THE CASK IN THE RIVER
From the cave to Borden’s Ford the advance was a continuous frolic. The
banks of the river were of rock and at places these closed in, making
little gorges through which the stream broke into rougher water. Now
and then there were places that might be called rapids. Particularly,
just below Borden’s Ford there was a long riffle over which the water
boiled and bubbled until it entered the gorge at Big Butternut. As
there was a sharp turn in this narrow defile the narrowed river swept
up in foam-crested waves.
Here, picnickers frequently spread their lunch. The younger folks
always lingered to throw sticks and logs down the riffle to see them
tossed about in the miniature whirlpool. From above the head of the
riffle there was boating as far as the quarry.
At Big Butternut Whirlpool the scampering Wolves came to a welcome
stop, with a general demand that the patrol be allowed to go in
swimming.
“That’s where there’s nothin’ doin’!” answered Connie. “I promised Mr.
Trevor that no one would be allowed to ‘shoot the rapids.’”
“You did?” shouted Art. “Well what’d we come for? He didn’t say nothin’
to me.”
“There was no need,” smiled Connie. “I’m the boss. That’ll do for all.”
“Did you bring a little knittin’ for us to do?” asked Davy Cooke
sarcastically.
“Can we go wadin’ up on the ford?” sneered Colly Craighead.
“We’re goin’ swimmin’ up above the ford,” answered Connie, unmoved by
these gibes, “as soon as we cool off. Then we’ll see if we can’t coax a
few bass into the fryin’ pan. I got a seine in my haversack. We’ll get
some minnies at the ford.” (By “minnies” Connie meant minnows.)
The stop at the whirlpool was not long. After hurling all loose wood
into the rushing gorge, the boys hurried to the ford and the near-by
clearing in the woods. Here, as at the cave, there were tables and
seats and remnants of many outings.
Running along the shore to this point, several boys made out a peculiar
object in the river, high up on the riffle and near the ford. The
object was dark and round. That it was not a rock, every boy knew. So
unusual was it in appearance that there was a general determination to
wade out and investigate.
“Looks like somethin’ that’s drifted down the river an’ got stuck,”
suggested Wart.
“Like a barrel,” was Leader Connie’s verdict.
“If it’s a barrel,” exclaimed Sammy Addington, “I wonder if it’s
anything in it?”
The squad had reached the ford by this time. Haversacks were dropped
and Art, Wart and Colly, pulling off their shoes and stockings, rushed
into the river. Connie, a little more dignified, walked down the bank
again, followed by most of the patrol.
“It’s a beer barrel,” were the first words from the investigators,
“full o’ nothin’.”
But the waders, glad to be in the splashing riffle, continued their
advance, twisting and balancing themselves on the slippery stones.
“There’s marks on it!” yelled Art a moment later. The keg was standing
end up and on a big flat stone. Its upper part was dry. As Art and
Wart reached it, one glance drew their heads downward for a closer
look. As the two boys grasped the head of the keg it slid off the rock
and fell on its side in the water. Art was excitedly waving his arms to
Connie and the others and yelling: “Come quick, all o’ you. It’s――” But
even in his excitement he could see Wart vainly attempting to hold the
cask with his scout staff.
[Illustration: THE MYSTERIOUS CASK]
“Stop it,” Art shouted. Then he too was floundering after the keg which
was bumping up and down. For a moment Wart’s staff caught and held the
cask. Then it rolled around the stick and into deeper water.
“She’s gone,” shouted Wart to those on shore. “Get her down below the
rapids. Run!”
Art did not despair at once. Springing forward in a deluge of spray
he tried to overtake the barrel. He thought he had it once and made
a final lunge. The slippery object spun about under the tips of his
fingers and the boy fell flat in the water. Before he could get to his
feet Wart splashed by him. He could just reach the cask with his stick.
But he could not hold it. Yet he slackened it until the drenched Art
rejoined him. By this time the water was well above each boy’s knees.
Suddenly the cask was caught by a new current and torn away from the
two staffs. It turned over several times in the deeper water as if
preparing for the swift journey through the whirlpool.
“Come on!” shouted Art to Wart. “Don’t let her get away. Let’s go with
her. Them kids may let her get away.”
Diving forward into the deepening current Art gave himself a quick
shove with his long staff and was off after the bobbing cask. Without
hesitation Wart followed, their new khaki shirts, neckties and scout
hats forgotten. It was a vain race.
