behind. He broached again and took a good look astern where they flew
along behind him. Then with redoubled speed he tore through the inner
line of breaking water, and before Samuels could grab the hatchet to
cut loose, his boat rose upon a crested breaker and plunged headlong
over into the trough beyond, pulling the assistant through, and almost
swamping him. It was now too late to let go. Ahead was another wall of
rising water which would break in an instant, and the only thing to do
was to go on and trust to the boat’s riding over it all right. To turn
the slightest, one side or the other, meant to be rolled over in the
rush of foam.
Samuels held on grimly. Once outside he hoped to haul line and come to
close quarters with the devil. Then he would deal with him in a more
satisfactory manner. That long lance would be brought into play, and
the fight would be with the odds upon his side. But he had reckoned
somewhat hastily with this outcast of the ocean. All the fearless
cunning of the sea-scavenger was being brought into play. The pain
in his side where the iron held was making him more and more savage.
He saw it was useless to run away, for the iron held his pursuers to
him. He had only intended to make a short run at the beginning, and
then turn to meet whatever there was in the shape of a foe. There was
little fear in his make-up. The sudden alarm at the stroke of the iron
was merely the natural instinct of the wild creature to keep out of
harm’s way. He had intended to come back and try his hand with the
small craft, only he would not run into unknown trouble. It would be
wiser to take things easy and approach the matter slowly, watching a
good chance to make a rush in when a fitting opportunity occurred. But
because he would go slow he would be none the less implacable. He had
never withdrawn from a fight yet, and his peculiar tenacity had more
than once brought him off victor when the odds were against him. He
was wary--an old wary fighter who began the struggle slowly only to
learn the forces opposed to him. When the issue was well begun he would
break forth in a fury unequaled in any other denizen of the ocean. The
continual pain of the pulling-iron was now goading him into a condition
of frenzied fury. In a moment he would turn, just as soon as he had
the small craft well into the foaming water, where he knew it would be
difficult to navigate.
Samuels had thought of the ray’s probable run for shoal water, and
dreaded coming up with him in the surf. He could not turn his small
boat broadside to the breakers without getting rolled over and swamped,
and his oars would be useless to pull clear with the iron fast. He
hoped the ray would make for the bottom in the deep water beyond
and pull him through. Just as the outer breaker rose ahead the line
suddenly slacked.
This was what Samuels dreaded most, and he began to haul in hand over
hand. Instead, however, of the line leading ahead, it suddenly let
off to starboard, and he was forced to let it go and take to his oars
to keep the boat’s head to the sea that was now upon her. He called
to the new keeper, who let go the line between the boats, to take out
his oars also. Both now headed straight for the crest, which instantly
broke over them, half filling Samuels’ craft and settling her almost
to the gunwales. At that moment the line came taut with a jerk. It
swung the boat’s head off broadside to the sea, and the next minute the
breaker rolled her over and over. As it did so a giant form rose like a
huge bat from the foam with mouth agape and flukes extended, its tail
stretching out behind, and the line from the harpoon trailing. Down it
came with a crash which resounded above the roar of the surf, and the
boat disappeared from view.
Samuels had by good luck been thrown clear of the craft when the sea
struck, and his head appeared a fathom distant just as the devil
crashed down. It was a close call. Then, as the half-sinking boat
returned slowly, bottom up, to the surface, he made for it with all
speed.
Beside it floated the long wooden handle of the lance, the blade
resting upon the bottom a fathom below. He seized it as he grasped the
keel, and calling for the keeper in the other boat to look out, he
made ready for the devil’s return, for the line was not pulling the
boat away, showing that the slack had not been taken up, and that the
creature was still close by.
He was not wrong in this. The huge devil swerved almost as soon as he
disappeared below the surface and headed back again slowly to where the
boat lay in the foam of the breaker. He kept close to the bottom and
came like a shadow over the sand.
The sun was shining brightly and objects could be seen easily. Samuels
soon made out a dark object creeping up from the side where the ray
had gone down. The water was hardly over his head when the seas broke,
and between them it was not more than four and a half feet deep. He
could keep his head out and his feet upon the sand until the rising
crest would lift him clear, when, by holding to the upturned boat’s
keel, he could keep his head out until the breaker had passed, the tide
setting him rapidly towards the deeper water inside the bar.
