A SAIL ON THE LAKE.
IT IS beyond my power to describe Guy’s feelings at that moment. He had
never in his life been more grievously disappointed. It had never
occurred to him that anybody who knew anything would discourage his
project, much less the editors of his favorite journal, to whom he had
made a full revelation of his circumstances and troubles. And then there
was the expense, which greatly exceeded his calculations. That was the
great drawback.
“Humph!” soliloquized Guy, after he had thought the matter over, “the
man who wrote that article didn’t know my father and mother. If he did,
he wouldn’t be so positive that everything they do is for the best. I
know better, and won’t give up my idea. I am determined to succeed.
There are plenty of men who make a living and see any amount of sport by
hunting and trapping, and why shouldn’t I? Kit Carson is a real man and
so is Captain Bridges. So is Adams, the great grizzly bear tamer. One of
these days, when I am as famous as they are, I shall laugh to think I
_did_ become a professional hunter. But the money is what bothers me
now. I shall need at least three hundred dollars. Great Cæsar! Where am
I to get it? I’ve worked and scraped and saved for the last six months,
and I’ve got just fifteen dollars. That isn’t enough to buy a rifle.
Where is the rest to come from? That’s the question.”
Guy walked along with his hands behind his back and his eyes fastened
thoughtfully on the ground, revolving this problem in his mind. His
prospects did not look nearly so bright now as they did an hour ago. He
was learning a lesson we all have to learn sooner or later, and that is
that we cannot always have things as we want them in this world, and
that the best laid schemes are often defeated by some unlooked-for
event. Three hundred dollars! He never could earn that amount. His rags
brought him but two cents a pound, and although he kept a sharp lookout
and pounced upon every piece of cloth he found lying about the house, it
sometimes took him a whole month to fill his bag, which held just five
pounds. Old iron was worth only a cent a pound, and business in this
line was beginning to get very dull, for he had not found a single
horseshoe during the last two weeks, and he had purchased the last thing
in the shape of broken frying-pans and battered kettles that any of his
companions had to dispose of. He must find some other way to earn money.
He had thought of carrying papers, which would add a dollar and a
quarter a week to his income, besides what he would make out of his
Carriers’ Addresses on New Years. But Mr. Harris had vetoed that plan
the moment it was proposed.
Guy did not know what to do next.
“Dear me, am I not in a fix?” he asked himself. “I read in the paper the
other day of a boy picking up five thousand dollars that some banker
dropped in the street. Why wasn’t I lucky enough to find it? That banker
might have whistled for his money when once I got my hands upon it. I
_must_ have three hundred dollars and I don’t care how I get it.”
Guy was gradually working himself into a very dangerous frame of mind.
When one begins to talk to himself in this way it needs only the
opportunity to make a thief of him. If Guy thought of this, he did not
care, for he continued to reason thus, and was not at all alarmed when a
daring project suddenly suggested itself to him. Twenty-four hours ago
he would not have dared to ponder upon it; but now he allowed his
thoughts to dwell upon it, and the longer he turned it over in his mind
the more firmly he became convinced that it was a splendid idea and that
it could be successfully carried out. He wanted to get away by himself
and look at the matter in all its bearings. With this object in view he
turned down Erie Street and bent his steps toward Buck’s boat-house,
intending to spend an hour or two on the lake. In that time he believed
he could make up his mind what was best to be done.
Arriving at the boat-house, Guy entered and accosted the proprietor, who
stood behind his bar dispensing liquor and cigars to a party of
excursionists who had just returned from a sail on the lake.
“Mr. Buck, is the Quail in?” asked Guy, giving the name of his favorite
sail-boat.
“Yes, she is,” replied a voice at his elbow; “but what do you want with
her?”
