[1] Copyright, 1925, by Stewart Edward White.
Somewhere along the British Columbia coast a well-found schooner
yacht moved in a thick, lazy mist. Glenn Walker, the owner thereof,
Aline, his comparatively recent wife, and Jimmy Forbes, together with
the mate, were all gathered about the wheel, combining their skill
and knowledge. The crow's nest aloft was occupied by a lookout man.
A sailor near the after hatch at intervals worked a crank that
actuated a bellows that, in turn, emitted a long, hollow groan. In
addition, Walker from time to time pulled the air-whistle cord. Then
the entire yacht fell silent, and everybody listened intently for an
echo that should indicate the proximity of islands and rocks.
Throughout all the ship's company was that nervous, intent, uneasy
alertness that is aroused only by a fog in uncertain, broken, or
unknown waters. Even Sam, the negro cook, had deserted his galley
and, an unusual solemnity adding a quite superfluous shadow to his
countenance, was gazing ahead.
"The worst of it is these confounded currents," observed Walker
impatiently, breaking the silence. "You can figure out where you
ought to be all right, but you can't tell where the currents may have
set you! We ought to be hearing from Disaster Point about now." He
pulled the whistle cord. All listened. Nothing! "Nice, cheerful
optimist named this country!" he grumbled. "Disaster Point;
Desolation Sound; Wreck Reef; Beware Passage; Destruction Point;
Grief Point----"
Nobody replied. All understood that the skipper was merely relieving
pressure.
The sailor mechanically cranked his machine. In answer to its hoarse
shout a booming bellow blared through the mist dead ahead. Walker's
hand jerked to the engine-room bell. The yacht came to a quivering
standstill. The water fell quiet under her counter as the reverse
ceased to operate. She lay gently rocking in the smooth swell. All
listened.
Nothing! Walker waved his hand toward the sailor operating the fog
horn.
It squawked; and almost immediately was answered from out the mists.
"No lighthouses up here, as I remember it," stated Walker, but in a
note of inquiry.
"No, sir; none," rejoined the mate positively.
"Doesn't sound like any ship's foghorn I ever heard, though."
"No, sir; more like a fixed signal."
The mate took two steps to their own foghorn, thrust the sailor
aside, and manipulated the crank, one long blast, followed by three
short ones. After a short interval he was answered; but, as before,
only by the single long-drawn-out note.
"Private signal; not in the books," he explained. "But everyone
navigating this coast knows it. Either that fellow's a cod-headed
fool or we're up against a fixed signal."
"Maybe it's a new establishment," suggested Jimmy Forbes.
"What I was thinking, sir. But why isn't it reported in this year's
'Information for Mariners'? They don't grow these things overnight."
Walker rang again, and the yacht's auxiliary engines fell silent.
"I don't hear any engine," he voiced the result of a short interval
of listening. "I'd better start up again and keep under control."
He signaled the engineer, and the yacht began to creep forward at a
snail's pace.
Jimmy Forbes and Aline sauntered forward to the bitts. Jimmy
clenched his pipe in his teeth, his hands were deep in his pockets,
and his face was alight. She glanced up at him.
"What is it?" she asked, struck by his expression.
"My psychic antennæ are vibrating," said he. "I smell adventure."
"Fog thinning aloft, sir," came the sailor's voice from the crow's
nest.
The invisible horn continued to blare at intervals, but the exact
direction or distance of its source was rendered uncertain by the
peculiar and baffling acoustic properties of the fog. At each
repetition everybody aboard the yacht strained his ears, and at each
silence exchanged low-voiced opinions, all different.
With the shattering effect of an explosion the lookout man's voice
came again from aloft. The effect was of the release from a spell, a
pearl-gray clogging muffled spell cast on sight and sound by the
spirit of the fog.
"Cow ho!" cried he.
A moment's incredulous silence was broken by an exasperated bellow of
inquiry from both Walker and his mate.
"Cow ho!" the sailor obligingly repeated.
"You triple idiot," shouted Walker, "what are you talking about?"
"It's a cow, sir," explained the lookout man.
"I can see her above the fog. She's standing on a sort of high peak
of rock that sticks up. Five points to sta'board, sir. She's a
spotted cow," he added after a moment, "and she's got a calf with
her."
"What in the name of Peter the Hermit do you suppose I care for her
color or her calf?" roared Walker, exasperated.
The mate was already eagerly searching the chart.
"It must be this little group here, sir," he indicated. "We've been
set west'ard by the tides."
"No bottom at ten," sang out the leadsman, who unbidden had cast his
lead.
In the bow Aline was looking at her chuckling brother. "You knew it
was a cow!" she accused him.
"I told you my psychic antennæ were quivering. You see, each and
every living thing has its own special aura which it emanates, or in
the midst of which it lives, so to speak. When two living things
come near enough to one another the auras contact or perhaps slightly
intermingle. One who--like me--is sensitive or especially trained in
the occult lore of the East is aware of the fact, and may even
identify the nature of that aura. It's very simple." He caught her
accusing eye. "And then, too," he continued, "it sounded like a cow."
