CRABS, BOYS, AND A BOAT-WRECK.
That Saturday morning was a sad one for poor Dick Lee.
His mother, the previous night, carefully locked up his elegant apparel,
the gift of Mr. Dabney Kinzer. It was done after Dick was in bed; and,
when daylight came again, he found only his old clothes by the bedside.
It was a hard thing to bear, no doubt; but Dick had been a bad boy on
Friday. He had sold his fish instead of bringing them home, and then had
gone and squandered the money on a brilliant new red necktie.
"Dat's good 'nuff for me to wear to meetin'," said Mrs. Lee, when her
eyes fell upon the gorgeous bit of cheap silk. "Reckon it won't be
wasted on any good-for-nuffin boy. I'll show ye wot to do wid yer fish.
You' a-gettin' too mighty fine, anyhow."
Dick was disconsolate for a while; but his humility took the form of a
determination to go for crabs that day, mainly because his mother had
long since set her face against that tribe of animals.
"Dey's a wasteful, 'stravagant sort ob fish," remarked Mrs. Lee, in
frequent explanation of her dislike. "Dey's all clo'es and no body, like
some w'ite folks I know on. I don't mean de Kinzers. Dey's all got body
nuff."
And yet that inlet had a name and reputation of its own for crabs. There
was a wide reach of shallow water, inside the southerly point at the
mouth, where, over several hundred acres of muddy flats, the depth
varied from three and a half to eight feet, with the ebb and flow of the
tides. That was a sort of perpetual crab-pasture; and there it was that
Dick Lee determined to expend his energies that Saturday.
Very likely there would be other crabbers on the flats; but Dick was not
the boy to object to that, provided none of them should notice the
change in his raiment. At an early hour, therefore, Dab and Ford were
preceded by their young colored friend, they themselves waiting for
later breakfasts than Mrs. Lee was in the habit of preparing.
Dick's ill fortune did not leave him when he got out of sight of his
mother. It followed him down to the shore of the inlet, and compelled
him to give up, for that day, all idea of borrowing a respectable boat.
There were several, belonging to the neighbors, from among which Dick
was accustomed to take his pick, in return for errands run and other
services rendered to their owners; but on this particular morning not
one of them all was available. Some were fastened with ugly chains and
padlocks. Two were hauled away above even high-water mark, and so Dick
could not have got either of them into the water even if he had dared to
try; and as for the rest, as Dick said,--
"Guess dar owners must hab come and borrered 'em."
The consequence was, that the dark-skinned young fisherman was for once
compelled to put up with his own boat, or rather his father's.
The three wise men of Gotham were not much worse off when they went to
sea in a bowl than was Dick Lee in that rickety little old flat-bottomed
punt.
Did it leak?
Well, not so very much, with no heavier weight than Dick's; but there
was reason in his remark that,--
"Dis yer's a mean boat to frow down a fish in, when you cotch 'im. He's
done suah to git drownded."
Yes, and the crabs would get their feet wet, and so would Dick; but he
resigned himself to his circumstances, and pushed away. To tell the
truth, he had not been able to free himself from a lingering fear lest
his mother might come after him, before he could get afloat, with orders
for some duty or other on shore; and that would have been worse than
going to sea in the little old scow, a good deal.
"Reckon it's all right," said Dick as he shoved off. "It'd be an awful
risk to trus' dem nice clo'es in de ole boat, suah."
Nice clothes, nice boats, a good many other nice things, were as yet
beyond the reach of Dick Lee; but he was quite likely to catch as many
crabs as his more aristocratic neighbors.
As for Dabney Kinzer and his friend from the city, they were on their
way to the water-side, after all, at an hour which indicated either
smaller appetites than usual or greater speed at the breakfast-table.
"Plenty of boats, I should say," remarked Ford, as he surveyed the
little "landing" and its vicinity with the air of a man who had a few
fleets of his own. "All sorts. Any of 'em fast?"
"Not many," said Dab. "The row-boats, big and little, have to be built
so they will stand pretty rough water."
"How are the sail-boats?"
"Same thing. There's Ham Morris's yacht."
"That? Why, she's as big as any in the lot."
"Bigger; but she don't show it."
"Can't we take a cruise in her?" asked Ford.
"Any time. Ham lets me use her whenever I like. She's fast enough, but
she's built so she'll stand 'most any thing. Safe as a house if she's
handled right."
"Handled!"
Ford Foster's expression of face would have done honor to the Secretary
of the Navy, or the Chairman of the Naval Affairs Committee in Congress,
or any other perfect seaman, Noah included. It seemed to say,--
"As if any boat could be otherwise than well sailed, with me on board!"
