty deep no more ’til spring. If she gits uneasy, she c’n run ’round in ’ere.”
The following May I called at the shanty and found Sipes sitting disconsolately in the door-way. After visiting with him for a while, I inquired for Saunders.
“Poor Bill’s dead. I ain’t got no partner now an’ it’s awful lonesome. He was a nice ol’ feller. He fussed ’round with the gas bug fer days an’ days, an’ ’e couldn’t make it go. He come in one night late, an’ the next mornin’ ’e didn’t git up. He didn’t seem in ’is right mind. His hand ’ud keep goin’ ’round an’ ’round, like it was crankin’ sump’n. Then ’e’d make sputterin’ sounds with ’is mouth like as if a motor was goin’, an’ then ’e’d keep still a long time like the Bug does, an’ then begin ag’in. He wouldn’t eat nothin’, an’ one night he said ’e guessed ’e needed overhaulin’. Then ’e said ‘choo-choo! choo-choo!’ three er four times, an’ ’e was gone. Come on with me an’ I’ll show you where ’e was laid away.”
We walked along the shore a short distance, crossed the beach and climbed the bluff. Nearthe foot of an old pine was a mound, on which was scattered the dried remnants of many spring flowers, which probably had come from the low ground in the ravine. Several bunches of white trilliums, with their leaves and roots, had been transplanted to the mound, but they had withered and died. A wide board, which protruded from the ground at the head of the grave, bore the rude inscription:BiLL SauNDERS—DEADUnder the name was a rough drawing of the fly-wheel of the motor, evidently made with Sipes’s stubby pencil.
Chiselled epitaphs on granite tombs have said, but told no more.
We stood for some time before the mound. The old sailor wiped a tear from his single eye as we left Bill’s last resting place in silence and sorrow.
“Him an’ me was shipmates,” said the old man sadly, as we returned to the shanty. “I off’n go up there an’ set down an’ think about ’im. Bill was honest. They’s lots o’ fellers that wouldn’t swipe nothin’ that was red-hot an’ nailed down,’spesh’ly ’round ’ere, but Bill never’d touch nothin’ that didn’t b’long to him er me. It was the gas bug that killed ’im. Fust it made ’im daffy an’ then it finished ’im. She’s over there now on the stern o’ the boat. I ain’t never had ’er out this year, but I’m goin’ to try ’er once’t, jest fer Bill’s sake. I think ’e’d like to have me do it.”
After many condolences, and a general review of the Bug’s disgraceful career by Sipes, I picked up my sketching outfit and resumed my journey, depressed, as we all are, by a sense of the transience and unsolvable mystery of life, when we have stood near one who has gone.
One calm morning, about a month later, I was rowing on the lake several miles from Sipes’s shanty. A boat appeared in the distance. Its high sides, broad beam, the labored, intermittent coughing of a motor, and the doughty little bewhiskered figure on the stern seat were unmistakable. Sipes altered his course slightly so as to pass within fifty or sixty yards. I wondered why he did not come nearer. He went on by with a cheery “Wot Oh!” and a friendly wave of his hand. Evidently he was on some errandthat he did not want to explain, or was afraid to stop the motor, fearing that it would not start again. In a few weeks I encountered him again, under almost identical conditions. His nets were nowhere in the vicinity.
In the early fall I found an old flat-roofed hut, built with faced logs, about six miles down the coast, in the direction that the old man had been going when I had last seen him. It was in a hollow near the top of a high bluff that faced the lake. It was effectually hidden from the water and shore by a bank of sand and tangled growth along the edge of the bluff. Built against the outside was a large dilapidated brick chimney, entirely out of proportion in size to the cabin. No smoke issued from it and the place seemed deserted. I went down to the beach. A mile or so further on I found a fisherman repairing a boat on the sand, and asked him about the cabin.
“That place is witched,” he declared. “Thar’s funny doin’s ’round thar at night an’ don’t you go near it. Thar’s a white thing that dances on the roof. It goes up an’ down an’ out o’ sight, an’ then thar’s a big thunderin’ noise. I don’t want to know no more ’bout it’n I know now. Itdon’t look right to me. I seen a wild man ’round ’ere in the woods once’t, a couple o’ years ago, an’ mebbe he lived thar an’ ’e’s dead an’ ’e hants that place. I don’t come ’round ’ere often an’ I don’t want to.”
THE “BOGIE HOUSE”(From the Author’s Etching)
THE “BOGIE HOUSE”(From the Author’s Etching)
My curiosity was aroused and I decided to investigate the mystery when an opportunity came. About nine o’clock one night I walked up a little trail in the sand that led toward the cabin from the woods back of the bluff. There was a dim light inside that was extinguished when I carelessly stepped on a mass of dead brush that had been piled across the path. The breaking of the little sticks had made quite a noise. Immediately a long, wavy, white object appeared over the roof of the cabin. It vaguely resembled a human shape and looked peculiarly uncanny. It swayed back and forth a few times and then seemed to grow taller. The trees beyond were partially visible through it in the uncertain light. Clearly I was in the presence of a spook. The apparition vanished as suddenly as it came. Then a dull, hollow sound came from the cabin, followed by a low, rasping, ringing noise. When it ceased, the silence was weird and oppressive.
I went on by the structure to the edge of the bluff, where another pile of dry brush obstructed the path, and purposely walked on it, instead of over the high sand on the sides of the opening. The breaking sticks made more noise. I turned and again saw the spectral form over the roof. The wraith swayed slowly to the right and left, bent backward and forward a few times, grew longer and shorter, and disappeared as before.
In departing I stumbled over a board which stuck out of the sand, and in the dim light could distinguish the words “Dinnymite—Keep Out!” heavily scrawled on it with red paint.
