The Sea Unicorn!
"Ahoy! and how goes it with the able-bodied seaman?" called Roger,
swooping down from the foremast. Tandy, polishing the brass trim on the
binnacle, looked up with a welcoming grin.
"Tip topsails!" he answered, pausing a minute to stare off toward the
skyline to see whether any islands or sea serpents were visible.
"And look at that muscle, now," marveled Roger, touching Tandy's arm
admiringly with his claw. "You're twice the lad you were, Mate, and
I'll wager my last feather you can lay any lubber by the heels. If
anyone gets fresh-water ashore, remember you're a salt sea-going sailor
and you just take a poke at him. That's my advice without any charge or
obligation. But then again, a chap that's a King, the Royal Artist of
an exploring expedition, with a sea forest named after him, might not
need to take any advice at all," added Roger with a long and knowing
wink.
"But I like you to tell me things," said Tandy, looking earnestly up
at the Read Bird. "You make everything seem so interesting and jolly."
With a secret smile, for Tandy was thinking how much he would enjoy
taking a poke at Didjabo, the Chief Ozamandarin, the little boy went
on with his polishing. If Didjabo said anything further about shutting
him up in the Tower, he just plain would take a poke at him. But saying
nothing of all this to Roger, he called up cheerfully, "How's Mo-fi?
Has he stopped scolding and begun to eat?"
Roger, who was running races with himself up and down the taffrail,
stopped short and held up his claw. "Everything I give him," he told
Tandy solemnly. "And I declare to badness he's getting to know me,
Mate. He only pulled out three feathers instead of a fistful when I
gave him breakfast just now. Before long he'll be so tame he'll be
riding around on your shoulder."
"Not MY shoulder," laughed Tandy, waving his bottle of polish at the
Read Bird. "Goodness, I believe you're growing fond of that monkey
fish, Roger."
"Well, why not?" retorted the Read Bird, puffing up his chest. "Ato has
me, the Captain has Sally, you have Kobo, so why shouldn't I have a
little pet if I want one?"
The monkey fish seemed such a strange prickly sort of pet, Tandy could
hardly keep his face straight, but seeing Roger was quite in earnest,
he tactfully changed the subject. "Do you suppose we'll make any new
discoveries today?" he asked, screwing the cap on the bottle of polish.
"Any as important as the sea forest, I mean?"
"Why not call it by its proper name?" teased Roger, scratching his head
with his left claw. "And I think it most unlikely we'll strike anything
as curious and important as Tazander Forest. Two discoveries like that
just couldn't happen two days running. Still, I'll just fly up to the
main truck and have a look around."
"Main truck?" Tandy wrinkled up his brows. "I thought I knew all the
parts of this ship by now. You never told me about the main truck,
Roger."
"Just the top of the main mast, Brainless." Giving Tandy an
affectionate little shove, Roger soared into the rigging and Tandy went
joyfully off to have another look at the forest Samuel had insisted
on naming after him. He had taken great pains with the painting and
printing when he sketched it on the map, and now with a sigh of
complete satisfaction he stood regarding the sea chart. Then, suddenly
remembering he had promised to water Samuel Salt's plants, he jog
trotted contentedly down to the hold.
The tumbleweeds in their small red pots grew so rapidly Samuel had
to cut them back every day. These Tandy watered very sparingly,
snapping his fingers at Mo-fi, who was gravely chinning himself on a
branch of his artificial tree. The slips of the sea trees in their
covered aquarium required no attention at all. Ato had planted all the
vegetable and fruit vines from Peakenspire on the rail outside the
galley, so that left only the creeping vines from Patrippany Island to
care for. He had just picked up one of the small potted creepers when
a sharp rap tap under his toes made Tandy leap straight up in the air.
Someone was knocking on the bottom of the boat.
"Ato! Captain! ROGER!" shrilled the little boy, scurrying up from the
hold faster than he had ever done before.
"Su--su--SOMEBODY'S knocking on the bottom of the boat." Before he
could explain, or tell them anything further, a perfectly terrific
knock from below made the _Crescent Moon_ shiver from end to end.
Samuel and Ato, leaning over the port rail, turned round so suddenly
they bumped their heads smartly together. Next with a scrape, screech
and splintering of timber, a giant white horn came tearing up through
the decks.
"Whale! Whale!" croaked Roger, falling off the main truck and coasting
crazily down to the deck. "Wha--what ever'n ever's that?" he quavered,
pointing a trembling claw at the rigid white column between the main
and mizzenmasts. Samuel did not even try to explain, for at that
instant the ship began to rise, to fall, to lash and plunge both up
and down and east and west. Hooking his arms through the rail, Tandy
blinked, gasped and shudderingly waited for the _Crescent Moon_ to fly
asunder.
"Narwhal, Mates!" panted Samuel Salt, throwing himself bodily upon the
wheel. "Horn like a--uni--corn--branch of the Odontocetes and--"
"Oh--you--don't say--it--is!" chattered Ato, who was lying on his
stomach bouncing up and down like a ball at each frightful lunge of the
monstrous fish. "Well, it's spiked us--is that a horn or a ship's mast?
Oh woe, oh! What'n salt'll we do now?"