Dabney, however, even while he was talking, had been hauling in from its
"float and grapnel," about ten yards out at low water, the very
stanch-looking little yawl-boat that called him owner. She was just such
a boat as Mrs. Kinzer would naturally have provided for her boy,--stout,
well-made, and sensible,--without any bad habits of upsetting or the
like. Not too large for Dabney to manage all alone, "The Jenny," as he
called her, and as her name was painted on the stern, was all the better
for having two on board, and had room in her then for more.
"The inlet's pretty narrow for a long reach through the marsh," said
Dabney, "and as crooked as a ram's horn. I'll steer, and you pull, till
we're out o' that, and then I'll take the oars."
"I might as well row out to the crab-grounds," said Ford, as he pitched
his coat forward, and took his seat at the oars. "All ready?"
"Ready," said Dab; and "The Jenny" glided gracefully away from the
landing with the starting-push he gave her.
Ford Foster had had oars in his hands before, but his experience had
been limited to a class of vessels different in some respects from the
one he was in now.
He was short of something, at all events. It may have been skill, or it
may have been legs or discretion; but, whatever was lacking, at the
third or fourth stroke the oar-blades went a little too deeply below the
smooth surface of the water. There was a vain tug, a little out of
"time;" and then there was a boy on the bottom of the boat, and a pair
of well-polished shoes lifted high in the air.
"You've got it," shouted Dabney.
"Got what?" exclaimed an all-but angry voice from down there between the
seats.
"Caught the first 'crab,'" replied Dabney: "that's what we call it. Can
you steer? Guess I'd better row."
"No, you won't," was the very resolute reply, as Ford regained his seat
and his oars. "I sha'n't catch any more crabs of that sort. I'm a little
out of practice, that's all."
"I should say you were, a little. Well, it won't hurt you. 'Tisn't much
of a pull."
Ford would have pulled it now if he had blistered all the skin off his
hands in doing so; and he did very creditable work for some minutes,
among the turns and windings of the narrow inlet.
"Here we are," shouted Dabney at last. "We are in the inlet yet, but it
widens out into the bay."
"That's the bay, out yonder?"
"Yes; and the island between that and the ocean's no better'n a mere bar
of sand."
"How d'you get past it?"
"Right across there, almost in a straight line. We'll run it next week
in Ham's yacht. Splendid weak-fishing right in the mouth of that inlet,
on the ocean side."
"Hurrah!" exclaimed Ford, "I'm in for that. Is the bay deep?"
"Not very," replied Dabney; "but it gets pretty rough sometimes."
Ford was getting pretty red in the face just then, with his unaccustomed
exercise; and his friend added,--
"You needn't pull so hard: we're almost there. Hullo! if there isn't
Dick Lee, in his dry-goods box. That boat'll drown him some day, and his
dad too. But just see him pull in crabs!"
Ford came near "catching" one more as he tried to turn around for the
look proposed, exclaiming,--
"Dab, let's get to work as quick as we can. They might go away."
"Might fly?"
"No; but don't they go and come?"
"Well, you go and drop the grapnel over the bows, and we'll see 'em come
in pretty quick."
The grapnel, or little anchor, was thrown over quickly enough; and the
two boys were in such an eager haste that they had hardly a word to say
to Dick, though he was now but a few rods away.
Now, it happened that when Ford and Dab came down to the water that
morning, each of them had brought a load. The former had only a neat
little japanned tin box, about as big as his head; and the latter,
besides his oars, carried a seemingly pretty heavy basket.
"Lots of lunch, I should say," had been Ford's mental comment; but he
had not thought it wise to ask questions.
"Plenty of lunch in that box," thought Dab at the same moment, but only
as a matter of course.
And they were both wrong. Lunch was the one thing they had both
forgotten.
But the box and the basket.
Ford Foster came out, of his own accord, with the secret of the box; for
he now took a little key out of his pocket, and unlocked it with an air
of--
"Look at this, will you?"
Dab Kinzer looked, and was very sure he had never before seen quite such
an assortment of brand-new fish-hooks, of many sorts and sizes, and of
fish-lines which looked as if they had thus far spent their lives on dry
land.
"Tip-top," he remarked. "I see a lot of things we can use one of these
days, but there isn't time to go over 'em now. Let's go for the crabs.
What made you bring your box along?"
"Oh!" replied Ford, "I left my rods at home, both of 'em. You don't
s'pose I'd go for crabs with a rod, do you? But you can take your pick
of hooks and lines."
"Crabs? Hooks and lines?"
"Why, yes. You don't mean to scoop 'em up in that landing-net, do you?"
Dab looked at his friend for a moment in blank amazement, and then the
truth broke upon him for the first time.