The fog continued to thin overhead, while still remaining opaque
below, as is often the habit of fogs. Dazzling bits of sky became
visible, like blue jewels set in cotton wool. Those on deck shortly
became possessed of the vision that had earlier been vouchsafed the
lookout man, nearer heaven. On a flat-topped spire of rock stood a
veritable spotted cow, with a smaller but gangle-legged replica of
herself snuggled alongside. The spire lifted sheer from the rolling
fog clouds below. Its top was perhaps ten feet across; its sides
apparently almost precipitous. The cow was as though upon an altar.
There needed only a few seraphim or cherubim leaning their chins over
the clouds below to complete an entirely appropriate setting. The
idea was put forward by Aline.
"Should the cherubim be small chubby calves' heads with wings?" she
inquired. "Or perhaps little fat pigs?"
Appropriate leisure for the admiration of the spectacle was, however,
denied them. The spell was broken by the sudden appearance alongside
of an agitated man in a small boat. He was a stockily built person,
with a round red face, a shock of brown hair, and an anxious and
serious eye.
"Say," he called without preliminary, "can some of you fellows help
me with my cow?"
"What's the matter with your cow?" asked Walker.
"I can't get her down. She's clumb up atop and she can't get down.
I never knew a more gentle cow, but I can't do nothing with her. She
never acted this way before. Something must have scared her; and
then she had her calf, and now she's gone crazy. If my piston-rod
bearing hadn't give out, me and my partner'd have done something, but
as it is she ain't had a drop or a bite for two days except what I've
got up to her, and what with a new calf--by golly, you fellers come
along just right!"
"With the permission of the owner, here," struck in Jimmy, who, in
common with the entire yacht's company was leaning over the rail, "I
would propose that you come on deck and embroider with the glittering
high lights of lucidity your suggestive but somewhat obscure
narrative."
The man stared at him. "Huh?" he ejaculated.
"Come aboard and have a drink and tell us about it."
The owner of the cow, painter in hand, immediately swarmed over the
side. The attentive steward dived below to reappear with a bottle
and glasses.
"Better drop your hook," suggested the stranger, his eye on the
bottle.
"Is there good bottom here?" queried Walker doubtfully.
"Sure. And good shelter. You're in Graveyard Cove."
"By the mark, seven!" sang out the leadsman hastily.
"Let go the anchor!" commanded Walker sharply.
"The cow," Jimmy Forbes was observing, "is, as perhaps you know, a
sacred animal among the Hindus. It therefore possesses for me, as a
humble Follower of the Path, a peculiar interest and significance.
The sight of one of these animals elevated to a position that I can
only regard as symbolical is significant of more than chance. I can
see in this concatenation of circumstances an interweaving of the
threads of Karma which may----"
"Give me that bottle!" Aline interrupted him severely.
She removed the cork and handed it, together with a tall glass from
the tray, to the newcomer. Jimmy sighed.
"Blinded," he murmured--"not so particularly to my occult lore as to
the alcoholic habits of the local native."
The glass was intended for high-balls, the soda for which was ready
on the tray. The man filled it three fourths full of whisky. This
he at once prepared to drink.
"Don't you take any water?" gasped Aline.
"Not if the whisky is good, ma'am."
He drank it in long gulps, set down the glass without a shudder and,
thus fortified, gave an account of himself. He lived, it seems, with
his partner on another small island a few miles distant. They ran a
cattle ranch. Jimmy pricked up his ears at this statement.
"How many head of stock have you?" he asked.
"Eleven," said the man. "We had twelve last year, but we killed one
for beef."
The spotted cow, being about to calve, and the grass becoming scant
on the "ranch" the idea had occurred to him to transfer her to this
island for better forage, and he did so.
"How?" asked Aline.
"In my gas boat, ma'am."
"But how?"
"I just put her in the cockpit and brought her over."
"I don't see how in the world----"
"It was easy enough, ma'am. I never knew a more gentle cow. Only
trouble was, it was choppy and she got seasick some."
The crossing and the landing had been successfully accomplished. All
seemed to be going well. Then trouble began.
The cow, after falling too eagerly on the new feed, had been seized
by a sudden panic.
"I can't think what ailed her," complained the man. "There wa'n't
nothing I could see to scare her. But she begun to run around and
bellow and curl her tail, and I couldn't do nothing with her nohow.
And she's the gentlest critter I ever see. I quit trying to get nigh
her, because I didn't want her to run around and get het up--she with
her calf, you see--but that didn't do no good. And how she done it,
I don't know, but somehow she managed to scramble right up to the top
of the island. Why, a goat couldn't hardly make it! Once she got up
there she quieted down, but there she was! She can't get down nohow,
and I can't figger no way to get her down. She's had her calf up
there, and there ain't no food or water, so I had to carry up what I
could, and she just stands there and bellers. And then when I
started to go get my partner to figger something out, my engine
breaks down; and I ain't got no small boat with me, and there I am."