The keeper in the other boat saw the shadow and called out, at the same
time getting a harpoon ready and resting upon his oars. The smooth
between breakers gave both a good chance to note the position of the
approaching monster.
The sea-devil came slowly up, his eyes showing through the clear water
and the line from the iron trailing behind him. When within a couple of
fathoms he made a sudden rush at the capsized boat.
The new keeper threw his iron well. It landed fairly in the top of the
broad back and sank deep, but it did not in the least stop the savage
rush. The huge bulk rose to the surface at the instant the iron struck
and came straight for Samuels, who held the lance ready in one hand and
clung to the keel of his boat with the other. He drove the long, sharp
weapon a full two feet into the monster’s vitals and then ducked behind
the sunken gunwale to avoid the teeth.
There was a terrific commotion in the sea. The devil bit savagely at
Samuels’ arm, but missed it, his teeth coming upon the gunwale of the
boat and shearing out a piece. Then he gave a tremendous rush upon the
craft and drove it before him until it disappeared under the surface.
The great ray smote the sea with his flukes and strove after his prey,
but the lance was firmly planted in him, and, try as he might, he could
get no nearer than the length of the handle to the keeper, for with
this grasped firmly in both hands Samuels went below the surface only
to get his foothold again and reappear to be driven along before the
furious creature.
Meanwhile the new keeper came hauling line from the rear. There
was a smooth between the seas, and he pulled the boat close to the
floundering devil before he knew what was taking place. Then, with
three irons ready, he drove one after the other in quick succession
into the monster. Taken from the rear in this manner the devil whirled
about. His barbed spear in his tail he drove with accuracy at the form
in the boat, striking the keeper in the thick of the thigh and piercing
it through and through. He fell with a yell, clutching the boat to
keep from being drawn overboard, and the spear broke off short, the
poisonous barbs remaining in the flesh.
The sudden diversion saved Samuels. He managed to withdraw his lance,
and by an almost superhuman effort he drove it again into the devil
just as a sea broke over him. When he came to the surface again he was
exhausted and expected to fall a victim, but the great creature made
no attack and only swam around in a circle, apparently dazed.
Samuels lost no time in getting aboard the still floating craft, taking
the towline with him. She was full of water from the breaker which had
rolled in, but it had struck her fairly in the bow and she would float
a little longer. He reached for the oars and held her head to the sea,
while the other raised himself in spite of the agony of his poisoned
wound and bailed for his life.
The sea-devil was mortally hurt and was failing fast. He came to the
surface and made one blind rush at the boat, but he missed and received
the last iron fairly between the eyes. Then he began to go slowly
away, following the flood tide, and towing both boats in through the
breakers to the smooth water beyond. In a short time the motion ceased,
and Samuels hauled in the lines until he was just over the body in two
fathoms of water and clear of the surf on the bar. Then he turned his
attention to his wounded comrade, and by great force pulled the long,
barbed spine through the flesh of his thigh and sucked the wound. As
the tide was flooding, they left the capsized boat fast to the devil on
the bottom below, knowing it would not get far adrift, and made their
way to the light, where the keeper’s wound was carefully cauterized and
bound up.
The great ray lay quiet for some time, his flukes acting as suckers
to hold him down. Then, the feeling that his end was at hand coming
gradually upon him, he fought against the deadly weakness of his
wounds. Summing up all the remaining energy within his giant frame, he
rose to the surface to make one last, desperate rally and annihilate
the towing craft. He breached clear of the sea and fell with a
resounding crash upon the fabric, smashing it completely. Then he tore
it with his teeth and flung the splinters broadcast, reaching wildly
for anything which looked like a human form. Then he suddenly stopped
and a quiver passed through him. He gave a mighty smash with his flukes
upon the remains of the boat, and then his life went out. He sank
slowly down upon the clean sand below, and the ground-sharks of the
reef came silently in to their feast.
