FRIENDS AFLOAT
Toby saw no more of Arnold for a week, for school kept him busy, but
Mr. Tucker reported that the _Frolic_ had twice been to the wharf for
gasoline and that on each occasion her skipper had inquired for him.
School came to end for the summer that Friday and Toby brought his
books home to his little slanting-walled room with a sigh of relief.
He didn’t mind studying, for he wanted to learn things, but since the
really warm weather had set in, lessons had been a task indeed. One
thing, though, that he could congratulate himself on was that he was
now through grammar school and next fall would start in at high school
over at Johnstown. As long as the weather would allow it, he meant to
make the trip back and forth in the _Turnover_, a matter of three miles
from landing to landing.
When the ice came he would have to walk to Riverport, a good two miles,
and take the train there for Johnstown, and that wouldn’t be quite
so pleasant. Toby’s ambition, though it was as yet not very strong,
was to some day take hold of Tucker’s Boat Yard and make it as big
and busy and successful as it once had been. But Toby’s father didn’t
give him much encouragement. Boat-building at Greenhaven, he declared
pessimistically, had had its day. Launches had taken the place of
honest sailboats, and there were too many launch-makers in that part of
the world. There was no money in it any longer; just a living, and a
bare one at that. Toby thought he knew better, but he didn’t argue it.
There was time enough yet.
In another four years, when he had learned all they had to teach him at
the Johnstown High School, and he was very, very wise, perhaps he would
take hold of the business and show his father that there was still
money to be made in it. Of course, Toby had not figured out just how he
was to do it. There was time enough for that, too!
He and Arnold had their next meeting Saturday morning, a week almost to
the minute after their first. Toby had taken some provisions around to
a houseboat moored in Nobbs Bay, on the other side of Spanish Harbor,
and was chugging lazily back in the _Turnover_, when from across the
water a faint hail reached him. A quarter of a mile away a figure stood
on the new steel pier that extended into the bay at the end of Spanish
Head, and Toby, shading his eyes, recognized Arnold Deering. Since
his errand had been accomplished and there was no more work in sight
just then, he turned the launch toward the landing and was soon within
talking distance. The _Frolic_ was lying beside the float there, in
company with a cedar skiff, and a brilliantly blue canoe rested, keel
up, on the planks.
“Hello, Tucker!” called Arnold in friendly fashion. “Where are you
going?”
“Nowhere much. I took some grub to that houseboat in there. Going out
in the launch?” Toby slid the _Turnover_ up to the end of the float and
Arnold came down the sloping gangplank.
“I don’t know. Maybe I will.” He held the _Turnover_ to the landing
with one rubber-soled shoe on the gunwale. “Say, I met your father the
other day.”
“He told me.”
“He’s awfully nice, isn’t he?”
Toby considered. Finally: “Yes,” he said. “He takes after me.”
Arnold laughed. “Say, you must have thought I was an awful fresh chump
the other day,” he said apologetically. “I’m sorry I was so peevish.”
He smiled reminiscently. “Fact is, you know, I was mad because I’d made
such a mess of that landing.”
“I guess we were both sort of fresh,” answered Toby. “Want to go out in
a good boat?”
“Yes.” Arnold leaped aboard. “Your father said you’d made this
yourself.”
“Most of it. I made the hull, but dad and Long Tim――he works for
dad――helped me a lot with the lockers and so on.”
“I should think you’d be mighty proud of it,” said the other
admiringly. “I would. How did you happen to call her the _Turnover_?”
Toby explained as he started off, and Arnold laughed appreciatively.
“That would be a better name for my canoe,” he said. “She turned over
with me the other day about a half-mile out there and I had to swim all
the way in with her. There’s too much chop around here for canoeing.”
“Which way do you want to go?” asked Toby. “Ever been over to
Johnstown?”
“No, Frank and I started for there last Saturday, the day we broke
down.”
“How did you happen to stop the launch out there, anyway? Were you
going to fish?”
Arnold nodded. “Yes, Frank said there’d be cod there. Then after we’d
got the anchor over we found we’d forgotten to bring any bait.”
“Cod!” laughed Toby. “I guess a sea robin or a sculpin would have been
about all you’d have caught. Who is this fellow Lamson?”
“He lives on the other side over there. He goes to school where I do.”
“Do you like him?”
“Like him?” Arnold had to consider that. “N-no, not a lot, I guess. Do
you?”