Evidently visitors were not wanted, and the tell-tale brush-piles were designed to give alarm of the approach of intruders. The functions of the filmy ghost and the queer sounds were to inspire terror of the place.
I related my experience to Sipes the next time I saw him. He was deeply interested.
“Did ye hear any groanin’ after them funny sounds?” he asked, with a quizzical look in his eye. I replied that I had not.
“I’ll tell ye wot we’ll do,” said he, after a few moments of reflection, “you an’ me’ll go down tothat bogie house some time an’ we’ll butt in an’ see wot’s doin’. I gotta go that way in the boat next week. We’ll take the gun, an’ mebbe we’ll blow that bogie offen the top o’ the house. I seen that place last year an’ I know where it is.”
I did not approve of the idea of needlessly invading the privacy of anybody who did not want to see us, and who had inhospitably stocked their domain with brush-piles, ghosts, and forbidding placards, but there was a strange look in Sipes’s eye that convinced me that the trip might in some way be justified.
On the appointed day we made the start. “I always spend jest an hour tunin’ up the Bug,” remarked the old man, as he began cranking the motor, “an’ then if she don’t pop, I cuss ’er out fer jest fifteen minutes, an’ then I row. Hell, I gotta have some system!”
Fortunately the Bug was in good humor and took us three-quarters of the distance without a break. It then went to sleep, and half an hour’s cranking and assiduous doctoring failed to arouse it.
“I got a great scheme,” said Sipes. “W’en she gits like that I fasten the steerin’ gear solid fer the way I want to go, an’ then w’en I keep oncrankin’, the propeller goes ’round an’ ’round, an’ I keep goin’ some.”
A little later a single turn of the fly-wheel started the treacherous device, but it was going backward. Sipes promptly seized the oars and turned the stern of the boat toward our destination.
“We got ’er now! Jest keep quiet an’ touch wood! Sometimes she likes to do that, an’ if I try to reverse ’er she’ll balk. She thinks it’s time to go home, but it ain’t. This crawfish navigat’n’s fine w’en ye git used to it.”
We landed beyond a point on the beach which was opposite to the cabin. After we had secured the boat to some heavy drift-wood with a long rope, I followed Sipes up the side of a bluff west of the cabin. We made a detour through the woods and approached it at dusk. The dry brush-piles practically surrounded it at a distance of about fifty yards.
“Don’t step on none o’ them sticks,” cautioned Sipes. He gave a low, peculiar whistle, which was answered from the cabin. “That there’s the high sign,” he remarked, as we walked to the door. We were greeted by Bill Saunders, alive and inthe flesh. He seemed surprised that Sipes had brought a visitor, but was very cordial. Sipes greatly enjoyed the situation and chuckled over what he considered an immense joke.
“You see it’s like this,” he explained. “Bill got to thinkin’ wot’s the use o’ gasoline? W’y not have sump’n that ’ud run ferever, an’ not ’ave to keep buyin’ that stuff all the time? He’d set an’ think about it in the shanty an’ then somebody’d butt in an’ mess up ’is thinkin’. He’d go ’way off an’ set on the sand by ’isself, an’ then some geezer’d come snoopin’ ’long an’ chin ’im, an’ ’e couldn’t git no thinkin’ done.
“That cusséd dog o’ Cal’s come ’long the beach one mornin’. He’s bin runnin’ wild since Cal lit out. Fer years this whole country’s been fussed up with ’im an’ ’is doin’s. He died jest as ’e was pass’n the shanty. We buried ’im up there on that bluff, an’ that gave Bill an’ me an idea. We fixed up the place so’s people ’ud think Bill ’ad faded. Then we humped off down to this bogie house so Bill could ’ave some peace an’ quiet to do ’is thinkin’ in. Bill’s invent’n some kind o’ power that’ll make ev’rythin’ hum w’en ’e gits it finished. It’ll put all them other kinds o’ machineson the blink. That cusséd motor’ll go ’round an’ ’round, an’ she can’t stop ev’ry time ye bat yer eye at ’er.
“I been bringin’ things down ’ere fer Bill to eat, an’ sometimes little beasties come ’round the hut wot ’e shoots. We fixed up that dry brush so’s nobody ’ud come snoopin’ ’round without Bill knowin’ it. Him an’ me’s goin’ to divide wot we make out o’ th’ invention, an’ we’ll ’ave cash money to burn w’en ’e gits it goin’. We’ll set in a float’n palace out’n the lake an’ smokeseegars, with bands on ’em, an’ let the other fellers do the fishin’, won’t we, Bill?”
“You bet!” responded Saunders. Just then we heard a sound of breaking sticks outside. Instantly he seized a long pole that lay along the side of the wall. It was fitted with a cross-piece and a round top. Over it was draped various kinds of thin white fabric. He mounted a box and pushed the contrivance up through a hole in the flat roof, moved it up and down, waved the upper end back and forth a few times, and withdrew it. He thumped the empty box heavily with the end of the pole as he took it in, and picked up about four feet of rusty chain, whichhe shook and dragged over the edge of the box several times.
Through a small chink between the logs we saw a dim figure moving rapidly away in the gloom. We heard the crackling of the brush at the edge of the bluff, and knew that the intruder had gone.
“That feller’s got the third degree all right,” remarked Saunders, as he carefully put the ghost back into its place. “’Tain’t often anybody comes, but w’en they do they gotta be foiled off. Them dinnymite signs helps in the daytime, but fer night we gotta have sump’n else.