[Illustration: THE SEADOG]
He was a yellow brute, mangy, lean, and treacherous-looking. He had
been in two ships where dogs were not particularly liked by the
officers, and the last one had gone ashore in the darkness during a
northeast gale off the Frying Pan. How he had come ashore from the
wreck was a detail beyond his reasoning. Here he was on the beach of
North Carolina, and not one of his shipmates was left to take care of
him.
He had at first foraged among the bushes of beach myrtle and through
the pine woods, stealing into the light-keeper’s yard at Bald Head
during the hours of darkness, and rummaging through his garbage for a
bit of food to keep the life within his mangy hide. He had now been
ashore for nearly five months, and during all that time he had shown
an aversion to the light-keeper’s society. There was no other human
habitation on the island, and the light-keeper had fired a charge of
bird-shot at him on two occasions. This had not given him greater
confidence in strangers, and that which he had had was of a suspicious
kind, born and nurtured aboard ship, where a kick was the usual
salutation. He was as sly as a wolf and as wild as a razor-back hog,
for he had gradually fallen upon the resources of the wild animal, and
his one thought was for himself.
He had broken away into the night howling after the last reception
by the light-keeper at the Bald Head tower, and sore and stiff he
had crawled into the bushes to pick at the tiny pellets that stung
so fiercely. In the future he would be more careful. He must watch.
Eternal vigilance was the price for his worthless life. All the evil
desires and instincts begotten through a line of rascally curs now
began to grow within him. He would not repress them, for was it not
manifest that he must exercise every selfish desire to its utmost if
he would live? His eyes took on that wild, hunted look of the beast
with whom all are at war, and his teeth showed fiercely at each and
every sound. A sullen savageness of mind came upon him more and more
every day, until after these months of wildness he had dropped back
again into the natural state of his forefathers. He was a wild dog in
every sense. As wild as the hogs who rooted through the pine woods or
tore through the swamp, lean as deer and alert to every danger, the
degenerates of the well-bred pigs of the early settlers.
Sometimes he would run along the edge of the beach in the sunlight and
watch the surf, but even this was dangerous, for once the light-keeper
happened to be out hunting and sent a rifle bullet singing past his
ears. He broke for cover again, and seldom ventured forth except
after the sun went down. In the daytime he would go slinking through
the gloom of the dense thickets with ears cocked and senses alert,
watching like a wolf for the slightest sign of danger. A wolf is seldom
seen unless he means to be, and the yellow dog soon became as retiring.
Small game furnished food during this season, for the creeks swarmed
with fish and crabs, which were often caught in shallows at low water,
and gophers were plentiful, but sometimes when the wind was howling
and soughing through the forest, and the rain rattling and whistling
through the clearings, he would try the light-keeper’s back yard again,
and grab a defenseless duck or goose that happened to be within reach.
Their squawking was music to his ears, for he remembered the flash and
stinging pain following his earlier attempts to procure food, and he
would dash furiously through the timber with his prize, nor stop until
many miles were between him and the bright eye that flamed high in the
air above and could be seen fifteen miles or more up the beach. The
lighthouse was an excellent guide for him in all kinds of weather,
but it was especially useful on very dark and stormy nights. To him it
meant a guide out of danger, even as it did to his earlier masters, and
he soon learned to navigate by it.
He grew more and more savage as his life in the wilderness went on, and
as his savageness increased so likewise did his cunning.
William Ripley, the light-keeper, and his assistant, were both
good hunters. They had plenty of time during daylight to make long
excursions along the beach, and through the pine woods, and they often
brought home a hog or two. They were worried at the visits from the
strange animal who left footprints like those of a dog, and who kept
always well out of sight after his first visits, when a glimpse of
yellow had flashed through the darkness, giving something tangible to
fire at. They had seen the vessel come ashore on the outer shoals, some
twelve miles away, and had seen her gradually break up without being
able to lend a hand at saving her crew. Nothing had washed on the
beach that had signs of life, and it had never occurred to them that
a yellow dog had been a survivor of that tragedy. The wreck had been
visited afterwards, and the vessel’s name discovered, but nothing was
ever heard of the men who had manned her, and who had evidently gone
to the port of missing ships. Their interest in the matter ended after
getting a few fathoms of line and a bit of iron-work, and the shifting
sands of the treacherous Frying Pan soon swallowed up all trace of the
disaster.