"In your estimate of your cattle holdings, did you include the calf?"
inquired Jimmy.
"Huh?"
"Have you eleven head counting or not counting the calf?"
"The calf makes twelve."
"What on earth has that to do with it?" demanded Aline.
"I was just figuring whether it meant a nine or an eight and a half
per cent loss," submitted her brother meekly. "At any rate, a heavy
loss for any large industry."
The stranger looked at Jimmy suspiciously, but otherwise ignored him.
"You can just bet I was glad to hear you fellows whistling," he
concluded his narrative.
The fog was now returning into the invisible. There was no motion,
just a withdrawal as though into a fourth dimension without
disturbance of the three in which we live. The surroundings were
becoming distinguishable.
The yacht was shortly seen to be at anchor in a crescent-shaped bight
with long rocky arms on either side. A sparsely wooded shore rose
close by in a series of low rocky terraces to the central spire on
the top of which stood the spotted cow and her calf. The spire was
perhaps ten feet high above the last terrace, and seemed to afford
various small hand- or footholds in the shape of miniature ledges and
crevices, but would appear to be, as the cow's owner had said,
problematically scalable to even the skiptious goat.
"Do you mean to say that cow actually climbed up there?" demanded
Walker, after surveying the situation.
"I don't think she flew," said the man, and he said it seriously,
which pleased Aline.
"Well, let's go ashore and look things over," suggested Walker. "I
expect we'll have to help out."
"Any objection to the men landing, sir?" inquired the mate. "Good
chance to stretch their legs."
"None. But leave one aboard."
The small boats were put overside, and shortly the ship's crew stood
on the island. They ascended by a series of broad shallow terraces,
where they grouped themselves at the foot of the spire and looked up.
The cow looked down.
"It's plain enough where she got up," observed Walker after a
pause--"she could do it if she scrambled hard and kept scrambling.
And it's equally plain why she doesn't get down. But I believe she
might be led if it were done carefully."
"I figured that," agreed the cow's owner, "if she'd come down gentle;
but she's all het up and excited. And she's the gentlest critter I
ever see. You can do anything with her. But now I can't even get a
rope on her."
A deprecating cough called attention to the steward.
"Beg pardon, sir, but, if I might try? You see, sir, I was cow hand
for two years in the Argentine pampas, and I learned methods."
"A hundred and sixty-seven," murmured Aline.
Jimmy raised an inquiring eyebrow in her direction.
"It's Johnston's age," she explained to him aside, "according to the
number of years he says he has done different things. He was a
hundred and sixty-five yesterday."
Receiving permission, the steward procured a rope and rapidly climbed
to the miniature plateau, to the farther edge of which the cow
promptly retired with her calf behind her.
"You see," he said modestly, addressing the multitude from his
vantage point, "it's partly confidence and partly secret master words
which have been known to animal tamers from time immemorial."
"If you know any secret master words, you'd better say them quick,"
warned Forbes suddenly.
Without waiting for the secret words, and disregarding the confidence
entirely, the cow uttered a bellow and dashed at the steward. The
latter, caught unawares by this unsportsmanlike conduct, recovered
his wits only in time to dodge sidewise and escape impalement by the
skin of his teeth. Now ensued a brief but lively game of tag within
most inadequate boundaries. The cow was It, but seemed likely not
long to remain so. Before the spectators could either formulate an
idea for rescue or even make a move toward it, Johnston, escaping
death thrice by a hand-breadth, was seen to topple for a moment on
the far edge, throw up his hands, and disappear.
Cries and movements. Above the confusion rose the roaring voice of
the cow's owner:
"Can he swim?"
Several voices answered him in the affirmative.
"Then he's all right. The cliff is straight up on that side into
deep water. They's no rocks there."
Two men tumbled into the dinghy and rowed madly around the nearer of
the two points. Suspended action for a short interval. Shortly it
reappeared, and all could see that Johnston sat now in the stern
sheets, streaming sea water. His remarks could not be distinguished
at the distance, but from his posture, gestures, and the sound of his
voice it was evident that he was addressing the spotted cow.
"Undoubtedly the secret words, though a trifle belated," observed
Jimmy. "The creature should now be quite tamed."
"I never see her act up so before," said the cow's owner. "She's the
gentlest critter----"
"Well," urged Walker genially, "any more volunteers? Any more
buckaroos in this outfit?"
He ran his eye over the crew, grinning cheerfully at them. They
grinned back, glanced at one another, shook their heads.
"No? Well, come on, boys, let's see what we can do."
He was warming up to the situation. He had been sitting on a rock,
like Aline and his brother-in-law, as a spectator. Now he rose and
became the central figure--with due deference to the cow.
"Johnston has the right idea--in a way," said he. "The first thing
is to get a rope on her. Got to get hold of her. I don't know much
about cows, but I do know that with a rope around the base of the
horns you can do most anything with them, and around the neck is no
good. That right?" he asked the cow's owner. "By the way, what's
your name?"