“This dress’n’ on the ghost mast come from Elvirey Smetters. We made up with ’er after ’er wedd’n with Cal busted up an’ Cal skipped. She was wearin’ most o’ this tackle fer the wedd’n, an’ she said she didn’t never want to see it ag’in. There’s a big thin veil fer the top o’ the pole, an’ some o’ the other stuff she said was long-cherry, er sump’n like that. We keep that hatch battened down w’en it rains, but she’s loose most o’ the time. W’en I shove the ghost out it pushes it open.”
Saunders extracted some rye bread, salt pork,and cheese from a cupboard. We fried the pork in a skillet over some embers in the big brick fire-place, and toasted the cheese. After our simple meal the old man piled more wood on the fire, and we smoked and talked until quite late.
The mechanism, on which Saunders was spending his days of seclusion, reposed under some tattered canvas near the wall. He was reticent concerning it, but Sipes volunteered the information that “they was some little wood’n balls wot went up an’ down in some tubes that was filled with oil, an’ then they rolled ’round inside of a wheel an’ come back.”
“Now you shut up!” commanded Saunders. “You leave this thing to me ’til I git it done, an’ then you c’n talk ’til yer hat’s wore out. They ain’t no use talkin’ ’til we git somew’eres, an’ then we won’t ’ave to talk. Wait ’til I git some little springs that’ll spread out quick an’ come back slow, an’ we’ll be through.”
Saunders’s mind was struggling with the eternal and alluring problem of perpetual motion. He was groping blindly for the priceless jewel that would revolutionize the world of mechanics.
It was after midnight when we bade him good-by,and departed through the moonlit woods for the beach.
We left the old man in the company of his fire, and is there greater companionship? It is in our fires that we find the realm of reverie. The fecund world of fancy reveals its fair fields and rose-tinted clouds in the vistas of shimmering light. Memory brings forth pages that the years have blurred. Fleeting filaments of faces wondrous fair, that long ago faded into the mists, smile wistfully, in halos of tremulous hues, and vanish. Slow-moving figures, crowned with wreaths of gray, sometimes linger, turn with looks of tender mother love, and dissolve in the curling smoke. The years that have slumbered in the old logs come forth at the touch of a familiar wand, and a soft light illumines chambers that time has sealed. The grim realities are lost in the glow of our hearth. In the dreamland of the fire we may ride noble steeds and soar on tireless pinions. We see heroes fight and fall. Cities with gilded walls and bright towers, broad landscapes, enthralling beauty, leaves of laurel on triumphant brows, majestic pageants, and acclaiming multitudes, are pictured in the flickering flames.
On the little stage under the arch of the fireplace the puppets come and go,—the comedies and the tragedies, the laughter and the sorrow. The dramas of hopes and fears are enacted in shifting pantomimes that melt away into the gloom.
Our hearth-stones are the symbols of home. We go forth to battle when their sanctity is imperilled. It would be a desolate world without our fires. Winding highways lead through them on which he who travels must mark the light and not the ruin. He must feel the glow and not the burning, and be far beyond the ashes when they come.
In the twilight, when our lives become gray, and only the embers lie before us, we can still dream, if our souls are strong. If we have learned to live with the ideals we have created, instead of charred hopes, golden visions may linger in the mellow light. Happy hours, as transient as the fitful flames, may dance again, and shine among the smouldering coals.
The grizzled old sailor, who had been fortune’s toy, and had been cast aside, may have found his solace in the visions before his fire. The pictures in it may have been of millions of wheels turnedwith the new force, myriads of aëroplanes soaring through the skies, dynamos of inexhaustible power giving heat and light, and countless looms spinning the fabrics of the world.
He may have seen himself worshipped, not for his achievement, but for his wealth, in the domain of Vulgaria, where Avarice is king—where worth is measured by dollars—where utter selfishness rules, and the cave man still dwells, veneered with a gilded tinsel of what, in his foolish pride, he thinks is civilization—where vanity parades in the guise of charity—where cruelty and greed hide under fine raiment—where human hyenas rend the weak and grovel before the strong—where the bestiality of the Hun darkens the world—where the only god is Gold, and where the idealist must fight or perish.
One night during the following spring I passed the cabin. The little structure, from which a great light might have radiated over the scientific world, was deserted. A pale, ghostly gleam was visible through the empty window frame. It might have been a phosphorescent glow from one of the decaying wall-logs, or a faint spark from the dream-fire that ever burns in the hearts of men.
“Na’cissus Jackson”
“Na’cissus Jackson”
Therewas much bustle and preparation around the fish shanty one August morning. Hoarded on a shelf of the bluff were a lot of water-worn boards, which had drifted in along the beach at various times, or been thrown up by the storms, and gradually gathered.
The old shipmates had selected suitable pieces from the pile, and were busily engaged, with hammer and saw, in building a cabin on the big boat. It was a cumbrous and unwieldy craft, about twenty feet long, with high sides and a broad beam. For years it had been used in the work of installing the pound- and gill-nets in the lake, and for the necessary visits to them when the surf was too high for the small row-boat, which was kept for ordinary use.
The long oars, with which Sipes and Saunders had so often fought the big waves, were not exactly mated, but when the detachable motor on the wide stern failed to run, navigation was stillpossible. A bowsprit had been added to the boat, and a mast protruded through the partially completed cabin. Many rusty nails and odd pieces entered into the building of the superstructure. A large square of soiled canvas and some miscellaneous cordage lay scattered about on the sand. Some scrawled lettering in red paint across the stern indicated that the boat was henceforth to be theCrawfish.
“We’r’ goin’ on a v’yage,” explained Sipes. “We’r’ goin’ ’way off up the lake, an’ we’ll touch at diff’nt ports fer some stores we gotta have, an’ then we’r’ comin’ back, an’ we’r’ goin’ to a cert’n river you know ’bout, an’ we’r’ goin’ up it. If you want to make pitchers, you c’n come ’long. We’ll stop an’ take you aboard w’en we come by with the stuff we gotta git.”
