AT ROCK ISLAND.
I could hardly believe that Mr. Norton intended to strike me. I had not
been struck for a long time; in fact, as far back as I could remember,
and I did not intend to submit.
Accordingly, when the man caught me by the collar, I jerked away as
quickly as possible, and put the table between us.
This seemed to enrage him still more, and he fairly leaped the
distance, caught me again, and bore me to the floor.
“We’ll see if you are going to mind or not!” he cried.
“Let me up!” I screamed.
“Yes, let him up,” put in Ford. “I won’t have you thrashing Rube.”
And he caught Mr. Norton by the arm, and pulled him in such a fashion
that he went sprawling on his back.
My tormentor was completely astonished by this movement. He scrambled
to his feet, and I lost no time in doing the same.
“What do you mean by interfering?” demanded Mr. Norton, turning a livid
face to the mill-hand.
“I won’t stand by and see Rube abused,” retorted Ford.
“It’s none of your business!”
“I’ll make it my business.”
“You’ll do no such a thing!” howled Mr. Norton. “I won’t have such a
fellow as you about the place. You are discharged.”
“I am willing. I wouldn’t want to work here if you are to be the boss.
But I’m Rube’s friend, and I’m going to stick up for him. Nice kind of
a man you are, raising a fight when you haven’t been here but a few
hours! You ought to be ashamed of yourself! If I told folks down to the
Bend about the way you carry on, they’d ride you on a rail.”
Ford was in for easing his mind, and I let him go on.
“Stop! stop!” cried Mr. Norton. “I won’t listen to a word.”
“Oh, yes, you will,” went on Ford. “Here is Rube just about heard of
his father’s death, and you treating him in this fashion! You haven’t
got a heart as big as a toad. Besides, the boy has told you the truth.”
“How do you know?” asked the man, somewhat abashed by the fact that
Ford did not back down. “His father must have been worth something.”
“Well, he wasn’t; and in these times it’s hard to make a living at
anything in Bend Center. I’ve looked around and I know.”
Mr. Norton was silent for a moment; then his manner appeared to change.
He threw the stick into the corner, and sat down on a chair.
“Perhaps I was a little hard,” he admitted; “but I was led to believe
that Stone was rich, otherwise I would never have loaned him the money
I did.”
No one made any reply to this, and he went on,――
“Sit down, Reuben; I won’t touch you. I didn’t think you had just got
the bad news. It’s over a week old to me.”
“I got your letter last evening.”
“Yes? I suppose it was enough to upset you. Come, we will let things
run along as they have been for a few days. You won’t find me hard to
get on with after you once know me.”
I had my doubts about this, but decided to keep them to myself. We
finished the meal in silence, and then Ford beckoned me out into the
mill-room.
“Do you want me to stay with you to-night?” he asked.
“Won’t it be too much of an inconvenience?”
“Not at all. I’ll go down to the house, and let the folks know, and
then come right back.”
“If you do you’ll have to sleep with me, for I’ll have to give the
spare bed to Mr. Norton,” I said.
“I won’t mind that if you don’t,” replied the mill-hand.
So the matter was settled. If Mr. Norton heard of it he did not say
anything, and for the remainder of the evening things ran smoothly.
Before we retired I had learned many things that are not necessary
to repeat here. Mr. Norton told of how he and my father had met in
Chicago, how my father had begged of him to advance him money from time
to time, and how the two had started together for South Dakota. He was
a fluent talker, and I grew quite interested, though I did not exactly
believe all that was told me.
We were all up early the next morning, and Ford and I prepared
breakfast. Before eating, Mr. Norton applied himself again to the
bottle, and asked the mill-hand if there was a good tavern at the Bend;
to which Ford replied that there was a tavern, but whether good or bad
he did not know, as he had never stopped there.
“Got any grinding to do?”
“Enough to keep us running till noon.”
“And after that?”
“We’ll have to wait for something to come in,” I replied.
“Then, Ford, we can get along without you,” continued Mr. Norton. “In
the future Reuben and I will do all the work.”
“All right,” said the mill-hand, seeing that there was nothing else to
be done. “How about my wages?” and he winked at me.
“How much is coming to you?”
“Eight dollars.”
“Reuben, have you the money?”
“No, sir; as I said before, I haven’t a dollar.”
Mr. Norton thought for a moment, and then got out his pocket-book.
“Here you are,” he said. “Give me a receipt. I will have to charge the
amount against the estate.”
“Then I don’t want it,” said Ford. “I’m not going to rob Rube of what
little is coming to him.”
“Take it, Dan,” I said. “You’ve earned it.” And I compelled him to put
the money in his pocket.
Then the receipt was written out, and this Mr. Norton placed carefully
in his notebook.
“Now we are done with you,” he said. “If I ever need you in the future
I will send Reuben for you. I suppose you never thought of buying the
mill, did you?”
“I haven’t got the money,” replied Ford.
“The reason I asked is because the place may be up for sale,” went on
Mr. Norton; “if so, it ought to be a pretty good investment for you.”
“It might be,” said Ford.
A little later he went off, and Mr. Norton and I were left alone. I
set to work with a will, and he stood around watching me.
“That’s easy enough,” he said, as I fed the grain into the hoppers. “I
should think almost any one could do that.”
“Feeding is easy enough, but there are a good many other things to
learn, as you will soon see.”
A little later Mr. Norton took a walk around the outside of the place.
He was gone fully an hour, and when he came back he appeared to be
quite uneasy.