"My name's Teller. Yes, that's right."
"Any of you men throw a lariat? No? How about you? You're a
ranchman."
"I ain't never tried."
"Well, I can't either--to amount to much. But I've had to catch my
horse a few times down in the cow country. Get me a stout line. I
think I can make a running noose."
Armed with his impromptu lasso, he started toward the rock.
"You aren't going up there?" cried Aline, alarmed.
"Don't worry; I have the greatest respect for the old girl."
He made his way to a point just below the little plateau, assured
himself of a good foothold, whirled the loop around his head, cowboy
fashion, and began to cast. The cow backed away to the far edge,
planted her feet and snorted. The position was awkward, Walker's
skill negligible, and the cow proved to be unexpectedly clever in
ducking. Again and again he hurled the rope, dragged it back empty,
and reformed the loop. Sometimes the loop would not spread,
sometimes the rope fell short, at encouraging moments it fell across
the cow, twice it actually settled over the horns and the attentive
bystanders uttered a yell, but before Walker in his unfavorable
position could take in the slack the cow lowered her head and flipped
her horns and the wide loop slipped off. By now the sun was shining
brightly. Walker took off his coat and wiped his brow.
"Gosh, this is hot work!" he remarked.
After the hundredth cast or so, he paused for a rest.
"I'm afraid I'm no Buffalo Bill," he confessed after another series
of failures. "One of you row off and tell that ineffable ass,
Johnston, to come back--to come ashore and have a try at this. He
ought to know how to throw a lasso if he was with the Argentine
Gauchos for two years."
While one of the men was gone in the dinghy Walker leaned against the
rock, resting. Presently the emissary returned.
"Johnston says they didn't lasso them down where he was," reported
the man, grinning. "He says they used bolos."
"Humph!" grunted Walker. "He's better read than I imagined."
He took up the rope again and hurled the loop carelessly and
disgustedly in the general direction of the cow. It settled about
the animal's horns.
"Stand by!" "Haul her!" "Take in your slack!" broke out a chorus of
yells.
The loop tightened. Walker descended from his elevated perch,
bringing with him the end of the long line.
"Now you've got her, what are you going to do with her?" murmured
Forbes.
But Walker, now wholly in the spirit of solving a difficult problem,
had his ideas.
"Get the calf down, and she'll follow of her own accord," he replied
promptly. "Here, some of you fellows take the end of the rope and
keep her from charging at me, and I'll see what can be done."
The cow securely tethered to one end of the plateau, Walker ventured
to mount to the other. Then ensued a game first of
blandishment--futile--then of dodge. The calf had been instructed by
Mother to view all proceedings with suspicion; on no account to do
anything he was expected to do; and to distrust all creatures that
did not progress on four legs. Infantile as he was, the calf had
understood and obeyed perfectly, a wonderful example to the young
independents of other species.
"That won't work," confessed Walker at length, descending the cliff.
"If you did get the calf, probably the cow wouldn't be calm enough to
pick her way down so difficult a path," consoled Aline. "Your
flannels are a sight!"
"There's something in that," assented Walker. "Darn my flannels."
"She's always been the gentlest critter I ever----"
"Well, she's reformed now," Walker cut him short. "Any suggestions,
anybody?"
The two groups had gradually drawn together until now master and crew
were gathered close. Nobody said anything for a moment.
"How about shoving her off the side where Johnston took the high
dive?" at length ventured one of the men.
"She'd bust herself wide open falling from that high up!" hastily
interposed Teller in alarm.
"How about shoving her off and then lowering her down with the rope
around her horns, then?" amended the author of the suggestion.
"We could all tail onto the rope on this side, run it over the top,
and then slack away," interposed another.
They gathered in a close group and discussed ways and means. It was
agreed that a roller of some kind would be needed to pass the rope
over so it would not chafe through. Also some sort of padded poles
for the shoving. Nobody seemed to fancy doing any shoving with the
naked hands. Also a selected squad to shove, and another to pull.
The plan gathered complications, fantastic nautical complications of
men accustomed to the sea but not to cows. Teller, who had been
listening with more and more bewilderment, finally dashed the whole
scheme.
"With her scraping and bumping down that clift," said he, "she'd
break a leg sure."
"We'll have to rig some sort of crane to sling her from," put in the
mate, who had heretofore remained silent. "Then we can run her over
and let her down easy."
"That's the idea!" cried Walker.
A new committee of the whole was formed. Three men held the cow back
by the rope while all the rest swarmed up the cliff to examine the
engineering possibilities. Cranes were more in line with a
sailorman's experience. The matter of a suitable foundation and
pivot was soon determined. There would need to be two stout timbers;
one upright and firmly guyed; the other attached loosely to its foot
like a boom. A block on the end of each through which ropes could be
rove would permit manipulation either up or down or sidewise. Then
reeve the cow's rope through the end of the boom, hoist her off her
feet, sling her sidewise into space, and lower away!