I had learned from experience that Sipes usually became reticent when questioned too closely. It was better to let him volunteer whatever he wanted to say about his own affairs. I was careful not to evince any curiosity as to the object of the river trip, and gladly accepted the invitation, as I had intended visiting the river during the fall.
The shanty was stripped of most of its small movable contents, which were put on board when the additions were completed. The nets were taken into the house and piled up. The small boat was laid on top of them along the wall, and the door fastened with a rusty padlock.
Sipes remarked, as he put the key in his pocket, that “they was always some bulgarious feller rubber’n round fer sump’n light an’ easy, that ’ud clean out that shanty if it wasn’t batt’n’d up an’ locked.”
The reincarnated craft was floated, and it sailed slowly away, with the doughty mariners giving boisterous orders to each other.
A week later I heard a loud halloo, and cries of “Wot Oh!” down on the beach opposite to my camp in the dunes. I looked over the edge of the bluff and saw theCrawfishriding proudly on the low swells. The broad sail flapped idly in the breeze, and Saunders was ensconced on top of the cabin, smoking his pipe. Sipes had waded ashore and was waiting to help get my belongings on board.
A small tent, a supply of canned goods, sketching materials, a camera, and other items were carefully stowed. My row-boat was connectedwith a line, and we were ready to start. We had only about fifteen miles to go, and expected to reach the mouth of the river about noon.
The cabin was characteristic of its builders. It was intended for use and not as an ornament. Ordinarily two could sleep in it comfortably, but the present cargo taxed its capacity. There was little ventilation when the door was closed. What fresh air there was entered through a pair of auger holes, which had evidently been bored for observation purposes. I suggested that the air inside would be better if the holes were larger, or if there were more of them, but Sipes claimed that they were large enough.
“Air c’n come in now faster’n you c’n breath it. Jest notice how much bigger them holes is than them in yer nose.” Such logic was uncombatable and the subject was changed.
The motor worked spasmodically and we sailed most of the way. The breeze died down when we were about half a mile from where the Winding River came out of the dunes. After much cranking the motor started, but would only run backwards. We turned the stern toward the river’s mouth and made fair progress.
“That’s w’y we named ’er theCrawfish,” explained Sipes. “We know’d we’d ’ave to do a lot o’ that kind o’ navigat’n’.”
We ran on to a small sand-bar, which delayed us for some time, but got off with the oars. After a hard row against the current, we entered the mouth of the river, which was not over fifty yards wide. We heard the sound of music from among the decayed ruins of a pier that extended into the lake. Seated on some chunks of broken limestone, between the rotting piles, we saw a gray-haired colored man of about sixty. He was playing “Money Musk” on a mouth organ. Near him a cane fish-pole was stuck in among the rocks, and extended out over the water. He was whiling away the time between bites with his music.
“I bet that feller ain’t no nigro,” remarked Sipes. “He looks like a white man wot’s been smoked.”
The solitary fisherman regarded us with an expectant look, as we tied up to one of the piles.
“Good mawnin’, gen’lemen! Does you-all happ’n to have sump’n to drink in yo’ boat?”
“We ain’t got nothin’ wet but wot’s leaked in. You c’n ’ave some o’ that if you want it,” Sipesreplied with some asperity. “Wot’s the matter with the lake if you’r’ thirsty?”
“Ah beg yo’ pa’don, but you-all looked like gen’lemen that might have sump’n with you. This ain’t thirst. Ah got a misery, an’ it ’curred to me you might like to save ma life. Ah ain’t had no breakfus’, an Ah feels weak.”
“Listen at that smoke,” said Sipes, in an undertone. “Wonder if ’e thinks we’r’ a float’n’ s’loon?”
Evidently discouraged over his prospects with Sipes, the old darky turned to me.
“Say, Boss, will you gimme a qua’tah, so Ah c’n go an’ git some breakfus’?”
We thought it better to give him some “breakfus’” from the boat, and, as it was lunch time, we passed part of our eatables over to him.
“Ah nevah had the pleas’ah of meet’n you gen’lemen befo’. Ma name’s Na’cissus Jackson, an’ Ah’m up heah f’om the south. Ah ce’t’nly am ’bliged to you fo’ this li’l breakfus’.”
We talked with Narcissus for some time. Evidently he was a victim of strong drink. He had drifted into prohibition territory, the extent of which he did not know, and out of which he had no financial means of escape.
“Ah’m on a dry island, Boss, an’ Ah don’t know how Ah’m goin’ to git off it. Ah was cook at the place wheah Ah wo’ked, an’ Ah got fiahed just ’cause Ah didn’t show up one mawnin’. They was goin’ to have me ’rested fo’ sump’n Ah didn’t have nuff’n to do with, an’ Ah come heah fo’ a li’l vacation.”
Sipes suggested that we ought to have a pilot to take us up the river, on account of its many sand-bars, that must have shifted since he was on it after ducks years ago.
“We oughta have somebody sett’n on top o’ the cab’n to yell out, an’ keep us from butt’n into sump’n w’en we’r’ tear’n up stream. This ain’t no canoe, an’ we got import’nt business an’ we don’t want to git stuck,” declared the old man.
“Theah’s a man ovah in the village named Cap’n Peppehs, that knows all about this rivah,” replied Narcissus. “S’pos’n you-all gimme a qua’tah, an’ Ah’ll go up an’ git Cap’n Peppehs fo’ you.”
I agreed to furnish the coveted coin if “Cap’n Peppehs” was produced, and our new-found friend took in his pole, climbed out over the rough stone filling, and departed for the village, which wasonly a short distance off. He soon reappeared, accompanied by a pompous, deep-voiced old man, with a red nose and scraggly whiskers, who looked us over with curiosity.
