AN UNEXPECTED BAG
Spring came early, but none too early for the majority of Beaufort
people. In particular, none too early for Ned, whose ankle was proving
a check on his farther winter sports; and none too early for Tom, to
whom Christmas had brought a gun which he had hardly been able to use
even on rabbits; and none too early for Bob, who, as has been said, was
not a cold-weather dog.
With the advent of the south winds and the steady dripping thaw,
Ned's ankle and Tom's cough--keepsakes from that memorable Newton
trip--rapidly disappeared; and the nearer ventured the ducks,
the stronger felt the two boys. Together--Tom no longer Ned's
squire, but now, by virtue of that Christmas present, become his
brother-at-arms--they haunted the levee, watching for the flight to set
in and the ice to go out.
Bob accompanied them. But he was not especially interested in ducks.
Dread of gun forbade him to hunt them, alive; and instinct forbade him
to gnaw the bones of them, dead. Summer really was Bob's only unclouded
season, for then he could share in all Ned's excursions. Still, even a
dog cannot go through life without trials.
All through the spring vacation that ice which had made such good
skating on the Mississippi hung and hung, regardless of the fact that
its mission had been fulfilled, and that it ought to leave the field
to the hunters. Meanwhile the wild fowl had been making use of the
Missouri waterway; and when, at last, the blockade in the Mississippi
was lifted, and in the shape of enormous floes of slush swept down the
channel, mashing against the piers of the Beaufort bridge and piling up
on the shores, the relief was too late.
Most of the ducks had passed by, on another route, and Ned and Tom had
killed never a one.
Tom was disappointed beyond measure. His new gun yearned for its first
duck, and but illy submitted to the superior blood-record of Ned's gun.
Probably this is why, in its mistaken zeal, it brought to bag what it
did.
The duck crop being a failure, the boys had to content themselves with
the snipe crop. After the ducks, save now and then a wood-duck or a
blue-winged teal which had decided to stay all summer, were beyond
reach of even a thirteen-inch cannon, not to speak of a twelve gauge
single-barrel, jack snipe and plover still lingered in the marshes and
along the edges of the streams.
It was the second Saturday in April, and Ned and Tom were among the
sloughs across the river, raking the country for whatever might be so
unlucky as to offer itself as an acceptable target. The withdrawal of
the ice from the Mississippi had given release to that in the sloughs,
and everything was springlike and green and watery.
Now it was afternoon. As to what the boys had thus far secured, the
less said, the better. Of course, one cannot have good luck on every
trip. But there was a chance, yet, to round out the day well, had not
Tom's gun, impatient and unruly, sailed in without waiting, and on its
own hook.
The slough was on the boys' right. They were walking single file--Ned
carelessly a few paces ahead, or Tom carelessly a few paces behind,
just as critics choose--on the alert for game. It might be a pair
of plover winging overhead, or a jack snipe whisking from under
their feet, or, possibly, a belated duck squawking from its covert,
or--something else.
"Boom!" And Ned was on his knees, and, astonished, was trying not to
fall farther.
It had happened so very suddenly. The first thing that he knew, his
ears had been deafened by a tremendous crash, and at the same instant
he had been struck a violent blow on the back, and thrown forward. The
next thing that he knew, he was tottering on his knees, and Tom was
bending over him, wailing:
"I've killed him, I've killed him! Oh, dear, what shall I do!"
"I know you didn't mean to, Tom," comforted Ned, still rather hazy as
to just what had taken place.
"Are you dying, Ned? Don't die! Oh, don't die!" pleaded Tom.
Ned examined himself, inwardly, a moment, to determine what his exact
state might be. He could place no pain; but this was what seemed awful:
that he might be dreadfully wounded somewhere, and yet not know it!
"Where did it hit me, Tom?" he asked, faintly, and not daring to stir.
"I shot your shoulder all to pieces!" cried Tom, wildly. "And my gun
wasn't even cocked!"
Ned fearfully looked over at his left shoulder. He beheld his coat at
that spot in tatters, and his whole left sleeve torn so that it hung in
only threads.
With such havoc made, surely there ought to be pain; but on the
contrary the sole sensation was a curious numbness in his left side and
extending to his left elbow.
He wondered if it could be true that he was about to die. He found
himself not afraid, although it was hard to die away off there, in the
open country, beside a slough. He was sorry for himself, and for his
father and mother, and for Tom. What would Bob think? What would the
boys and girls say? Poor little Zu-zu would cry and cry, and keep his
duck wings forever.
"Can you move your arm? Try!" implored Tom.
Ned cautiously tried, and found that he could swing his arm and wiggle
his fingers. But it was as though he was experimenting with the arm of
somebody else.
Both were now becoming somewhat more hopeful. Of the two, Tom, as was
natural, was the more excited and frightened, because upon his head
rested the accident, and because it was he who could view the full
extent of the damage.
Ned could only imagine; Tom could both see and imagine.
"I don't believe I'm shot so bad, after all," mused Ned, easing himself
by settling back upon his heels. "It doesn't hurt a bit."
"But you are! I'm afraid you are!" moaned Tom, pitifully. "And it's all
my fault, though I don't see how it ever happened."