“Not so far. He looks all the time as if he’d swallowed something that
didn’t agree with him. And he pretty nearly said I had red hair!”
“Say, I’m sorry I said anything about――about your hair,” said Arnold
contritely. “It was beastly rude.”
“Well, I’m sort of touchy about that,” replied Toby. “Of course my hair
is――er――I mean when you look at it a certain way it does seem a little
bit inclined to be reddish. It isn’t really red, you know, but it――it
has a sort of tinge! Lots of fellows make mistakes about it. The first
year I was in grammar school I was all the time――er――showing fellows
how mistaken they were.”
“The same way you showed me?” inquired Arnold slyly.
Toby nodded, and smiled gently. “About like that. Of course, I don’t
mind a joke, you know. Folks I like can call me red-headed all they
want to. But I don’t seem to care for it from strangers.”
“I see. I won’t ever say anything like that again,” Arnold assured him.
Toby gazed intently toward the island sliding past them to port. “I
wouldn’t care if you did――now,” he murmured. “If I like a fellow”――his
voice dwindled off into silence.
“All the more reason I shouldn’t,” said Arnold. “If I like a fellow I
don’t want to hurt his feelings.”
“No, but――when you like a fellow you don’t mind what he says,” returned
Toby. His eyes sought Arnold’s face for an instant and then returned to
the island. “You can call me Red-head if you want to. I wouldn’t care.”
“I guess I’d rather call you by your real name,” laughed Arnold. “I
would if I was sure of it. Is it Toby?”
“Yes. Funny sort of a name, isn’t it? Tobias it is when it’s all there.
Dad got it out of the Bible. All the male Tuckers have Bible names.
Dad’s is Aaron. When he was a kid the boys used to call him ‘Big A,
little a, r, o, n!’ His father’s name was Jephthah; Captain Jeph, they
called him. I’m glad they didn’t tag me with that name!”
“I think Toby’s a rather jolly name,” said Arnold reflectively. “I like
it better than Arnold.”
“I don’t. Arnold’s got a lot of style to it; sounds like it was out of
a story. What do the fellows at school call you?”
“Arn, usually. Say, this boat can travel, can’t she? How fast is she
going?”
“About ten, I guess; maybe eleven.” Toby advanced the throttle as far
as it would go, listened and pushed it back a little. “She misses if I
give her too much gas.”
“Seems to me she goes faster than the _Frolic_.”
“She’s smaller and you’re nearer the water. That makes her seem to go
faster. There’s the landing ahead. Want to go in?”
“No, let’s just knock around, unless you’ve got something to do.”
“I haven’t as long as I stay away from home,” replied Toby dryly. “Say,
what school do you go to in winter?”
“Yardley Hall.”
“Where’s that?”
“Wissining, Connecticut.” Arnold waved a hand vaguely toward the west.
“Over there on the other side of the Sound. Ever hear of it?”
Toby shook his head. “I don’t know much about schools. It’s a boarding
school, isn’t it?”
“Yes, and it’s a dandy. I wish you could see it. Where do you go, Toby?”
“Me? Next year I’m going to high school here at Johnstown. You can
almost see the building. It’s about a mile up from the landing there,
near where you see that white steeple. I’d rather go to a boarding
school, though. It must be lots of fun. What do you do?”
So for the next half-hour, while the _Turnover_, slowed down to a
four-mile gait, rocked and swayed over the sunlit waters of the bay,
Arnold recited the glories of Yardley Hall School and told of football
and baseball and hockey battles and of jolly times in hall. Perhaps
Arnold drew rather a one-sided picture of life at Yardley, omitting
mention of such things as study and discipline and the periodical
examinations, but that was only natural, for he was proud of Yardley
and wanted to make it as alluring as possible. Toby listened intently,
questioning now and then, because many of Arnold’s references were
quite unintelligible to him, and, when Arnold had reached the end of
his subject, sighed wistfully.
“My, wouldn’t I like that!” he exclaimed. “Are the other fellows nice?
I suppose they’re mostly all swells like you, aren’t they?”
“I’m not a ‘swell,’ thank you! There are all sorts of fellows at
Yardley, though. I guess the kind you call ‘swells’ are pretty few.
Lots of them are just poor fellows――――”
“Like me,” interpolated Toby.
“I didn’t mean that!”