“My name’s Peppers. What can I do for you?” he asked in a friendly tone.
“We’r’ goin’ up the river an’ we don’t want to git messed up on no sand-bars,” replied Saunders. “If you been navigat’n’ these waters, we’d like to git you to go ’long ’til we git where we want to go.”
“If you’ll drop me off back o’ the third bend, I’ll git aboard,” said the old man. “You won’t need no pilot after that. You c’n go on up an’ not hit anythin’ but float’n snags beyond that fer three miles in that craft.”
He got into the boat. I handed Narcissus his “qua’tah,” and he picked his way back over the rocks to his fish-pole, where, like his fabled namesake, he may have found solace in the contemplation of his image in the placid water.
“Cap’n Peppehs” examined the motor with interest. “Are you goin’ to run ’er up with that?” he asked.
“Yes, if she’ll go,” replied Saunders, “but I bet she won’t. A friend of ours that peddlesfish got it some’r’s ’round ’ere, an’ turned it over to us. If we ever cetch the feller that shifted that cusséd thing onto John, we’r’ goin’ to kill ’im. We got a gun in the cab’n wot’s wait’n’ fer ’im.”
“I know sump’n ’bout them things,” said the Captain, “an’ mebbe I c’n start ’er.” He fussed over the machine for some time, and finally got it going. With the help of the oars we made fair progress against the slow current.
“You c’n go on up now an’ camp in that bunch o’ timber beyond the marsh, an’ you’ll be all right,” said the old man, when we reached the point where he was to leave us. “You’ll find a mighty fine spring up there.”
We thanked him warmly for his services. Sipes proffered the hospitality of a two-gallon jug, which he extracted from the pile of stuff in the cabin. It was eagerly accepted. He wished us good luck, and disappeared.
“That’ll make ’is nose bloom some more,” remarked Sipes. “He’s a nice ol’ feller, but wot’s springs to him? It wasn’t no green peppers ’e was named after.”
The river made many turns in its sinuous course through the marsh, and it was nearly dark whenwe reached a hard bank at the edge of the woods.
TheCrawfishwas made fast to a venerable elm, and we went ashore.
“I’ll put a couple o’ extra hitches on ’er so she can’t back off in the night, if the gas bug takes a notion to git busy,” said Saunders, as he took another line ashore from the stern.
It was warm and pleasant, and we decided that no shelter would be necessary that night. We built a small fire against the side of a log, fried some bacon in a skillet, made coffee, and fared well, if not sumptuously, with supplies from the boat.
We sat around and talked until quite late. The object of the expedition was revealed by Saunders.
“They was a feller that come to the bogie-house one night w’en they was a big storm that ’ad come up sudd’n. He’d come from the lake, an’ it was blowin’ so hard that it ’ud take hair off a frog. He’d started on a long trip with a little boat. He had one o’ them cusséd motors like wot we got, an’ it went punk, an’ ’e had an awful time git’n’ in alive. He seen my light an’ come up. I didn’t ’ear ’im til ’e knocked, so I didn’t ’ave nochance to spring the ghost on ’im. W’en I seen the mess ’e was in, I took ’im in an’ fed ’im an’ dried ’im out ’fore the fire.
“He seemed to be a scientific feller, an’ ’e told me a lot about the rivers all over the country. He said that durin’ the fall ’is business was to go ’round an’ buy pearls wot fishers got out o’ them fresh-water clams that’s all over the bottoms o’ the rivers. He’d pay ’em good prices. He said the pearls ’ad thin layers on ’em, like onions, an’ sometimes one would look like it was no good. Then ’e’d take a steel thing an’ peel off the outside skin, an’ sometimes ’e’d git one that way that was wuth five hundred dollars. Then ’e said they was button companies that ’ud buy all the shells o’ the clams, so they was a lot o’ money in it, even if they wasn’t no pearls found. He had a little pearl in ’is pocket that ’e’d peeled. It wasn’t a very good one—prob’ly wuth three er four dollars. He gave it to me fer bein’ good to ’im, an’ ’ere it is.”
The old sailor carefully unrolled a small piece of paper, which he took out of his tobacco pouch, and produced the pearl.
“This feller gimme a little book that didn’t’ave no cover on, that’s sent out by the gov’ment, an’ it tells all about clam fish’n’, an’ how to make drag-hooks, an’ how to rig ’em, an’ drag ’em, an’ all about it.”
He brought out the interesting pamphlet, with the address of the giver written in pencil on one of the margins.
“The next mornin’ I helped the feller put wot was left o’ his boat an’ motor up in the bogie-house, an’ ’e went off through the woods. He said ’e’d come back some day an’ git ’em.
“Invent’n’s no good. We gotta git sump’n we c’n git a big bunch o’ money out of. Fish’n’s git’n’ to be too hard work fer us. They’s slews o’ wealth in this water, an’ we’r’ goin’ to git it out an’ we won’t ’ave to work no more. We didn’t say nothin’ to nobody. John come ’round an’ we told ’im, but ’e’s all right. This whole thing’s a dark secret. It’s all right fer you to know, but we gotta keep still, er the place’ll be full o’ flatboats an’ the pearls’ll be gone. Sipes an’ me’s seen where the mushrats ’as been pilin’ the shells ’round them little places where they got holes in the banks, an’ out’n the marsh where their houses are, w’en we was down ’ere duck-shoot’n’. Ifthem little beasties c’n git ’em, we c’n mop out the whole river with all that tackle that the book tells about.”