Guy recognized the voice and turned to greet the speaker. He was a boy
about his own age, who sat cross-legged in an arm-chair beside the door,
his hat pushed on the side of his head rowdy fashion, one hand holding a
copy of a sporting paper, and the other a lighted cigar, at which he was
puffing industriously. His name was Robert Walker. He was a low-browed,
black-haired fellow, and although by no means ill-looking, there was
something in his face that would have told a stranger at the first
glance that he was what is called a “hard customer.” And his looks were
a good index of his character and reputation. He was known as one of the
worst boys in the neighborhood in which Guy lived. Parents cautioned
their sons against associating with him, for he would fight, smoke,
swear like any old sailor, and it was even whispered about among the
boys belonging to the Brown Grammar School that he had been seen rather
the worse for the beer he had drank. But Guy had always admired Bob; he
was such a free and easy fellow! Besides, he knew so much that boys of
his age have no business to know, that he was looked upon even by such
youths as Henry Stewart as a sort of oracle. He and Guy represented two
different classes of boys—one having been spoiled by excessive
indulgence, and the other by unreasonable severity.
Robert’s father was Mr. Harris’ cashier and book-keeper, and the two
families would have been intimate had not Bob been in the way. The
fathers and mothers visited frequently, but the boys never did; their
parents always tried to keep them apart. But in spite of this they were
often seen together on the streets, and a sort of friendship had sprung
up between them. This was the boy Guy wanted for a companion on his
runaway expedition, now that Henry Stewart had declined his invitation.
“The Quail is in,” continued Bob, extending his hand to Guy, who shook
it cordially, “but you are just a minute too late. Mr. Buck is going to
get her out for me as soon as he is done serving these gentlemen.
However, seeing it is you, I’ll take you along, and we can divide the
expenses between us.”
“All right,” replied Guy. “Do you know that you are just the fellow I
want to see?”
“Anything particular?” asked Bob, knocking the ashes from his cigar.
“Yes, very particular.”
“Well, that’s curious. During the last week I have had something on my
mind that I wanted to speak to you about—it’s a secret, too, and one
that I wouldn’t mention to any fellow but you—but somehow I couldn’t
raise courage enough to broach the subject. We’ll go out on the lake
where we can say what we please without danger of being overheard. Let’s
take a drink before we go. Come on.”
“I am obliged to you,” answered Guy, “but I never drink.”
“Take a cigar, then.”
“No, I don’t smoke.”
“Nonsense. Be a man among men. Give me some beer, Mr. Buck. Take a glass
of soda, Guy. That won’t hurt you, and it is a temperance drink, too.”
Guy leaned his elbows on the counter and thought about it. This was a
temptation that he had never been subjected to before. What would his
father say if he yielded to it? But, on the whole, what difference did
it make to him whether his father liked it or not? He was going away
from home to be a hunter, and from what he had read he inferred that
hunters did not refuse a glass when it was offered to them. If he was
going among Romans, and expected to hold a high place among them, he
must follow their customs. So he said he would take a bottle of soda,
and when it was poured out for him he, not understanding the etiquette
of the bar-room, watched Bob and followed his motions—bumped his glass
on the counter, said “Here are my kindest regards,” and drank it off.
“Now,” said Bob, smacking his lips over his beer, “we’re all ready. I’ve
got half a dollar’s worth of cigars in my pocket, and they will last us
until we get back.”
The boys followed Mr. Buck out of the house, and along a narrow wooden
pier, on each side of which were moored a score or more of row and
sail-boats of all sizes and models. When they reached the place where
the Quail was lying they clambered down into her, Mr. Buck cast off the
painter, and the little vessel moved away. Guy never forgot the hour he
spent on the lake that day. A week afterward he would have given the
world, had he possessed it, to be able to wipe it out or live it over
again.
As the harbor was long and narrow and the wind unfavorable, considerable
maneuvering was necessary, and for the first few minutes the attention
of Guy and his companion was so fully occupied with the management of
their craft that they could find no opportunity to begin the discussion
of the subject uppermost in their minds. But when they rounded the
light-house pier and found themselves fairly on the lake, Bob resigned
the helm to Guy, and relighting his cigar, which he had allowed to go
out, stretched himself on one of the thwarts, and intimated that he was
ready to listen to what his friend had to say, adding:
“You may think it strange, but I believe I can tell you, before you
begin, what you want to talk about.”
