I
Because it all seems so improbable--so horribly impossible to me now,
sitting here safe and sane in my own library--I hesitate to record an
episode which already appears to me less horrible than grotesque. Yet,
unless this story is written now, I know I shall never have the
courage to tell the truth about the matter--not from fear of ridicule,
but because I myself shall soon cease to credit what I now know to be
true. Yet scarcely a month has elapsed since I heard the stealthy
purring of what I believed to be the shoaling undertow--scarcely a
month ago, with my own eyes, I saw that which, even now, I am
beginning to believe never existed. As for the harbor-master--and the
blow I am now striking at the old order of things--But of that I shall
not speak now, or later; I shall try to tell the story simply and
truthfully, and let my friends testify as to my probity and the
publishers of this book corroborate them.
On the 29th of February I resigned my position under the government
and left Washington to accept an offer from Professor Farrago--whose
name he kindly permits me to use--and on the first day of April I
entered upon my new and congenial duties as general superintendent of
the water-fowl department connected with the Zoological Gardens then
in course of erection at Bronx Park, New York.
For a week I followed the routine, examining the new foundations,
studying the architect's plans, following the surveyors through the
Bronx thickets, suggesting arrangements for water-courses and pools
destined to be included in the enclosures for swans, geese, pelicans,
herons, and such of the waders and swimmers as we might expect to
acclimate in Bronx Park.
It was at that time the policy of the trustees and officers of the
Zoological Gardens neither to employ collectors nor to send out
expeditions in search of specimens. The society decided to depend upon
voluntary contributions, and I was always busy, part of the day, in
dictating answers to correspondents who wrote offering their services
as hunters of big game, collectors of all sorts of fauna, trappers,
snarers, and also to those who offered specimens for sale, usually at
exorbitant rates.
To the proprietors of five-legged kittens, mangy lynxes, moth-eaten
coyotes, and dancing bears I returned courteous but uncompromising
refusals--of course, first submitting all such letters, together with
my replies, to Professor Farrago.
One day towards the end of May, however, just as I was leaving Bronx
Park to return to town, Professor Lesard, of the reptilian department,
called out to me that Professor Farrago wanted to see me a moment; so
I put my pipe into my pocket again and retraced my steps to the
temporary, wooden building occupied by Professor Farrago, general
superintendent of the Zoological Gardens. The professor, who was
sitting at his desk before a pile of letters and replies submitted for
approval by me, pushed his glasses down and looked over them at me
with a whimsical smile that suggested amusement, impatience,
annoyance, and perhaps a faint trace of apology.
"Now, here's a letter," he said, with a deliberate gesture towards a
sheet of paper impaled on a file--"a letter that I suppose you
remember." He disengaged the sheet of paper and handed it to me.
"Oh yes," I replied, with a shrug; "of course the man is
mistaken--or--"
"Or what?" demanded Professor Farrago, tranquilly, wiping his glasses.
"--Or a liar," I replied.
After a silence he leaned back in his chair and bade me read the
letter to him again, and I did so with a contemptuous tolerance for
the writer, who must have been either a very innocent victim or a very
stupid swindler. I said as much to Professor Farrago, but, to my
surprise, he appeared to waver.
"I suppose," he said, with his near-sighted, embarrassed smile, "that
nine hundred and ninety-nine men in a thousand would throw that letter
aside and condemn the writer as a liar or a fool?"
"In my opinion," said I, "he's one or the other."
"He isn't--in mine," said the professor, placidly.
"What!" I exclaimed. "Here is a man living all alone on a strip of
rock and sand between the wilderness and the sea, who wants you to
send somebody to take charge of a bird that doesn't exist!"
"How do you know," asked Professor Farrago, "that the bird in question
does not exist?"
"It is generally accepted," I replied, sarcastically, "that the great
auk has been extinct for years. Therefore I may be pardoned for
doubting that our correspondent possesses a pair of them alive."
"Oh, you young fellows," said the professor, smiling wearily, "you
embark on a theory for destinations that don't exist."
He leaned back in his chair, his amused eyes searching space for the
imagery that made him smile.
"Like swimming squirrels, you navigate with the help of Heaven and a
stiff breeze, but you never land where you hope to--do you?"
Rather red in the face, I said: "Don't you believe the great auk to be
extinct?"
"Audubon saw the great auk."
"Who has seen a single specimen since?"
"Nobody--except our correspondent here," he replied, laughing.
I laughed, too, considering the interview at an end, but the professor
went on, coolly:
"Whatever it is that our correspondent has--and I am daring to believe
that it _is_ the great auk itself--I want you to secure it for the
society."
When my astonishment subsided my first conscious sentiment was one of
pity. Clearly, Professor Farrago was on the verge of dotage--ah, what
a loss to the world!
I believe now that Professor Farrago perfectly interpreted my
thoughts, but he betrayed neither resentment nor impatience. I drew a
chair up beside his desk--there was nothing to do but to obey, and
this fool's errand was none of my conceiving.
Together we made out a list of articles necessary for me and itemized
the expenses I might incur, and I set a date for my return, allowing
no margin for a successful termination to the expedition.
"Never mind that," said the professor. "What I want you to do is to
get those birds here safely. Now, how many men will you take?"
"None," I replied, bluntly; "it's a useless expense, unless there is
something to bring back. If there is I'll wire you, you may be sure."
"Very well," said Professor Farrago, good-humoredly, "you shall have
all the assistance you may require. Can you leave to-night?"
The old gentleman was certainly prompt. I nodded, half-sulkily, aware
of his amusement.
"So," I said, picking up my hat, "I am to start north to find a place
called Black Harbor, where there is a man named Halyard who possesses,
among other household utensils, two extinct great auks--"
We were both laughing by this time. I asked him why on earth he
credited the assertion of a man he had never before heard of.
"I suppose," he replied, with the same half-apologetic, half-humorous
smile, "it is instinct. I feel, somehow, that this man Halyard _has_
got an auk--perhaps two. I can't get away from the idea that we are on
the eve of acquiring the rarest of living creatures. It's odd for a
scientist to talk as I do; doubtless you're shocked--admit it, now!"
But I was not shocked; on the contrary, I was conscious that the same
strange hope that Professor Farrago cherished was beginning, in spite
of me, to stir my pulses, too.
"If he has--" I began, then stopped.
The professor and I looked hard at each other in silence.
"Go on," he said, encouragingly.
But I had nothing more to say, for the prospect of beholding with my
own eyes a living specimen of the great auk produced a series of
conflicting emotions within me which rendered speech profanely
superfluous.
As I took my leave Professor Farrago came to the door of the
temporary, wooden office and handed me the letter written by the man
Halyard. I folded it and put it into my pocket, as Halyard might
require it for my own identification.
"How much does he want for the pair?" I asked.
"Ten thousand dollars. Don't demur--if the birds are really--"
"I know," I said, hastily, not daring to hope too much.
"One thing more," said Professor Farrago, gravely; "you know, in that
last paragraph of his letter, Halyard speaks of something else in the
way of specimens--an undiscovered species of amphibious biped--just
read that paragraph again, will you?"