“The fust thing we gotta do, after we git a flatboat built, is to git some heavy wire fer them clam drags,” said Sipes. “We c’n go back to the railroad an’ git some out between them telegraph poles. The wire don’t cost them fellers nothin’, an’ it’s better we should ’ave it. Tomorrer we’ll rig up a reg’lar camp, an’ then we’ll go to work on all the things we gotta git ready so we c’n begin devastat’n them clamsies.”
The old man then went over to the boat for the jug. He set it down and began working the cork out with his knife.
“I don’t do much drink’n’, but me an’ Bill’s git’n’ old, an’ we’r’ in a my-larious country, an’ we gotta have grog once an’ aw’ile.”
Just as the cork came out, we heard a rustle of dead leaves on the ground back of us.
“Good evenin’, gen’lemen!” greeted Narcissus Jackson, as he appeared out of the darkness, and walked deferentially up to the fire. “Fine evenin’, ain’t it?”
“Youbetit’s a fine evenin’!” exclaimed Sipes,with freezing politeness. “How fur off did you smell this jug from?”
“Ah just thought Ah’d drop ’round an’ see how you gen’lemen was get’n’ ’long. Ah come up in a li’l boat I got offen Cap’n Peppehs. Ah saw yo’ fiah, an’ Ah just come to pay ma respec’s. Is you-all well an’ puffec’ly comfo’ble up heah? How’s you feel’n’, Mr. Sipes? Seem’s like you had a li’l cold this mawnin’.”
“I’m better, but ‘Ah feels weak,’” quoted Sipes, with biting sarcasm.
“Ah ce’t’nly am glad to heah yo’ voice again,” continued Narcissus. “It’s a long tia’some row up heah, an Ah ce’t’nly am glad to find you gen’lemen all sit’n’ so comfo’ble ’round yo’ li’l fiah.”
The veiled appeal was irresistible. Sipes handed over the jug and cup, after he and Saunders had been “refreshed,” and he had pitied my teetotalism with a patronizing glance.
“That’s aniceli’l tin cup, an’ that’s an awful pretty shaped jug,” observed our unexpected visitor, as he affectionately watched the red liquid trickle out. “Pa’don me, but Ah always closes ma eyes when Ah take ma li’l drink, ’cause if Ah don’t, ma mouth watahs so it weak’ns mawhiskey.” The contents of the cup instantly vanished.
We were about ready to make our arrangements for the night when Narcissus appeared. Fortunately my own supplies included a lot of mosquito netting. I got it out and he promptly offered to help. He deftly improvised an effective covering with the netting and some sticks that excited the admiration of all of us.
“If you’d git toughed up, an’ raise a face o’ whiskers, them skeets wouldn’t chase after you,” observed Sipes.
Narcissus sat on a log and did not seem inclined to go away.
“Say, Boss, will you lemme have a qua’tah to get ma breakfus’ with in the mawnin’?” he asked humbly.
The request was cheerfully complied with. I really liked Narcissus. His interesting face, winning personality, and happy-go-lucky ways appealed to my sense of the picturesque. It occurred to me that if the jug could be eliminated from the situation, he would be a valuable addition to the camp. I invited him to stay all night and have breakfast with us in the morning.
When Sipes heard the invitation accepted, he went down to the boat to satisfy himself that Saunders had locked the door when he had returned the jug to the cabin.
In the morning Narcissus volunteered to prepare our simple breakfast. He did it with such skill that we realized that our own cooking was crude and amateurish.
During the forenoon I had a long talk with him. He was stranded and would like to stay with us if we were willing. For a moderate stipend he agreed to do the cooking and make himself generally useful.
I did not wish to intrude too much on the old shipmates, and, as I wanted to be alone much of the time, and do some sketching along the river, I established my camp about a hundred yards further up on the same side of the stream. This I judged to be near enough for sociability, and far enough for privacy. Narcissus helped erect my tent, and made many ingenious arrangements for my work and comfort.
The old sailors became so enthusiastic over his cooking that they were glad to have him down with them most of the time. The sail had beentaken off the boat, and a “lean-to” tent rigged between two trees, where they all slept.
“You jest watch that cookie coin pancakes!” exclaimed Sipes. “He jest whisks up the dope in the pan, an’ gives ’em a couple o’ flops, an’ they all come to pieces in yer mouth ’fore ye begin chewin’.”
He seemed to anticipate all our wants. He had evidently overheard what Sipes had said about telegraph wire, and the second morning afterward there was about a hundred feet of it in camp, with a pair of heavy wire-nippers, and other tools used by repair men on the lines, which he said he had found. The next night he came in with a half-grown turkey, which he claimed he had found dead in a fence, where it had caught its neck on the barbed wire. The unfortunate bird was roasted to a beautiful brown, and I noticed that the feathers were carefully burned.
The aspect of affairs was getting serious. I took Narcissus in hand and subjected him to a thorough cross-examination. I told him that we wanted to pay for anything we used, and that he positively must not find any more young turkeys in wire fences. The telegraph wire incident wasperplexing. He declared that this stuff had been abandoned, and was far from the railroad. The fact that the tools and wire were somewhat rusty seemed to lend some slight color of truth to his statement, but we finally understood each other as to the rule to be followed in the future.
A cash allowance was made for the fresh vegetables, eggs, fruit, and other supplies, which he was instructed to buy around in the back country and along the river. I hoped later to discover the owner of the ill-fated turkey.
The old shipmates worked industriously. They took theCrawfishdown the river to the village twice, and returned with cargos of second-hand lumber, with which they constructed a flatboat about ten feet long by six wide. Supports were put at the four corners, and railings nailed to the tops. They rigged a strong pole, the length of the platform, along which they attached four-foot wires eight inches apart. At the ends of these were the four-pronged clam-hooks. Lines ran from the ends of the pole to a centre rope, by means of which the device was attached to the flatboat and dragged in the river. When the hooks came in contact with the unsuspecting mollusks,lying open on the bottom, they were to close their shells on them tightly, and thus their fate would be sealed. When the pole was pulled out sideways, with the big rope, the bivalves would hang on its fringe of dangling wires, like grapes on pendant vines.