“You can!” exclaimed Guy. “What makes you think so?”
“The way you act, and the pains you are taking to make money. Does your
father know that you are a dealer in rags and old iron?”
“Of course not.”
“I thought so. What do you want with the little money you are able to
make in that way? You don’t see any pleasure with it, for you never
spend a cent. What are you going to do with that powder-horn you’ve got
hung up in your curiosity shop? It is of no use to you, for your father
won’t allow you to own a gun. And then there’s that lead bullet-ladle,
rubber blanket, and cheese-knife. They are not worth the room they
occupy as long as you stay here. But you are laying your plans to run
away from home, young man—that’s what you are up to. Indeed, you have
almost as good as said so in my hearing two or three different times.”
“Well, it’s a fact, and there’s no use in denying it,” said Guy. “You
won’t blow on me?”
“Certainly not. That’s just what I wanted to see about, for I am going
to do the same thing myself.”
“Are you? Give us your hand. We’ll go together. I’m going to be a
hunter.”
“I know you are; I’ve heard you say so. I had some idea of becoming a
sailor, but since I have thought the matter over I have made up my mind
that your plan is the best. If one goes to sea he has to work whenever
he is ordered, whether he feels likes it or not; but if he lives in the
woods he is his own master, and can do as he pleases. Have you any
definite plan in your head?”
“Yes. As soon as I get money enough. I am going to step aboard a
propeller some dark night and go to Chicago. I can travel cheaper by
water than I can by land, you know, and money is an object, I tell you.
From Chicago I shall go to St. Joseph, purchase a horse and whatever
else I may need, join some wagon train that is going to California, and
when I reach the mountains and find a place that suits me, I’ll stop
there and go to hunting.”
“That’s a splendid plan,” said Bob with enthusiasm. “It is much better
than going to sea. When do you intend to start?”
“Ah! that’s just what I don’t know. I find by a paper I bought this
morning that I shall need at least three hundred dollars; and that’s
more than I can ever raise.”
“By a paper you bought!” repeated Bob.
“Yes; there it is,” said Guy, taking it from his pocket and tossing it
toward his companion. “You see I wrote to the editors, telling them just
how I am situated and what I intend to do, and they answered my letter
this week. Look for ‘An Abused Boy’ in the correspondents’ column, and
you will see what they said.”
After a little search Bob found the paragraph in question, and settled
back on his elbow to read it.
When he finished, the opinion he expressed concerning it was the same
Guy had formed when he first read it.
“It is rather discouraging, isn’t it?” asked the latter.
“Not to me,” answered Bob. “These editors don’t know any more than
anybody else. Why should they? In the first place the man who wrote this
is not acquainted with our circumstances; and in the next, he is not so
well posted on the price of some things as I am. He says a rifle will
cost twenty-five dollars. Pat Smith has a cart-load of them, good ones,
too, that you can buy for twelve dollars apiece.”
“Is that so?” asked Guy.
“Yes; and after we get through with our sail we’ll go around and look at
them. He has hunting-knives, which he holds at a dollar and a quarter. I
know, because I asked the price of them. Blankets are not worth more
than five dollars per pair; and if you take steerage passage on the
steamer and a second-class ticket from Chicago you can go through to St.
Joseph for twenty-five dollars. Then how are you going to spend the rest
of your three hundred? Not for a horse, certainly; for I have heard
father say that when he went to California in ’49 he bought a very good
mustang for thirty dollars. However,” added Bob, “it will be well enough
to have plenty of money, for we don’t want to get strapped, you know.”
“But where is it to come from?” asked Guy.