This masterpiece of planning by a dozen eagerly interested small
boys--for this is what they had all become--was no sooner rounded out
in all details than an obvious and damning fact ruined it. On the
little island there grew no trees big enough to furnish materials!
There were no trees big enough--so Teller admitted--on any of the
islands near by.
At this realization a consternation blank of everything but baffled
irritation fell upon the spirits of the multitude. With one accord
all stared at the cow; with one accord all cursed the cow. One or
two even cursed Teller for daring to own the cow. Teller was quite
meek, but very anxious and worried; and only muttered that she was
the gentlest cow he had ever known. Which, of course, helped.
"Better shoot the fool and use her up for beef and be done with it!"
sighed Walker wearily.
Into this lull obtruded the splash of oars. It had not been noticed
that some time previous Sam had withdrawn. Now he was to be seen, in
full white regalia, his bulk nearly filling the little dinghy,
placidly paddling to shore. He beached his craft, deliberately
shipped his oars, heaved himself on the strand, and approached.
"Lunching," he remarked with dignity, "is served. Gittin' cows down
offen rocks is no job on an empty stummick."
"Good Lord! It's two o'clock!" cried Walker, glancing at his wrist
watch, "Sam has the right idea. Get aboard and feed."
The cow, released from pressure, advanced to the edge of the little
plateau, dragging her rope after her. She stared down at them with
the unfocused bulging-eyed imbecility of the rattled bovine.
"Bla-a-a-a!" she bellowed, and in the cry there seemed to be a note
of sneering scorn.
"Make it snappy!" ordered Walker. "A half hour. Teller, you go
aboard and eat with the men. I'm going to get that cow down if it
takes a leg!"
Lunch was, to Sam's scandal, quite devoid of customary formalities.
Walker swallowed his food hastily and without further comment. Then
suddenly he bellowed for Johnston.
That astonished individual, accustomed to being summoned gently and
electrically as though by the lascivious pleasings of a lute, popped
in with unwonted haste.
"Bring that man Teller in here--the cow man," commanded Walker.
"In here, sir?"
"I said here!"
Johnston popped out again, looking slightly scandalized.
"Sit down," invited Walker when the ranchman had been ushered in.
"Tell me, how deep is the water on the other side of the island just
under the cliff?"
"It's about eight or ten fathom."
"Sure?"
"Yes, I've caught cod there."
"Any rock or shoals?"
"No, she runs off sheer and clean."
"How close in could a craft like this get?"
"Lord, you could tie up to the clift if you wanted to."
Walker hit the table with satisfaction.
"All right," he cried. "I've got it! It's as simple as falling off
a log. We'll take the yacht around there right under the confounded
cow. We'll use our mainmast as our upright and our main boom as the
spar."
"You can't raise it high enough," interposed Forbes quickly.
"Can't, eh? Well, to make sure, we'll hoist it and chock it high
enough up."
"It'll mar your mast."
"Hang the mast! I wish it was taller. We can't hoist her clear, but
we can pull her off sideways and catch her weight as she comes off
the plateau. It'll work perfectly, if only the weather will continue
calm."
He was as eager as a boy. Leaping from his seat, he ran on deck.
The crew, already fed, were up from below.
"I've got it worked out," he told them rapidly, and detailed his
scheme.
"They's nigh a twenty-foot tide in these waters, sir," said the mate,
"so if you pull her off at high tide you'd gain that much on her."
"Good man!" cried Walker. The mate had already dived for the
tide-tables. They flipped the pages. "Here we are, Port Simpson--it
won't be far off Port Simpson--tides here--high water 19.7 feet at
22:48--why in blazes don't they say 10:48 P.M. and be done with it?
We can't do it to-day. It's 19.5 feet to-morrow morning. We'll do
it then. It'll take us the rest of the day to get rigged, anyway."
Walker underestimated the activity of sailormen at work on a job they
really understand and in a cause that has enlisted their fervent
interest. The boom was raised a little higher up the mast; the gaff
was unshipped and lashed to the boom where it would lend most
support; the necessary blocks and running gear were installed; the
contraption was swung and tested and pronounced satisfactory by the
middle of the first dogwatch. Satisfied that nothing more could be
done until the next day, Walker went below to remove the signs of
toil.
But shortly appeared Teller from the shore, where he had been
thrusting some fodder and a pail of water up to the plateau. He had
a new and disconcerting idea, which was that it was very possible
that during the night the noose might fall loose and the cow be
enabled to slip it off her horns. This horrible thought gave pause
to all satisfaction. Walker retired into executive session with
himself to grapple with the new problem. Finally he summoned the
mate, and explained the difficulty.
"We've got to keep that noose from slipping open," said he, "and the
only way to do it that I can see is to throw a half hitch, or
something above it around the beast's horns. It can be done, I
think, by flipping the slack of the rope in a sort of loop and giving
it a twist that will cross it as it flips. See what I mean?"