But ducks and geese were scarce and valuable. There was a thief abroad,
and something must be done. The cold weather was approaching, and
already frost had turned the leaves of some of the trees. Soon a slight
fall of snow announced that winter was upon the coast in earnest.
The cold was hard upon the outcast. His thin hair was but poor
protection against the wind, and the food of the creeks was
disappearing. He was getting more and more savage and desperate,
and the great eye that shone above him through the blackness was
attractive, for it showed where there lay plenty. Often, when the gale
blew from the northward, and the weather was thick, the wild ducks and
geese came rushing down the wind and headed for the eye that shone
so brightly in the night. It had a peculiar dazzling fascination for
them, and they would go driving at it with a rush of a hundred miles an
hour, only to find too late that it was surrounded by a heavy wire net.
Then, before they could swerve off, they were upon it with a terrific
smash. Headlong into the iron meshes they would drive until, flattened
and distorted lumps of flesh and feathers, they would go tumbling down
to the ground beneath. In the morning the keeper would see traces of
their feathers and sometimes a duck or two, but more often he saw the
footprints of the strange animal that so resembled either a dog or wolf.
“I reckon it’s about time we caught up with that un,” said Ripley, one
morning; “there aint been no wolves around this here island sence I kin
remember, an’ I’m bound to find out jest what kind o’ critter this one
is. Why, what d’ye s’pose he done last night, hey?”
“Don’t ask me no riddles when I’m sleepy,” said the assistant.
“Oh, well, it’s no matter, then,” said Ripley, and he turned into the
house.
“Well, what?” asked the assistant.
“The first thing he done was to eat the seat out’n your pants you left
hangin’ on the line, but that’s no matter----”
“What next?” asked the assistant, awakening a little.
“Well, he chewed the uppers off’n your rubber boots, them ones you said
cost five dollars----”
“Name o’ sin, no! Did he? Where’s the gun, quick----”
“Hold on a bit. Wait a minute,” interrupted Ripley. “There aint no
hurry about the case. I was jest a-sayin’----”
“Go on,” said the assistant earnestly.
“Well, then, don’t interrupt me no more. That blamed critter got old
red-head by th’ neck an’ walked off with him, an’ there aint no better
rooster ever been hatched. That’s erbout all.”
“You kin hand me down the rifle,” said the assistant; “that critter or
me leaves this here island, an’ that’s a fact.”
The track led down the beach, and there was no trouble following it.
The assistant started off at a swinging pace, determined to cover the
distance between himself and the thief before midday.
But the track soon led into the scrub and was lost. When it was taken
up again it was a good half-mile farther down the shore. Here it swung
along easily for a short distance until a heavy belt of timber was
reached, and where the ground was hard and covered with pine-needles.
There all trace of it was swallowed up as soon as it struck the pines.
The assistant came home that evening a tired but no wiser man. That
night the outcast saw the man-tracks, and knew he had been followed,
and the spirit of deviltry entered deeper into his pariah soul. He
would make them sorry for his nightly visits. All were enemies to him,
and the more harm he could do to everything alive the better it would
be. Savagely he snarled at the footprints. As the moon rose he saw the
beautiful light silvering the cold ocean, and it stirred something in
his hard heart. He raised his nose high in the air and let forth a long
howl of fierce defiance and wrath.
Slinking through the darkening shadows of the forest, the outcast made
his way to the clearing wherein the great eye rose above the ground to
the height of a hundred feet or more. Here he halted upon the outer
edge, where the thicket hid him in its black shadow. Then he raised
his voice in such a prolonged howl that the fowls secured within the
coops of the yard set up a vast cackling. He changed his position in
time to avoid a charge of buckshot which tore through the thicket and
rattled about the leaves beneath the trees. Then he slunk away for a
little while, only to return again and give vent to his feelings in a
succession of yelping barks, such as had never disturbed the quiet of
the island before. Another charge of shot rattled about him, but he
was now far too wary to get hit, and his hatred was greater than his
fear. It gave him a savage joy to listen to the crack of the gun or the
sharper snap of the rifle, for he knew it worried the keeper to hear
him and know he was near. Night after night he now came, and many were
the shots fired at him, but all to no avail. He would do any mischief
he could, and woe to any duck or chicken that came within his reach.