Our “cookie” was assiduous in his camp duties. He procured some flat stones, which he skilfully piled so as to confine his fire. Heavy stakes were driven into the ground, and another laid across, with its ends in the forked tops. The cross-piece supported the iron kettle, with which he performed mysterious feats of cookery. He improvised a broiler with some of the telegraph wire, and baked delicious bread and biscuits in a reflecting oven, made of a piece of old sheet-iron. He was very resourceful. From somewhere beyond the confines of the dark forest he obtained materials for menus that exceeded our fondest hopes.
He spent a great deal of time off by himself, and would often drop around where I happened to be sketching. We had many confidential talks. He confessed that drink was his besetting sin. He had generally been able to get good jobs, butinvariably lost them when he drank. Some day he was “goin’ to sweah off fo’ good.” The poor fellow was floating wreckage on that poison stream of alcohol that our false conception of economics permits to exist. It was battering another derelict along the rocks that line its sinister shores.
He had attached himself to us like a stray dog. His moral sense had been blunted by his infirmity, but, under proper influences, his reclamation was possible. Narcissus was a strong argument in favor of compulsory prohibition, for he was beyond his own help.
The old shipmates agreed with me that he ought to be kept away from temptation as much as possible, “spesh’ly,” said Sipes, “as we ain’t got none too much in the jug. It ain’t fit fer nobody that’s under sixty-seven. Young fellers oughta let that stuff alone. They git filled up with it an’ it runs down in their legs an’ floats their feet off.”
Narcissus’s ancestry was mixed. He had some white blood, and one of his grandfathers was an Indian. Though the African characteristics predominated, there were traces of both the white man and the Indian in his face. It may havebeen a remnant of Indian instinct—a mysterious call of the blood—that lured him to the dune country, where the red men were once happy, when he got into trouble. Possibly it was the sixth sense of the Indian that led him up the river to the jug, on the night of our arrival, or, as Sipes remarked, “mebbe the perfumery got out through the cork an’ drifted over ’im w’en ’e was roostin’ on them rocks.”
He cooked some carp, which he had caught in the river, and was much disappointed when we found them unpalatable. The following evening he compounded a delicious sauce, with which he camouflaged the despised fish almost beyond recognition, but their identity was unmistakable. Sipes declared that “the dope on them carps is fine, but I don’t like wot it’s mixed with.” He ate the sauce and threw his piece of fish out among the trees. The next morning he saw a crow drop down and eat it.
“That ol’ bird’s been through enough to know better’n that,” he remarked.
The fish that came to us from the land of the Hun, and now infests our inland waters, has little to commend it. It is objectionable whereverit exists. It breeds immoderately, eats the spawn of respectable fish, and begrimes the pure waters with its hog-like rooting along the weedy bottoms. It is of inferior food value and pernicious. No means of exterminating these noxious aliens have been discovered. Like the Huns, they have all of the instincts of marauding swine, without their redeeming qualities.
“These heah cahp ah funny fish,” said Narcissus. “A gen’leman tol’ me a few yeahs ago of a cahp that was caught in the Mississippi rivah that was ve’y la’ge. They opened ’im an’ found a gold watch an’ chain that ’e’d swallowed, an’ the watch was tickin’ when they took it out, an’ theah was a cha’m on the chain, an’ inside the cha’m was a li’l pict’ah of a young lady. The young man that caught the cahp found that young lady an’ theah was a wedd’n. Of co’se Ah didn’t see the watch, er the young man, but that was the tale Ah hea’d. Theah’s been some awful wonde’ful things happened down on that Mississippi rivah.”
“Gosh! if them Dutch fish ’ave got timepieces in ’em, mebbe we better pursue ’em instid o’ clams,” remarked Sipes. “Them carps c’n live on landpretty near as well as they do in water. They’r’ like mudturkles. Bill an’ me seen a big one once’t, that was in a little puddle on some land that ’ad been flowed over. We thought prob’ly the water’d gone down an’ left ’im stranded. His back stuck out o’ the puddle an’ was all dry an’ caked with mud. Mebbe he’d been out devastat’n’ the country fer watches an’ jools, er sump’n, in the night, an’ ’ad jest stopped at that hole fer a little rest on ’is way back.”
We spent many interesting evenings around the old shipmates’ camp fire. Sipes and Saunders related marvellous tales of the sea. Narcissus told many ornate yarns that he had picked up during his checkered life, and sang negro revival songs and plantation melodies. The bleached skeleton of some animal in the woods had provided him with material for two pairs of “bones,” with which he was an adept. His mouth organ was a source of much entertainment. Sipes’s favorite was “Money Musk,” the merry jingle that came over the water when we entered the river, and he often asked Narcissus to “play that cash-money tune some more.”
When the clam-boat was completed, and fullyrigged with its paraphernalia, it was pushed out into the slow current. It was controlled with the oars from theCrawfish. The pole, with its pendant wires, was dropped over the side, and actual operations began. A bench had been erected in the middle of the rude craft, before which Sipes stood, flourishing a stubby knife, ready to open the mollusks and remove their precious contents. He had a small red tin tobacco box, with a hinged cover, which he intended to fill with pearls the first day.
“Let’s pull ’er up now,” he suggested, after the flatboat had drifted about a hundred feet downstream. Saunders lifted in the tackle. Two victims dangled on the wires.
“Gosh, this is easy! Gimme them clams!” They were eagerly opened, but careful scrutiny revealed no pearls. “I guess them damn Dutch fish ’ave got ’em, like they did that watch Cookie told about. Heave ’er over an’ we’ll try ’er ag’in, Bill.”