The mate said that he did.
"Well, send one of the men over to try it. On no account must he get
up onto the plateau with that crazy animal. I don't want any
accidents."
He went below to finish his interrupted toilet, which he did
leisurely. After a bath and a complete change he returned to the
deck to find that he was absolutely alone on the yacht. On the last
ledge below the pinnacle were closely grouped the missing ship's
company intently watching a man who, head and shoulders above the
level of the plateau, was painstakingly flipping in hopeful spirals
the bight of the line toward a brace-legged and snortsome cow.
After a number of trials he desisted, and to an accompaniment of
somewhat subdued jeers clambered down to the level of the company.
Another man deposited something in a hat that lay on the ground, spat
on his hands, climbed to the edge of the pinnacle, and in his turn
began to flip the rope.
Walker glanced overside. At least they had had the grace to leave
him his own dinghy. He dropped into it and rowed ashore.
On his appearance activities ceased, and a slight cloud of uneasy
uncertainty fell upon the occasion. Jimmy Forbes took upon himself
an explanation.
"It is a game," said he--"an excellent game in that it combines the
elements of chance, of skill, and the hope of pecuniary gain. You
deposit ten cents in the hat, and in return therefor you are allowed
ten tries. If you succeed in throwing a half hitch, you are rewarded
by the contents of the hat. I have myself already contributed twenty
cents, which, I am bound to confess, I am beginning to believe
irretrievably lost to me. Want to join? If you have not ten cents,
I am sure your credit is good."
"Thanks. I've just cleaned up," replied Walker dryly. "But don't
let me interrupt. I'll watch."
He went to seat himself by Aline, who was perched near by, a book in
her lap. The game was renewed, at first a little deprecatingly, but
soon with noisy hilarity. Walker picked up the book. It was Victor
Hugo's _Toilers of the Sea_.
"I brought it as a textbook," Aline explained.
A wild cheer greeted Johnston's extremely lucky cast. He descended,
emptied the hat.
"It's just a twist of the wrist," he announced loftily. "It's not
unlike handling a bolo."
The next morning proved calm, so the yacht was run around to the
other side of the island, moored fore and aft, and properly fended
from the perpendicular cliffs. It was found that the end of the boom
was just enough above the tiny plateau on which stood the marooned
cow that with the six-foot rise that remained of the tide a
sufficient hoist would be afforded.
But now a new complication was introduced by Teller. Where were they
going to deposit the cow once she was swung clear? Walker said he
had thought they would dump her into the sea and let her swim.
Teller had no faith that the cow in her present condition could swim
that far, and in such cold water and with so many currents. The
alternative seemed to be to lower her to the deck. Walked looked a
little dashed. The yacht's spick and span ultra-holystoned deck! He
took the hurdle nobly, however, and the men set to work to arrange a
suitable place on which to deposit her.
At last the great moment was at hand. Dispositions were carefully
made. Each was assigned his job and minutely instructed as to just
what he was to do. The men on the guy ropes braced themselves; those
on the falls began slowly and cautiously to haul. A lookout at the
foretop reported progress.
"She's afloat!" he shouted as the cow, hanging back and snorting,
began to be forced, in spite of braced feet, inexorably toward the
edge of the cliff. "Her bow's off bottom!" he yelled as the upward
pull lifted her from her forefeet. Over the edge of the cliff, in a
cloud of loose earth, the beast came into view.
"Hoist away! Smartly, men!" cried Walker.
She rose into the air; dangled. The yacht careened slightly as she
took the weight so far offside and so high up.
"Hold the falls! Swing her!" shouted Walker.
The men on the guy ropes swung the boom. High in the air, kicking
like a fish and uttering cries either of bovine profanity or of
terror, the cow dangled by her horns.
"Oh, the poor thing!" exclaimed Aline.
"Lower away!" cried Walker.
The cow descended, swinging to and fro, rocking the yacht from side
to side. The men at the falls watched their chance to catch her at
center, lowering rapidly a few feet, then checking the descent. A
dozen pairs of hands were outstretched to receive and guide the
descending pendulum. For a moment or so there was imminent danger
that the animal would either be dashed against the rocky wall or
carry away some of the yacht's standing rigging. The lookout man,
reaching up, managed to get hold of a hind leg. This was a mistake.
He went overside and splashed into the sea as though he had been
projected from a catapult. Somebody threw him a rope and he
scrambled aboard dripping, against a volley of facetious remarks from
those who were not too busy.
"Hurt?" snapped Walker.
"No, sir," replied the man, but he stood apart rubbing his shoulder,
having had enough of cows for the moment. Some ingenious and more
cautious spirit threw the loop of a small line over the beast. By
means of it she was guided safely to the deck, where she stood, feet
apart, blowing and rolling her eyes. The men cheered.