"Oh, I see! You never caught any crabs. Well, just you lock up your
jewellery-box, and I'll show you."
It was not easy for Dab to keep from laughing in Ford Foster's face; but
his mother had not given him so many lessons in good-breeding for
nothing, and Ford was permitted to close his ambitious "casket" without
any worse annoyance than his own wounded pride gave him.
But now came out the secret of the basket.
The cover was jerked off; and nothing was revealed but a varied
assortment of clams, large and small, but mostly of good size,--tough
old customers, that no amount of roasting or boiling would ever have
prepared for human eating.
"What are they for,--bait?"
"Yes, bait, weight, and all."
"How's that?"
Dabney's reply was to draw from his pocket a couple of long, strong
cords, bits of old fishing-lines. He cracked a couple of clams one
against the other; tied the fleshy part of one to each of the cords;
tied bits of shell on, a foot or so from the ends, for sinkers; handed
one cord to Ford, took the other himself, and laid the long-handled
scoop-net he had brought with him down between them, saying,--
"Now we're ready. Drop your clam down to the bottom, and it won't be
half a minute before you feel something pull on it. Then you draw it up
gently,--steady as you know how. You mustn't jerk the crab loose. You'll
get the knack of it in five minutes. It's all knack. There isn't any
thing else so stupid as a crab."
Ford watched carefully, and obeyed in silence the directions he had
received.
In a minute or so more the operation of the scoop-net was called for,
and the fun began.
"You got him!" exclaimed Ford in a loud whisper, as he saw Dab quickly
plunge the net into the water, and then shake out of it into the bottom
of the boat a great sprawling "blue-legged" crab. "He's a whopper!"
"He'll do for one."
"There's one on mine! I declare, he's let go!"
"You jerked the clam away from him. Sink it again. He's mad about it.
He'll take right hold again."
"He's pulling now, or it's another one."
"Let him pull. Lift him easy. Long as he thinks he's stealing something,
he'll hold on. There he comes,--see him?"
Ford saw the white flesh of the clam coming slowly up through the water,
and he held his breath; for just behind and below it was a sprawling
shadowy something that was tugging with all its might at that tough
shell-fish.
"It's an awful big one!"
"Shall I scoop him?"
"No, indeed: I want to scoop him myself. I saw how you did it."
Splash went the net, as the prize came nearer the surface; and Ford
began, somewhat excitedly, to shake it all over the bottom of the boat.
"Why, where's that crab? You don't mean to say he was quick enough to
dodge away?"
"Quick? well, no, that isn't just the trouble. I forgot to tell you to
scoop way under him. You hit him, square, and knocked him ever so far.
The water deceives your eyes. Drive the net under him quick, and then
lift. I've got one--now just you see how I scoop."
Ford felt dreadfully disappointed over the loss of his first crab, but
the rapidity with which he caught the "knack of it" after that was a
great credit to him. He did not miss the next one he pulled up.
It was great fun; but it had its slack moments, and in one of these Dab
suddenly exclaimed,--
"The young black rascal! If he hasn't gone and got a sheep's-head!"
"A sheep's-head?"
They were both staring at the old punt, where Dick Lee was apparently
enjoying the most extraordinary good fortune.
"Yes, that's it. That's why he beats us so badly. They're a sight
better'n clams, only you can't always get one. I wonder where he picked
up that one."
"But how he does pull 'em in!"
"We're doing well enough," began Dabney, when suddenly there came a
shrill cry of pain from the black boy's punt.
"He's barefooted," shouted Dab, with, it must be confessed, something
like a grin; "and one of the little pirates has pinned him with his
nippers."
That was the difficulty exactly, and there need not have been any very
serious result of such an expression of a crab's bad temper. But Dick
Lee was more than ordinarily averse to any thing like physical pain, and
the crab which now had him by the toe was a very muscular and vicious
specimen of his quarrelsome race.
The first consequence of that vigorous nip was a momentary dance up and
down in the punt, accompanied by exclamatory howls from Dick, but not by
a word of any sort from the crab.
The next consequence was, that the crab let go; but so at the same
instant, did the rotten board in the boat-bottom, upon which Dick Lee
had so rashly danced.
It let go of the rest of the boat so suddenly that poor Dick had only
time for one tremendous yell, as it let him right down through to his
armpits.
The water was perfectly smooth; but the boat was full in an instant, and
nearly a bushel of freshly-caught and ill-tempered crabs were
manoeuvring in all directions around the woolly head, which was all
their late captor could now keep in sight.
"Up with the grapnel, Ford," shouted Dab. "Take an oar: we'll both row.
He can swim like a duck, but he might split his throat."
"Or get scared to death."
"Or those crabs might go for him, and eat him up."
"How he does yell!"