The first day’s work was fruitless, as were many that followed. The clam-hooks frequently got snagged, and seemed to bring up everything but pearls. Once an angry snapping-turtle wasthrown back. An enormous catfish, whose meditations on the bottom had been violently disturbed, was pulled to the surface, but escaped.
“Mebbe we’ll cetch a billy-goat if this keeps up,” remarked Sipes.
The old men toiled on with dogged persistence. One Sunday morning an aged bivalve was pulled up and a pearl, over three-eighths of an inch in diameter, fell out on the bench when Sipes’s knife struck the inside of the shell.
“Hoo-ray!!! Here she is!” he yelled.
“Be quiet, y’ol’ miser! Gimme that,” commanded Saunders.
He examined it closely and compared it with the one the wrecked pearl-buyer had given him.
“How much d’ye think that onion-skinner’d give us fer that?” asked Sipes, anxiously.
“It’s about three times as big, an’ it’s rounder. It oughta be wuth fifteen er twenty dollars,” replied Saunders, as he put it with the other specimen and rolled it up in the soiled paper.
“Here, Bill, you can’t do that! Gimme that jool. It’s gotta go in the box.” Saunders surrendered the pearl, and Sipes carefully put it where it belonged.
“We ain’t goin’ to fuss with no button companies, w’en we c’n find them things,” declared Sipes, as he kicked the pile of empty shells overboard. “That ain’t no money fer a jool like that. Wot are you talk’n’ about? You don’t know nothin’ ’bout pearls. I bet it’s wuth a thousand dollars right now, an’ mebbe it’ll be wuth two thousand if we git that feller to peel it. I bet all them jools has to be peeled.”
That part of the pearl-buyer’s talk with Saunders that related to the removal of the layers, and the comparison of a pearl’s structure with that of an onion, had strongly impressed Sipes, and he generally referred to him as “the onion-skinner.”
During the rest of the day he shook the box frequently to assure himself that the pearl was still there.
Various “slugs,” pearls of irregular shape and of little value, were found during the next week, and the increasing spoil was gloated over at night.
Narcissus was sometimes added to the working force on the flatboat, which was taken up stream as far as the depth permitted, for a fresh start.
“We’r’ goin’ to drag this ol’ river from stem to gudgeon,” declared Sipes. “W’en we git through the mushrats’ll have a tough time hustl’n’ fer food. We’ll git back in the marsh where the big clams stay in them open places ’mong the splatter-docks, where all them lily-flowers grow, an’ we’ll git some jools that it won’t do to drop on yer foot. I seen a clam in the marsh once’t that was over eight inches long, an’ I bet ’e was a hundred years old.”
One night Narcissus tied his little boat to a tree near the spring. He left some fresh vegetables in it, which he had procured up the river. In the morning it was discovered that the boat had been visited. The unknown caller had eaten most of the supplies. Fragments were scattered about, but no tracks were visible. A pile of green corn and some melons met the same fate a few nights afterward, and Sipes decided to ambush the visitor.
He lay on his stomach in the dark, with his gun beside him, and waited. About midnight he heard splashing in the shallow water along the bank, and, a moment later, the dim light revealed a spotted cow helping herself liberally to the contentsof the boat. Evidently she had forded the river somewhere up stream, and had accidentally found a welcome base of supplies.
“Come ’ere, Spotty!” Sipes called softly, as he cautiously advanced. The friendly marauder did not seem at all alarmed, and submitted peacefully to the coil of anchor rope that was taken from the bottom of the boat and gently slipped over her horns. She was led out of the water and tied to a tree. Sipes procured a tin pail at the camp, and “Spotty” yielded of her abundance.
There was cream for our coffee the next day. Spotty was nowhere visible. The old man had conducted her into the woods and “anchored ’er,” with a stake and a long rope, in a hidden glade, where there was plenty of grass.
The following evening we were enjoying our pipes, while Narcissus was cleaning up after a delicious dinner. An old man with a heavy hickory cane hobbled into camp. His unkempt white beard nearly reached his waist. His shoulders were bent with age. He appeared to be over eighty.
“Hello, Ancient!” was Sipes’s cheery greeting, as the patriarch came up to the fire.
“Good evenin’!” responded the visitor. “How’s the clam fish’n’?”
“Jest so-so,” replied Saunders. “Have a seat.”
He gave the old man a box, with an improvised back, to sit on, and, after a few remarks about the weather, our caller explained that he had lost a cow, and wondered if we had seen anything of her.
“Wot kind of a look’n’ anamile was she?” inquired Sipes.
“Gray, with a lot o’ black spots on ’er. One horn bent out forrads, an’ the other was twisted back, an’ she had a short tail. She’s been roamin’ in the woods a good deal lately, an’ last night she didn’t come home. I thought I’d come down this way an’ see if I could locate ’er.”
“I seen a cow like that yisterd’y,” replied the culprit. “She was over on the other side o’ the river, an’ come down to drink. She prob’ly mosies ’round nights like that ’cause she’s restluss. Her tail’s bobbed an’ she can’t switch away the skeets. She’ll prob’ly show up all right.”
“Yes, I s’pose she will. Guess I won’t worry about ’er.” The visitor’s eyes wandered about the camp. I had noticed a small brown turkeyfeather on the ground, near where Sipes sat, but that wily strategist had deftly slipped it into his side pocket.
Evidently the industry on the river had been duly observed by the scattered dwellers in the back country, for our caller seemed to know all about us. He understood that I was “drawin’ scenes ’round ’ere.” Possibly some unknown observer had, at some time, come near enough to see what I was doing, and noislessly retreated.