But the jubilation was cut short by a cry of warning from aloft. The
calf was seen to be wabbling back and forth along the edge of the
cliff, apparently getting ready to jump down after his parent. The
lookout man waved his cap; those on deck shouted and threw up their
arms and tossed up rope ends and cut antics in an effort to convince
the child that in spite of appearances to the contrary cows cannot
fly. Teller fell into the dinghy and began frantically to splash
toward a point from which he could scale the cliff. All these
maneuvers seemed doomed to failure; the calf had apparently every
intention of casting itself into space. Suddenly it froze to
immobility, staring fixedly straight out in front. All looked in the
direction of that gaze. At the foretop crouched Johnston, humped up
and gazing directly into the calf's bulging eyes. Calmly he held
that calf with his glittering eye. The calf stared. For the second
time Johnston had made good!
Breathless silence fell. If Teller could scale the cliff before the
unprecedented spell broke! He did! Breathing heavily and perspiring
freely, he was seen to creep upon the hypnotized calf, to grasp him
firmly. Everybody cheered. Two of the sailors clasped each other
and pulled off an impromptu dance.
But the celebration nearly proved fatal. In the excitement the two
men at the falls had dropped their rope in order to do a little caper
of triumph. This released the pressure on the cow. Whether her
finer feelings had been outraged to the point of retaliation, or
whether she was merely looking for her progeny, is obscure. At any
rate, she uttered another bellow and took charge of the deck. There
was no opposition. Men swarmed up the rigging. Aline and her
brother dived down the hatch. The lookout man, caught unawares
between wind and water, and with no other place to go, again went
overside. But, then, he was already wet. Walker swung himself up on
the boom, from which point he gave his view of the situation in no
uncertain terms.
The flurry was, of course, momentary. The trailing rope was soon
seized and the beast made fast. And at that moment the gentle and
plaintive voice of Teller was heard alongside, begging for assistance
in getting the calf aboard.
Excitement drained away as the sea drains from rocks, leaving the
yacht and her people once more a part of the surroundings instead of
a self-contained center of an unholy row. Walker looked about him.
The deck was strewn with ropes and chairs and things. Rigging
flapped idly at loose ends. The varnish on the masts and rails was
scraped and marred. The yacht looked like a drunken harridan. Also
the trip down and the excitement had made the cow seasick.
"Some job!" cried Walker, wiping his forehead. "I never expected to
be skipper of a cattle ship, but I guess I am." He began to laugh.
"I haven't had so much fun in a coon's age," he chuckled to Aline and
her brother. "Now what?"
Teller, in his deprecating way, proffered a suggestion, or rather a
request.
"You see," said he, "my gas boat is out of order and I've got to run
in a new bearing; and I wouldn't dast to put the cow back on this
island again, nohow; she might do the same thing again; and I thought
as how it wouldn't be no more trouble for you now if you was to take
her over back home again."
Walker stared at him a moment incredulously; then chuckled.
"All right, old-timer," he agreed; "anything goes. Where is it?"
Teller pointed. The other island was now in plain sight and about
four miles distant.
"They's a bight with five fathom on the south side. You can't miss
it. They's a good beach, and the water's still, so all you have to
do is to drop her overside and let her swim. It's only about a
hundred feet and she can make that. You'll find my partner across
the neck. Just tell him I will be along as soon as I get my gas boat
fixed up."
"All right," agreed Walker. "Here, Parks, you row him around to his
boat in the dinghy and then come back. We'll wait here."
The dinghy departed.
"Good Lord, I'll be glad to be rid of her!" cried Walker, with a
despairing glance toward the cow, which was now bellowing
continuously and with more vigor. "How did we ever get into such a
mess? What do you suppose is ailing her now?"
"It's so romantic!" pointed out Aline. "The rescue of a matron in
distress! She's hungry, poor thing. What have we aboard that is fit
for cows?" She approached the animal gingerly and held out something
in her flattened palm. The cow smelled of it and resumed her awful
racket. "She doesn't like green olives," observed Aline, regretfully
throwing the rejected fruit overboard. "I thought there was no harm
trying." She stopped as though thunderstruck. "Isn't there some
proper thing we have neglected?" she inquired seriously. "Oughtn't
we to run up the milk-white flag, for instance?"
Johnston appeared bearing a large white bowl.
"What have you there?" asked Walker.
"It's canned green peas, sir," answered Johnston. "It's all we've
got in the stores that we ever used to feed cows when I was in the
dairy business."
"How long were you in the dairy business, Johnston?" inquired Aline
interestedly.
"Not long, madam, about a year."
"A hundred and sixty-eight," tallied Aline.
Johnston approached the rescued matron, holding out his bowl of
canned peas. The cow ceased her racket and sniffed. Then she
inserted her nose in the bowl. Johnston looked around in pardonable
triumph. The cow apparently tasted and disapproved. Without
troubling to remove her muzzle from the bowl she blew violently.