When the keg shot into the twisting whirlpool its pursuers suddenly
found enough to do in caring for themselves. Connie was on the
right-hand bank of the gorge but the current set toward the left. He
yelled to the boys to keep to the right but the rush of the water bore
them to the opposite side. Connie and others of the boys lay on the
edge of the cut, reaching down with their staffs. But the stream-tossed
boys were beyond the reach of these and no one had time to cross the
gorge to the other side.
Midway, where the defile made an angle, the cork-like cask was hurled
against the rocky wall. The swimmers struck the same foam-covered
barrier an instant later. The barrel was not out of their minds. Each
boy kept his head off and each took the wall on his left shoulder.
Several times the swimmers struck and scraped against the rough rock,
buried in the spitting spray and the boiling current.
At the lower end of the gorge, where the river turned again into
shallower and quieter waters, most of the excited patrol members were
on the look-out. As the mysterious keg shot out of the foaming gorge
it was seized. In its wake came the exhausted Art and Wart. The boys
had suffered no damage, beyond black-and-blue shoulders and half-ruined
uniforms. But the dash through the gorge had been one attempted only by
the hardiest swimmers.
“Did you make it out?” panted Art as he caught his staff from a
rescuer. “Look on the end!”
The keg was rolled out on the sand and upended.
“The other end,” exclaimed Wart――his smart new “Baden-Powell” (as the
boys termed their hats) limp and his shirt clinging to him like a
second skin.
As the keg was reversed and the patrol crowded about, it could be seen
that a crude inscription had been made on its head. As one of the boys
dried the top with a handkerchief the marks seemed to have been carved
in the wood or possibly burned in with a hot iron. After a close look
Connie gasped:
“Wha――wha――how――?”
“It may ’a’ been buried,” exclaimed Art. “Mebbe way up in the wild
country and mebbe the river washed it up.”
“You can’t tell,” sputtered excited Colly Craighead. “I’ll bet you it’s
somepin’.”
“Anyway,” broke in Wart, “it’s ours――we found it, an’ ‘finders is
keepers.’”
The astounding inscription was this:
[Illustration: Jessie James Tresure
1901]
“If it’s money,” suggested Duke Easton, “mebbe we oughtn’t to take it.
Like as not it’s blood money.”
“Mebbe it’s jewlry,” broke in Sammy Addington. “If it is, we could
advertise it.”
“I can’t see how Jesse James would be hidin’ anything ’round here,”
spoke up Leader Connie. “I’ve read his life an’ history an’ bloody
deeds an’ he lived way out in Missouri where he done his robbin’.”
“You don’t reckon Round Rock River runs way out there, do you?” asked
Sammy. “I never heard where it comes from.”
“Say,” broke in Phil Abercrombie fired by a brilliant idea, “the
railroad goes acrost the river up at the old quarry. I’ll bet the gang
was on a train an’ they throwed the cask o’ treasure offen the train
so’s to hide it so they wouldn’t be no evidence.”
“In that case,” remarked Connie, “they’d hardly burn the name on the
barrel.”
“Mebbe it was their enimies ’at done that,” ventured the rebuffed Phil.
“Boys,” exclaimed Connie in a new tone. “I’m suspicious o’ this thing.
This ain’t no buried treasure cast up by the waves. Some one put it
where it was. It couldn’t ’a’ floated over the ford.”
“I don’t know about that,” exclaimed Art indignantly. “Who’d ’a’ put it
there? Ain’t no one around here to get excited over it.”
“We’re here,” replied Connie with a smile as he kicked the cask over on
its side.
“But who knowed we was comin’ here?” argued Art resentfully.
“For one,” went on Connie as he rolled the keg about, listening to
something pounding within, “Nick Apthorp knew, ’cause I told him where
we was comin’ and when we’d get here.”
“That settles it,” exclaimed Colly. “It’s a job. Let’s throw it back in
the river.”
“Not on your life!” shouted Art. “I’ve heard o’ smart guys ’at wouldn’t
pick up a pocket book with real money in it, ’cause it was first of
April.”
“An’ besides,” continued Connie, his smile even more pronounced, “the
head o’ this keg has been took out an’ put back. You can see the new
here. It ain’t been in the water long.”
“Always knockin’,” retorted Art. “Anyway, me and Wart found it. I guess
we’ll take it for ours, eh, Wart?” he added with a wink.
“You can have my share,” exclaimed Connie. “But if it was me I
wouldn’t touch it. I smell Goosetown all over that thing.”
For answer red-faced Art caught up a heavy boulder and dashed it
against the top of the beer keg. The head fell in and water splashed
out.
“It’s been leakin’,” he exclaimed. “I hope it ain’t spoiled what’s
inside.”