Samuel had not the heart to answer, for he had all he could do to
hang on to the wheel as the ship, like a wounded animal, reared and
plunged, thrashing the sea to a fury of foam and spray. Nikobo,
diving precipitously off her raft, began to squeal in high and low
hippopotamy, making brave but ineffective lunges at the lashing giant
beneath the ship.
"Su--suppose it su--submerges?" wailed Ato, who had managed at last to
seize a rope from the end of which he banged and slammed continuously
up and down against the deck. "Oh, my stars! Oh, my spars! Oh, my
beams and--" Tandy never heard Ato's last anguished cry, for at that
moment a savage shake of the Narwhal's head sent him flying into the
sea. Coming up coughing and choking, Tandy instinctively began to swim
and for the first time became aware of the creeping vine he still had
clutched tightly in one hand. And in that instant and in that whirl of
danger, disaster and destruction, the little boy suddenly grew calm
and purposeful. This vine--well, why would this powerful vine from
Patrippany Island not work as well under water as on land? The chances
were that it would. Swimming boldly back to the ship, Tandy took a
quick dive, hurling the vine pot and all in the general direction of
the Narwhal. No sooner had the vine touched the water than it began
to open, creep and grow and, spraying out a hundred strong tentacles,
it seized and bound the plunging monster in a secure and inescapable
cradle of leafy wood.
Gasping and sputtering, but with his heart pounding with joy to think
he had really saved Samuel's beautiful ship, Tandy rose to the surface.
Nikobo, letting off shrill blasts of anger and fright, came paddling
anxiously toward him. But giving the hippopotamus a reassuring wave,
Tandy seized the end of a rope ladder and pulled himself up to the deck.
Samuel, though battered and bruised, still clung to the wheel, and Ato,
almost pounded to a jelly, had rolled into the scuppers where Roger
was fanning him vigorously with a butter paddle. The Read Bird, having
wings, could have left the ship at any time, but had clung bravely to
his post, preferring to go down with the ship and his shipmates. Now
all three of them stared in dazed silence at Tandy as he climbed back
over the rail, for in the terrible confusion and excitement no one had
seen him go overboard.
"Tandy! Tandy! Where've you been?" With outstretched arms Samuel Salt
rushed groggily forward. "Shiver my liver! Why's everything so quiet?
Could it be that you single-handed have destroyed that ship-shaking
menace?"
"I don't think he's destroyed, Master Salt," answered Tandy, limping
happily to meet the Captain, "but he's caught fast as a lobster in a
lobster pot and can't move at all."
"Caught?" rasped Samuel, running across the deck to peer over the rail.
"By the creeping vine," explained Tandy, and in short, breathless
sentences he told them all that had happened after he was flung into
the sea.
"Well, bagpipe my mizzenmain sails!" gasped Samuel Salt, staring at
Tandy with round eyes. "This is the strangest and happiest day of my
life. You've saved the ship and the whole expedition, my boy, and all
we have to do now is cut loose from this cavorting unicorn of the sea
and sail off with the largest ivory horn in captivity. An ivory mast,
blast my buckles! Wait till the Ozites see us sailing up the Winkie
River with four masts instead of three! Ahoy, below! Ahoy, Kobo! Can
you dive with me beneath this ship?"
"Dive and stay under as long as you can," vowed the hippopotamus,
shaking the water out of her eyes and looking cheerily up at the
Captain. "You see, I was right about those creeping vines, now wasn't
I?" Nikobo, having done a little investigating on her own account, was
well nigh ready to burst with pride at Tandy's quick action and the way
in which the vines had overcome their gigantic foe.
"RIGHT!" boomed Samuel Salt, hurrying off for his oxygen helmet and
powerful diamond toothed saw. Ato was too bruised and exhausted to
rise, but Tandy and Roger, perching on the ship's rail, watched Samuel
in his queer diver's helmet climb down the rope ladder and clamber
up on the hippopotamus. Next minute Nikobo had disappeared under the
surface and presently from the slight shiver and shake of the boat
they knew that Samuel was determinedly at work cutting them loose.
Fortunately there was room between the ship's bottom and the whale's
head for Nikobo to swim about, and so splintering sharp was Samuel's
saw that in less than five minutes he had cut off the great column of
ivory level with the ship's bottom, carefully calking the edges with
material he had brought down. In its tight and live wood crate the
Narwhal could not stir an inch, and, while the cutting of its horn was
not painful, it blubbered and spouted so terrifically that Samuel and
Nikobo heaved tremendous sighs of relief when the dangerous operation
was accomplished.
Backing off a few paces, Nikobo began butting the crated sea beast with
her head till she had driven it out from beneath the boat. Roger and
Tandy, with little shrieks of wonder and excitement, saw the crated
fish like some queer and monstrous mummy rise to the surface and go
floating sullenly away toward the east. Now that they had a full view
of the Narwhal they saw that it was three times the length of the
_Crescent Moon_.
"A great wonder Sammy didn't tie it to the ship and tow it along,"
sighed Ato, who had at last got to his feet and draped himself weakly
over the rail. "Some fishin'--eh, Mates?"
"But look at the beautiful mast we have!" cried Tandy, waving to Nikobo
and the Captain as they came cheerfully alongside.
"Huh! you're as bad as Sammy," grunted Ato, rubbing his bruises
sorrowfully. "And of course a mast was just what we were needing! Whale
of a mast! Mast of a whale! HUH!"