Canned peas sprayed upward as from a fountain. Around both Johnston
and the cow was a nimbus of green peas. They scattered over the
already disgraceful deck. Johnston disappeared, spattered and
discomfited. The howls of joy from all in sight were drowned by the
renewed ululations of the cow. Johnston had leaned too heavily on
his luck.
Sam was summoned. He suggested canned corn and dried beans and
beets. A pail was produced and in it was prepared a marvelous bovine
goulash. "We've got to quiet the beast somehow, or we'll go mad,"
said Walker. "We ought to have a vegetable garden aboard," said
Aline. "It would be very simple: a foot or so of good garden soil in
that flat place there just forward of that funny thingumajig." The
cow accepted this; ate it; drank a pail of water; quieted down, began
to lick her calf, which in turn applied itself to its own meal.
Parks and the dinghy returned. Preparations were made for getting
under way.
"Two of the men will have to stand by while we're under way," Walker
instructed his mate, "in case there's a swell outside or the
confounded beast gets excited."
"The cow watch!" cried Aline delighted, "and it comes right before
the dogwatch; and it's miles ahead of the dogwatch because the
dogwatch hasn't any dog to watch, but the cow watch has a real cow to
watch!"
The engine took up its rhythm; the moorings were loosed; the yacht
swung slowly to the open. All was well. The cow had now apparently
become the gentlest critter in the world, as so repeatedly advertised
by her loving owner, and was dreamily chewing a placid cud. The calf
was still in search of refreshments.
"Sweet rural scene!" murmured Aline.
But beyond the point the yacht encountered a dead swell which cradled
her in long slow swoops from trough to crest. Thanks to the pen
improvised for her by spare spars and canvas, the cow had no
difficulty in holding her feet, but she stopped chewing her cud and
into her eyes came a haunted, querying uneasiness.
"I've seen that expression before. And she's stopped chewing her
cud!" cried Aline. "I believe she's going to regurgitate."
"The demoralization is complete," groaned Jimmy, "and I do not refer
to the cow."
"Tell Johnston to bring a basin," suggested one of the crew.
The spirit, however, was one of hilarity. Everyone had his little
joke. Some of those voiced by the crew out of hearing of the
quarterdeck were not entirely decorous, having to do largely with
possible safeguards of a no longer immaculate deck. Aline alone was
silent, lost in a brown study. Walker noticed this most unusual
condition and inquired about it.
"I'm composing a poem," she vouchsafed. "I haven't got very far with
it. Only the first two lines."
"Let's have them," urged Walker.
Aline struck an attitude; her voice became deep and solemn.
"When canned goods take the place of grass and hay,
The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the sea,"
she declaimed in a stage-elocution voice.
The cove on the other island was found without difficulty, and after
an interval of sounding the yacht came to anchor within a few hundred
feet of a shelving beach. Preparations were made for the landing.
The cow presented no difficulties: simply sling her overside, cast
off the lines, and let her swim ashore. Teller had informed them
that the cow could swim. But how about the calf? Nobody knew. It
was a very young calf. Do such animals swim naturally, or do they
have to be taught? Birds have to to be taught to fly, and flying is
their natural mode of progression. Swimming is not a cow's natural
mode of progression. Aline brought up these points, and argued them
with great ability in face of much scoffing. Finally, more in
disgusted yielding to feminine imbecility than from any conviction,
Walker ordered life preservers to be hooked about the body of the
little beast. The calf did not object. He had but one idea in his
poor little head, and that was concerned solely with the meals at all
hours of his conception.
"No meals will be served during the landing!" sang out one of the men.
It was finally considered advisable to lead the beasts while in the
water. Walker, Jimmy and three men in the dinghy undertook this
task. The other members of the ship's company lined the rail. The
men beached the boat and disappeared in the small timber and brush,
in search of Teller's partner. After a half hour they returned and
rowed over. Jimmy was laughing.
"Did you find him?" asked Aline as soon as they had stepped on deck.
"Yes, we found him: across a little narrow peninsula. He was working
in a garden. He was a long, lank, solemn individual, and he didn't
even look up at us as we approached. Just grunted in answer to our
greeting, and went right on working. He was planting potatoes, and
he had a basket of seed potatoes and a sack of starfish. He'd lay a
starfish in the hole, and put a potato on top of that, and then
another starfish, and cover them up with earth."
"Probably planting a milky way for the cow," murmured Aline. "Go on."
"Finally Glenn told him his partner's boat was out of commission, so
we'd brought back the cow for him, as the cow didn't like the other
island. Didn't go into details, and the partner didn't ask for them.
"'That so?' said he. 'What kind of boat you got?'
"'Pretty good sized boat,' says Glenn.
"'Well now,' says the old boy, 'that's a piece of luck that don't
often happen to me, because I was figuring on how we're going to get
the old bull back there--he's getting mighty poor here, and our gas
boat is too small. Could you take him back with you?'"
Jimmy chuckled. "What did you say?" Aline asked Walker.
"Say!" exploded the young man. "I said _no_ more forcefully than I
ever said it in my life!"