"Pieter!" Marta broke in sharply. "You are _not_ going fishing!"
Pieter wriggled uncomfortably. "Well," he said, "I can at least listen
to what the man says, can't I?"
"One haul of the nets," Hans continued, "and maybe one thousand, maybe
two thousand pounds of whitefish. Never less than five hundred. For that
you get six cents a pound in the Chicago market. You don't earn that on
your farm, and besides, fishing is a lot more fun. A smart Dutchman
don't have to tend cows."
"_Uaah!_" Pieter breathed.
"Pieter!" Marta said.
Ramsay listened, dazzled by the prospects of a fisherman's life as
compared to any future a farmer might have. Determinedly Marta brought a
huge dish of wheat cakes and sausage over and thumped it firmly down on
the table.
"Eat!" she commanded.
The three gave all their attention to the food, and they did not speak
while eating. Then Hans pushed his chair back.
"If I am going to fish again, I must start," he announced. "First I
will go down and see if there is any salvage."
"We'll help you!" Pieter exclaimed. "My boat was not badly smashed. A
little work and it will be good as new."
"Pieter!" Marta said. "You are not going fishing!"
"Now I ask you," Pieter said plaintively, "is helping a man pick up his
own property, his very own property, is that fishing? Could anyone even
think it was fishing? No. Come on."
The three left the kitchen and walked down to the lake. Calm after the
storm that had raged across it, only little waves were washing in.
Ramsay looked out at the rock, as though half expecting to see the
_Spray_ still there, and saw nothing. Pieter gave a triumphant little
exclamation and waded into shallow water to pick up something that
bobbed back and forth.
It was the carved Valkyrie maiden that had been the _Spray's_
figurehead. Exquisitely and almost perfectly hand-carved, the wooden
statue leaned forward, as though she would embrace the whole lake to her
bosom.
Hans Van Doorst's eyes were soft as he took it from Pieter. "My
sweetheart!" he murmured.
Captain Klaus winged down from the ridge pole of the house to alight
near them. Clucking softly to himself, happy because Hans was once more
with him, he followed the three men down the beach. Ramsay found a coil
of rope, then another, and farther on was the _Spray's_ torn sail.
Ramsay pointed out onto the lake.
"About there is where we saw the White Sturgeon," he said.
"I know," Hans Van Doorst murmured. "We saw him a half-dozen times."
Ramsay looked at him, puzzled. Then, "The sailors told me he always
brings bad luck."
"The sailors!" Hans scoffed. "They know nothing about anything except
maybe how to stuff themselves with good whitefish that the fishermen
bring them! The White Sturgeon noses his way to the top when a storm
comes, so he is bad luck? Do not believe it! He is good luck! He comes
to the top so that he may show fishermen the way back to shore!"
Ramsay grinned appreciatively. This, in spite of the fact that the Dutch
fisherman's idea of the White Sturgeon bringing good luck was as
superstitious as the sailors' notion that he always brought bad, fitted
in. It was what Hans should have said.
"How big is that sturgeon?" Ramsay asked.
"The Grandfather of all lake fish," Hans Van Doorst asserted solemnly.
"Have you not noticed that, like all grandfathers, he is white? In
truth, I have never seen a bigger fish anywhere."
"Another coil of rope!" Pieter said, pouncing on it.
Hans, who had grinned happily with each new find, did not even look
around. Ramsay looked at him questioningly. Anything but stolid, the
Dutch fisherman had been bubbling over at the prospect of going fishing
again. Now he seemed melancholy, immersed within himself, and his whole
attention was given to the lake.
Ramsay followed his gaze, but saw little. True, a vast number of small
aquatic worms had been washed ashore by the pounding waves. There must
have been countless millions of them, so many that they formed a living
carpet as far up the beach as the waves had washed. The wriggling,
writhing mass was now disentangling itself, and the worms that could
were crawling back into the lake. A number of sea gulls and a number of
land birds were gorging themselves, and new birds arrived by the flock.
They scarcely made a dent in the multitude of worms. Ramsay looked again
at Hans Van Doorst.
"Never, never!" the fisherman breathed.