His high, yelping howl resounded through the clearing and sounded above
the dull roar of the surf, making night hideous to the keeper on watch
in the light above.
Once he caught a loose fowl, and its feathers were strewn about the
yard. Again he found a string of fine fish the keeper had hung up for
the night. They went the way of the ill-fated. His keen sense of smell
told him many things the keepers did not wish him to know, and he
managed to keep out of harm’s way.
But this could not last. Ripley was an old hunter, and was not to be
disturbed beyond reason. He brought out an old mink-trap, with steel
jaws of great power, and he buried it in the sand on the edge of the
clearing, smoothing the rumpled surface of the ground so that nothing
showed, and strewing the place with dead leaves. Then he killed a
sea-gull and dropped it almost directly over the steel jaws. The
outcast would doubtless smell it and stop a moment to investigate. He
had only to step upon the ground in the near vicinity and his leg would
be instantly clasped in a steel embrace.
The first night the keeper watched for him. It was very dark, and the
cold north wind soughed through the pines, and the surf thundered. The
cold made the keeper’s teeth chatter a little as he watched in silence
from his place upon the outer rail of the tower. He had his rifle with
him for a finish, should the trap take hold.
The outcast came slinking along late that night. He was hungry and
wet, and the light attracted him as it did always on particularly bad
nights, for it stood for the mark of plenty, the only thing on the
barren island that kept a glimmering of the past in his sullen mind.
He noticed a peculiar smell as he skirted the fringe of the cover, and
soon spied the dead gull. How came it there, was the question. Gulls
did not die ashore. At least, he had never seen one. But he knew them
in the air. There was something suspicious in the matter. Why should a
gull be dead so close to the lighthouse? He began to investigate, and
drew near the danger zone.
But months of wildness had made him cunning. All the sly instincts of
the races of animals from which he had sprung had been developing. He
approached the bait slowly, barely moving, and touching the ground ever
so lightly with his paws. Then he halted. No, it would not do. There
was something wrong with that bird, showing like a bit of white in the
darkness. He could smell it plainly. It was the scent of a man. He drew
slowly off, and began nosing about for the trail, and soon found it. He
followed along, and it led straight to the dwelling where the keeper
lived. Then he went back a little way into the scrub and sat upon his
haunches, and, in spite of his cold and hunger, he lifted up his voice
in a long, dismal howl, that to the keeper’s ears had an unmistakable
ring of derision.
Night after night the trap was set, but the pariah kept clear. Then,
one day, it grew thick, and a cold wind began setting in from the sea.
Before night it was howling and snoring away with hurricane force,
driving the seas roaring up the sands, and tearing their tops into
smothers of snowy spume drift.
The pariah came to the beach and tried to look seaward to see what was
coming with that fearful rushing blast, but the wind was so strong and
the snow so blinding that he soon took to the cover, and headed for the
light, in the hope he might pick up something to eat in the vicinity
of the keeper’s dwelling. Before going to the yard he looked again
seaward and saw a light flash out. He did not know what it meant, but
he knew it was off on the Frying Pan, far out on the treacherous shoals
where a thundering smother of rolling whiteness flashed and gleamed now
and again. Then he skirted the clearing, and brought up back of the
fowl-house, where now all the ducks and chickens were secured at night.
He went forward, trying to smell his way, but the snow was too much for
him. Then he stopped a moment. He located the house and started again,
when suddenly, “Snap!”
Something had leaped from the ground and seized his foreleg in a
viselike grip. He sprang forward and fought to get away, but it was
of no use. The thing had him fast with an awful grasp that cut into
his flesh and squeezed his leg so tight that it soon became numb.
With snarling growls, he fought desperately on, twisting and turning,
struggling and biting, but all to no purpose. He was fast. Then the
state of affairs began to dawn upon him, and he desisted, for the agony
was supreme. Sitting there in the flying snow of the winter’s night,
with the roar of the storm sounding over him, he raised his voice in a
long, yelping bark of challenge and disdain.