“Oh, I don’t mind. I am poor, you know. I mean dad is. We used to have
a little money, when the boat yard was more――more flourishing, but
nowadays we just sort of scrape along. That’s why I couldn’t go to
boarding school. It would cost too much money. I’d like to, though.
Say, wouldn’t I just!” Toby’s face lighted. Then he laughed. “I guess
it wouldn’t do, though, because I’d have to fight half the school for
calling me red-headed!”
“You’d have your hands full then. We’ve got about three hundred
fellows.”
Toby shook his head sadly. “I wouldn’t last, then, would I? The only
thing I could do would be to dye my hair black. Do you have to study
very hard?”
“Yes, we do,” answered Arnold, frankly. “Especially in fourth and third
classes.”
“What’s your class?”
“I’ll be in third next year. Last year was my first. Say, wouldn’t it
be great if you could get your father to let you come to Yardley?”
“Yes, it would be dandy,” answered Toby, smiling wryly. “And I can see
him doing it! How much does it cost, anyway? Say it slow, will you, so
it won’t sound so much?”
“Well, the tuition’s only a hundred――――”
“Is that all?” asked Toby carelessly. “Would they take a check for it?
Go ahead. What else do you have to pay for?”
“Room and board, of course. That costs from two hundred to three
hundred and fifty, according to your room.”
“Well, I’d want a nice room, of course; one with a southern exposure
and hard and soft water. How much would I have to pay for storing my
automobile?”
“Don’t be an idiot,” laughed Arnold. “That isn’t an awful lot of money,
is it?”
“No, indeed! Oh, no! But I suppose there’d be extras, wouldn’t there?
Maybe I’d have to tip the principal and the teachers, eh?”
“You’d have to pay five dollars a year as an athletic assessment, and
pay for your washing and your books. Books don’t cost much. You can get
second-hand ones usually if you want to.”
“I guess not!” exclaimed Toby indignantly. “Nothing cheap for Tobias
Tucker! Well, I’ll figure it up and think it over. But say, honest now,
do all boarding schools cost like this one of yours?”
“I don’t know, but I guess they’re about the same. Some cost you more,
maybe.”
“Where could I find one of those? I’d hate to get settled at your
school and then find there was a more expensive one! That would pretty
nearly break my heart, it would so! Well, maybe we’d better be getting
back. I suppose you’ve got to polish your diamonds yet.”
“Shut up,” said Arnold, shortly. “If you talk like that I’ll――I’ll call
you ‘Carrots’!”
“Better not,” chuckled Toby. “The last time you did it it cost you two
dollars! Calling me names is expensive!”
“What are you going to do until lunch time?” asked the other, as Toby
headed back toward the Deerings’ landing.
“Me? Oh, I guess I’ll go back to Perkins & Howe’s and see if they’ve
got any more jobs. I made a half-dollar taking that stuff to the
houseboat.” He pulled the coin from his pocket and exhibited it. Arnold
observed it interestedly.
“I suppose,” he said thoughtfully, “a half-dollar seems a lot bigger if
you make it yourself.”
“Oh, I didn’t make this,” said Toby innocently. “I just earned it. It’s
a regular half-dollar.” He flipped it in the air to let it fall on
the seat beside him in proof of his assertion, and it did just as he
intended it should, up to the point when it struck against the wood.
After that it acted most inconsiderately, for, having landed on its
edge, it flew up again and described a graceful curve over the gunwale.
“Grab it!” yelled Arnold. Toby made a frantic clutch for it, but his
hand closed emptily and the coin disappeared into the green water of
Great Peconic Bay!
There was a moment of deep silence during which the occupants of the
launch gazed at each other in surprised consternation. Then:
“I’m awfully sorry,” murmured Arnold.
A slow smile spread over Toby’s face. “So am I,” he replied,
cheerfully. “But that’s what I get for being foolish. I mean that’s
what I don’t get. Well, maybe I earned it too easily, anyhow. I guess
a quarter would have been enough for that job. It puts me back fifty
cents, though, toward getting to Yardley Hall, doesn’t it?”
“Look here,” began Arnold shyly, “I wish you’d let me――――” His hand
moved tentatively toward his pocket. “It was partly my fault,
anyway――――”
“Yes, you rocked the boat,” answered Toby gravely. Then he broke into
a hearty laugh. “Say, Arnold, you and I will have this old bay just
choked up with money if we keep on! They’ll have to begin and dredge
it first thing we know. There’s two and a half already, and here it is
only the first of July!”