“I know. I have been thinking it over during the last week, and I know
just how to go to work. Perhaps you won’t like it, and if you don’t you
can go your way and I’ll go mine. Here, smoke a cigar while I tell you
about it.”
“No, no! I can’t smoke.”
“What will you do when we are in the mountains? There’ll be plenty of
stormy days when we can’t hunt or trap, and you’ll need a pipe or cigar
for company.”
“It will be time enough for me to learn after I get to be a hunter.”
“Perhaps it is just as well,” returned Bob, after a moment’s reflection.
“If I carry out my plans you will have to help me, and you will need a
clear head to do it. Listen now and I will tell you what they are.”
Bob once more settled back on his elbow, and to Guy’s intense amazement
proceeded to unfold the details of the very scheme for raising funds
which he himself had had in contemplation when he came to Mr. Buck’s
boat-house, and which Bob proposed should be put into execution at once,
that very day.
Guy trembled with excitement and apprehension while he listened, and
nothing but the coolness and confidence with which his companion spoke
kept him from backing out. He had always imagined that the day for the
carrying out of his wild idea was in the far future, and from a distance
he could think of it calmly; but if Bob’s plans were successful they
would be miles and miles away ere the next morning’s sun arose, and with
the brand of _thief_ upon their brows.
He begun to realize now what running away meant. He did not once think
of his home—there was scarcely a pleasant reminiscence connected with it
that he could recall—but now that the great world into which he had
longed to throw himself seemed so near, he shrunk back afraid. This
feeling quickly passed away.
The wild, free life of which he had so often dreamed seemed so bright
and glorious, and his present manner of living seemed so dismal by
contrast that, feeling as he did, he could not be long in choosing
between them. He fell in with Bob’s plans and caught not a little of his
enthusiasm. He even marked out the part he was to play in the scene
about to be enacted, making some suggestions and amendments that Bob was
prompt to adopt.
The matter was all settled in half an hour later, and the Quail came
about and stood toward the pier. When she landed and the boys entered
the boat-house, Bob reminded Guy that it was his turn to stand treat.
The latter was prompt to respond, and won a nod of approval from his
companion by calling for a glass of beer.
Having settled their bill at the boat-house the boys started for the
gunsmith’s. There they spent twenty minutes in looking at the various
weapons and accouterments they thought they might need during their
career in the mountains, and Bob excited the astonishment of his friend
by selecting a couple of rifles, as many hunting-knives, powder-horns,
bullet-pouches and revolvers, and requesting the gunsmith, with whom he
seemed to be well acquainted, to put them aside for him, promising to
call in an hour and pay for them.
“Isn’t that carrying things a little too far?” asked Guy when they were
once more on the street. “What if we should slip up in our
arrangements?”
“But I don’t intend to slip up,” returned Bob confidently. “There’s no
need of it. Why, Guy, what makes your face so pale?”
“I feel nervous,” replied the latter honestly.
“Now don’t go to giving away to such feelings, for if you do you will
spoil everything. Remember that our success depends entirely upon you.
If I fail in doing my part the fault will be yours. But I must leave you
here, for it won’t be safe for us to be seen together. If you are going
to back out do it now before it is too late.”
“I’m not going to do anything of the kind. I’ll stick to you through
thick and thin.”
“All right. Remember now that when the South Church clock strikes one I
will be on the corner above your father’s store, and shall expect to
find you there all ready to start.”
“You may depend upon me,” replied Guy. “I’ll be there if I live.”
The two boys separated and moved away in nearly opposite directions,
their feelings being as widely different as the courses they were
pursuing. Bob, cool and careless, walked off whistling, stopping now and
then to exchange a pleasant nod with an acquaintance, while Guy was as
pale as a sheet and trembled in every limb. It seemed to him that every
one he met looked sharply at him, and with an expression which seemed to
say his secret was known. He felt like a criminal; and actuated by a
desire to get out of sight of everybody, and that as speedily as
possible, he broke into a run, and in a few minutes reached his home.
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