Colly Craighead was the first to peer within. Then he caught his nose
between his fingers and fled to Connie’s side without a word. As Art
raised the broken head of the cask Sammy Addington thrust his short
arm into the keg and drew out the dead body of “Wolf,” the fat little
yellow pup that the Goosetowners had led in insulting parade before the
Elm Streeters.
Art gave one quick sweeping glance about the place. If he expected to
find Nick Apthorp and his friends in spying ambush he was disappointed.
“All I got to say,” he exclaimed in an angry voice, “is that this
thing’s gone far enough. We stood for what they done marchin’ past us
the other day but I ain’t a-goin’ to stand for no more. This Boy Scout
business is all right but I ain’t a-goin’ to let these guys rub it in.”
“Say, Art,” spoke up Connie, coming forward, “you know what we’re goin’
to do to that gang before we get through with ’em?”
“We’re goin’ to make ’em dance to Miss Ginger!” exclaimed Art defiantly.
“We ain’t goin’ to do anything of the kind,” retorted Connie. “We’re
goin’ to give ’em rope like we been doin’ an’ when they get enough――”
“They’ll hang theirselves,” broke in Wart Ware.
“No,” went on Connie. “When they get to the end o’ the string they’ll
turn an’ eat out o’ our hands an’ be glad to.”
“What d’you mean?” growled Art.
“I mean they ain’t a bit worse’n we are only they’re dyin’ kind o’
hard.”
“I ain’t settin’ myself up for no goody-goody,” retorted Art. “But I
like to be half decent.”
“Then,” laughed Connie, “let’s bury poor little Wolf and forget it.”
Art and Wart Ware were really the only disgruntled boys. The others
took the incident as a joke. And by the time the noonday spread was
under way even the scouts who had shot the chutes began to forget
their chagrin. There was a long loaf after dinner, then an hour in
the water, and later the march was resumed to the quarry where the
automobiles were waiting for the trip homeward. Art did not tell his
parents of the episode of the treasure keg as he had of his purchase of
the aeroplane ticket.
The hike to Round Rock River only whetted the appetite of the Wolves.
Even on the way home they began discussing the details of next week’s
“camp out.” Sleeping in the open overnight, stories and songs by the
red camp fire, blankets to snuggle up in when it turned cool just
before dawn, the joys of sentinel duty where possibly the solitary
picket might have to stand his watch in the soft summer rain――protected
of course by his rain coat――were the things that enticed.
All the scouts were glad to hear that the injured boy was improving.
But it was not yet possible for any of his boy admirers to be admitted
into the sick room. The real preparation for the next outing was left
to Mr. Trevor, and he responded most satisfactorily. It was finally
arranged that the patrol was to start for Bluff Creek Thursday morning
and return Saturday evening. The boys were to walk both ways, the camp
equipage being carried in a single-horse cart loaned by Mr. Addington.
This had been a delivery wagon and it bore a dilapidated top, the
ornamentation of which was the legend on its sides:
STAPLE AND FANCY GROCERIES.
By Wednesday evening new strips of white muslin had covered these and
on the new field of white blazed the words:
SCOTTSVILLE BOY SCOUTS:
WOLF PATROL.
When the squad started Thursday morning Colly Craighead was in the
driver’s seat and the wagon bed behind him was crowded with tents,
poles, bedding, cooking utensils, dishes and, not the least in
importance or quantity, provisions both “staple and fancy.”
It was perhaps unfortunate that the direct road to Bluff Creek, east
of Scottsville, lay through the danger zone of Goosetown. No assault
from their old enemies was anticipated but it was certain that the
expedition would not pass unobserved. And it did not. While they were
crossing the railroad tracks a well-known voice greeted the joyous
party. It was that of Nick Apthorp, who was beginning the day with
a pipe and a bit of gossip, perched high in the air in the semaphore
signal tower.
“Hello, kids,” he exclaimed heartily. “Lookin’ for some more lost
treasure?” The result of their Round Rock River humor was of course
well known to the Coyotes long before this.
“You had a lot of courage to kill a little pup like that,” responded
Art instantly. “Take all of you to do it?”
“Nope,” responded Nick with a guffaw, “he died o’ grievin’ fur his
friends. What’s doin’?”
“We’re goin’ campin’ for a couple o’ days down to Bluff Creek,”
answered Connie. “Say, Nick,” he added, “this Boy Scout business is
great. We had a bully time down to Round Rock. We’re goin’ for two
weeks next month and have games.”
As the party passed on Nick sat gazing at it in silent thoughtfulness.