“Do you need anything from the village?” he asked.
“We need a number of groceries,” I replied. “I wanted to get them day
before yesterday, but Mr. Jackson wouldn’t let me have them until I
settled up in full. I owe him three dollars yet.”
“Well, you had better go down and get those groceries now. Let this
grinding go till this afternoon or to-morrow. I want you to get me
some――some tobacco.”
“I will have to pay for all I get.”
“Well, I will give you the money. Will two dollars do?”
“I need but a dollar.”
“Then here is a dollar and a quarter. Get me a quarter’s worth of
plug-cut smoking. You needn’t hurry about getting back. Seeing what
you’ve got on your mind you need a rest.”
In ten minutes I was off in the sloop. Mr. Norton seemed to be very
anxious to have me go, but for what reason I could not determine.
“And remember you needn’t hurry back,” he called out as I hoisted the
mainsail and stood off from the shore; “if any orders come in I will
attend to them.”
As I moved down the shore toward the Bend I reviewed my strange
situation. How much had happened in the last forty-eight hours!
I was far from satisfied with Mr. Norton――somehow I could not call him
my uncle. I had expected my mother’s brother to be a different kind of
a man. He would evidently make a hard guardian, and I was sure that for
me there were many breakers ahead.
As the sloop skimmed along far enough from the shore to catch the full
benefit of the breeze that was blowing, I espied another craft anchored
in a little cove a quarter of a mile below the mill.
She was a stranger to me, and I wondered who owned her, and why her
master had stopped at the spot, which was a rocky one, full of thorny
bushes.
Perhaps he had come for some geological specimens, which the visitors
at Bayport were frequently after. The region was full of all kinds of
stone, and I knew it was quite a fad to study them.
I passed the craft, and continued on the way to Bend Center, arriving
there in the middle of the forenoon.
I found that the news of my father’s death had been widely circulated,
and nearly every one I met came forward to extend a sympathy that went
straight to my heart.
I did not go to Mr. Jackson’s store, but to the “opposition,” as it is
called in such places. This was kept by Mr. Frank Lewis, a young man,
and one whom I found very obliging.
It did not take me long to make my purchases. As I turned to go back to
the boat I came face to face with Tom Darrow.
“Hullo, Rube!” he exclaimed. “Well, this is lucky! You’re the fellow I
want to see.”
“What about?” I asked. “Have you found the sloop?”
“Come with me and I’ll tell you,” he replied.
And he led the way out of the store, and down to the pier.
“I ain’t found the sloop, Rube, but I’ve found out something about her.”
“What have you found out, Tom?” I questioned, as my heart gave a bound.
“I overheard three men talking about some sloop they had picked up,”
went on the old fisherman. “They stopped talking as soon as they saw I
was around. I reckon they want to scoop the prize for themselves.”
“Who were the men?”
“I didn’t know two of them; the other was Andy Carney. You know him?”
“Yes; he is one of the tough fishermen from the north end. What do you
suppose the three have done with the boat?”
“Taken her up to one of the coves at Rock Island. If I was you I’d sail
up and take a look around.”
“I will,” I replied.
“I’d go along, only I can’t spare the time,” said Darrow.
Five minutes later I was on board my sloop, and speeding for Rock
Island in search of the Catch Me, which I was now certain had been
stolen.
The large sloop had become my property, and as the craft was worth at
least three hundred dollars it is no wonder that I was anxious to find
her. The sum of money represented a good deal to me, especially in my
present situation.
Mr. Norton, my newly appointed guardian, had told me to take my time
about getting back to the mill, so I considered that I had at least
several hours of my own before me. This was long enough, I calculated,
to take a run up to Rock Island, make an investigation, and get back
to the mouth of the Torrent Bend River.
I let the mainsail out full, and also the jib. This was all the small
sloop could carry in the present wind, and even then I found I had a
lively time whenever it came to changing the tack.
I stowed away the stuff I had bought in the cuddy, where it would not
get wet, and then took things easy in the stern-sheets.
It was a beautiful day, and had my mind been free I would have enjoyed
the outing thoroughly. But the clouds of sorrow and perplexity were
upon me, and I paid scant attention to the fair blue sky above and the
rippling water beneath.
At length I came within a quarter of a mile of the island, and then
began to keep my eyes wide open for whatever might come to view.
Rock Island was half a mile wide by nearly a mile long, and on all
sides were a number of coves and inlets, some well hidden by the masses
of bushes and trees that grew along the shores.
I decided to make my investigation as systematic as possible, knowing
that it would be folly to sail about in a haphazard fashion. I ran
into the first cove I came to, looked around in every direction, and
continued this until I had visited the entire south and east shores.
By this time it was midday. I was hungry, for a breeze on the water is
calculated to sharpen up almost any one’s appetite. I had a lunch in
the locker, and this I munched as the sloop sped along to the north
shore.
Suddenly I saw, or fancied I saw, a speck of white in the bushes some
distance ahead. I tacked in the direction, and presently distinguished
the mast of some vessel standing out straight among the crooked trees
that lined a long and narrow inlet.
Satisfied that I had made a discovery of importance, I lowered the jib
and took several reefs in the mainsail. The wind carried me directly
into the opening, and here I dropped anchor.
“Hullo, there! What do you want here?”
It was a rough voice that hailed me, and looking around I beheld a
rougher-looking man standing on the shore, not ten feet away from me.
It was Andy Carney, the fellow Darrow had mentioned to me. He carried a
gun, and his manner was one of astonishment and anger.