Curiosity dispelled the last vestiges of Percy's seasickness. For a
little while he gazed without speaking.
A cove four hundred feet wide opened toward the south between two rocky
points. At its head a pebbly beach sloped up to a sea-wall, behind which
a growth of cattails bespoke a stagnant lagoon. Still farther back a
steep bank of dirt rose to the overhanging sod of the pasture.
From the western point a spur extended into the cove, forming a little
haven amply large enough for a modest fleet of fishing-boats. Near by on
the sea-wall stood two structures, one low, oblong, flat-roofed, with a
rusty iron stovepipe projecting from its farther end; the other a small,
paintless shed with a large door. Percy gave them only a casual glance.
"You said we were going to live in a camp. Where is it?"
Jim pointed to the first structure.
"There! It's the cabin of an old vessel that came ashore here in a
southerly gale years ago. Uncle Tom jacked it up a foot, put in a good
floor, and made it into a first-rate camp. It's got bunks for half a
dozen, and at a pinch could hold more. The roof's a bit leaky, but we'll
soon fix that. There's a good stove, and always plenty of driftwood on
the beach. It's a mighty snug place on a stormy day."
Percy turned up his nose at this list of good points.
"What's that pile of chicken-coops near it?"
"Lobster-traps."
"And that big box with its top just above water?"
"A lobster-car. All that we catch in the traps we put in there until the
smack comes."
The mooring-buoy was now alongside. Making the _Barracouta_ fast, the
boys went ashore in the dory and pea-pod. Percy became conscious that he
was thirsty.
"Where can I get a drink?"
"There's the spring at the foot of that bank."
Opening a trap-door in a rude wooden cover, Percy looked down into a
shallow well. The only cup at hand was an empty tin can. Rather
disdainfully he dipped it full and tasted, then spat with a wry face.
"It's brackish!" he called out, indignantly. "I can't drink that."
Spurling and the others were hard at work unloading the boats. Percy
repeated his complaint:
"I can't drink that stuff."
Jim was staggering up the beach, a heavy box of groceries in his arms.
"Sorry!" he replied, indifferently. "That's what all the rest of us'll
have to drink. It isn't Poland water, but I've tasted worse."
Percy slammed down the cover and tossed away the can in a huff. Lane
was passing boxes and bundles ashore from the dory to Stevens and
Filippo.
"Catch hold here, Whittington, and help tote some of this stuff up to
the cabin," exhorted Budge.
Percy complied ungraciously; but he was careful not to tackle anything
very heavy.
"I didn't come out here to make a pack-mule of myself," was his mental
remark.
Jim unfastened the rusty padlock on the cabin door and stepped inside.
Percy followed him, eager to get a glimpse of his new home.
The camp had not been opened for some weeks; it smelled close and
stuffy. As Percy crossed its threshold his nostrils were greeted by a
mingled odor of salt, tarred rope, and decaying wood, flavored with a
faint suggestion of fish. Mastering his repugnance, he looked about.
He saw a single, low room, nine by fifteen, dimly lighted by three small
windows, one in the farther end directly opposite the door, the
remaining two facing each other in the middle of the long sides. Along
the right wall on each side of the central window was built a tier of
two bunks. On Percy's left, over a wooden sink in the corner near the
door, was a rough cupboard. Next came a small, rusty stove with an oven
for baking; then, under the window, an unpainted table; and on the wall
beyond, a series of hooks from which were suspended various articles of
clothing and coils of rope. Empty soap-boxes supplied the place of
chairs.
With nose uplifted and a growing disgust on his features, Percy surveyed
the cramped, dingy room.
"How do you like it?" asked Spurling.
"You don't mean to say that five of us have got to live in this hole?"
"Nowhere else, unless you want to stay out on the beach or in the
fish-house."
"But where do we sleep?"
"There!" Jim gestured toward the wooden framework on the right wall.
Percy thrust his hand into one of the bunks.
"Why, there's no mattress or spring here! It's only a bare box!"
"That's just what it is, Whittington! You've hit the nail on the head
this time. You'll have to spread your blanket on the soft side of a pine
board. If you want something real luxurious you can go into the woods
and cut an armful of spruce boughs to strew under you."
Percy disregarded this badinage. From his view-point the situation was
too serious for jesting. It was outrageous that he, the son of John P.
Whittington, should be expected to shift for himself like an ordinary
fisherman.
"I'm not used to living in a pigpen!" he snapped. "This cabin's too dark
to be healthy; besides, it isn't clean."
A spark of temper flashed in Spurling's eyes.
"Stop right there, Whittington! This is my uncle Tom's cabin. Any place
that's been shut up for weeks seems stuffy when it's first opened.
You'll find that there are things a good deal worse than salt and tar
and fish and a few cobwebs. I want to tell you a story I read some time
ago. Once in the winter a party of Highlanders were out on a foray.
Night overtook them beside a river in the mountains, and they prepared
to camp in the open. Each drenched his plaid in the stream, rolled it
round his body, and lay down to rest in the snow, knowing that the
outside layers of cloth would soon freeze hard and form a sleeping-bag.
In the party were an old chieftain and his grandson of eighteen. The boy
wet his plaid like the others, but before he lay down he rolled up a
snowball for a pillow. The old chief kicked it out from under the lad's
head. He didn't propose to have his grandson be so effeminate as to
indulge himself in the luxury of a pillow when everybody else was lying
flat on the ground."