From the appearance of that back it seemed to Tom that the whole load
must have entered Ned's shoulder.
"Isn't any one in sight to help us?" queried Ned.
"Not a soul," said Tom, with a quaver of despair in his voice. "Shall I
fix you as good as I can, and then run like lightning and get a wagon,
or something?"
"I bet I could walk as far as the road," asserted Ned, pondering. "That
would be a better place to leave me, for people are more apt to come
along there, you know."
"But I hate to have you walk, Ned," said Tom. "It might not be right
for you."
Nevertheless he took Ned's hand and helped him get on his feet--which
was done with no apparent harm.
"I don't need to be held up," objected Ned, as Tom started to put
an arm around his waist, and lead him off. "You carry the guns. You
weren't going to forget them, were you?"
Tom raised Ned's gun from the spot where it had dropped when Ned
himself had dropped, and then gave his own, lying where he had flung
it, a kick.
"It can stay here and rust, for all of me," he declared. "I'll never
touch it again; never."
"Shucks, you will, too," scolded Ned. "Now you pick it up."
So Tom roughly picked it up. Together the two boys--the injured and the
sound--slowly walked across the field, with Tom watching Ned askance,
as if expecting him to keel over at any instant.
Ned, however, while keeping himself well in hand, and on the lookout
for any new and warning symptoms, did not feel the least discomfort
from the motion.
His shoulder was numb, and only numb.
To reach the road they had to cross a railway track; and as they neared
it Tom halted and cried, joyfully:
"Listen!"
A clattering rumble, around the curve, fell upon their ears.
"A train--it's a train!" cried Tom. "You stay here and I'll go ahead
and stop it."
"Maybe it won't stop," said Ned.
"Yes, it will. I'll make it," assured Tom, running forward. "They
wouldn't go on and leave you here to die!"
Uncertain as to how he would do it, but determined to stop the train at
all hazard, Tom flew for the track.
Around the long curve swept the Pacific Coast Limited, due in Beaufort
at 3:21. The engineer, peering ahead, was startled to see, planted
between the rails in the rapidly nearing distance, a boy with a gun in
each hand, threatening the advance of the train.
The engineer opened the whistle valve, and the engine sounded its
angry, impatient command: "Out of the way!"
Tom saw the white flare of steam, and a second later heard the quick
shriek of warning. But he never budged. He only waved his arms and guns.
He tried to make the engineer know; now he flourished the guns, and now
he patted his left shoulder, and now he pointed off toward Ned, and
wept aloud in his fear that he was not being understood.
The engineer and the fireman noted the gestures, and saw that the boy
stubbornly stood and budged not.
It seemed to be a question of either slowing down or running over him.
To Tom it was a question of either saving Ned or being run over.
The engineer's hand tightened on the air-brake lever. The other hand
grudgingly jerked the throttle.
Tom saw the engine still closing in upon him at relentless speed--and
he only gestured the more.
Then, on a sudden, with grinding of wheels, and a disgusted wheeze, the
train stopped; the pilot of the engine just touched his boot-legs.
"What's the matter with you, eh?" demanded the engineer, savagely,
leaning out of his window.
"A boy's been shot! He's got to be taken to town right away," explained
Tom, hastening around beside the cab, and looking up at the grimy face
far above him.
He clutched the cab steps imploringly, resolved that the train should
not start without him.
The fireman had jumped to the cab door and was listening.
"Well, where is he?" demanded the engineer.
"There----" began Tom, but he was interrupted by a brakeman, who,
followed by the conductor, came running up from the foremost coach.
"What's the matter here?" asked the brakeman.
"A boy's shot, and you've got to take him to Beaufort," announced Tom,
again.
"Where is he?" snapped the conductor, now taking hold of affairs.
"He's coming. All right, Ned," encouraged Tom, beckoning to Ned, who
was walking as fast as he could, through the field, toward them.
"That him?" demanded the conductor, shortly.
"Yes, sir," replied Tom. "He's----"
"Go ahead," ordered the conductor, turning on his heel, to the
engineer. "Young man, this is a dangerous business you're in--stopping
limited trains just for the fun of it. I've a mind to take you to town
and turn you over to the officers."
He glared at Tom, and the brakeman glared at Tom, and the fireman and
engineer glared at Tom, and all the faces stuck out of the windows of
the line of coaches glared at Tom.
The engineer reached for the throttle, and Tom reached for the
conductor's coat-tail.
"Oh, but it's true, it's true!" cried Tom. "He _is_ shot. I shot him
myself. You look at his shoulder and you'll see. Please wait! Please
wait, just a second. If it isn't so, you can do anything to me you
like. See--how his left sleeve is all torn."
"Have him hurry up, then," said the conductor, moved by Tom's appeal,
and able to see for himself that evidently something was wrong with Ned.
Tom dropped his guns, and jumping down the slight embankment sped to
Ned, to help him pass a barbed wire fence, and climb the gravelly slope.
"By Jinks--the boy _is_ hurt!" observed the brakeman.
The conductor tapped with his foot impatiently.
"At any rate, he's making us lose lots of time," he remarked.
"All aboard!" he called, as Tom and Ned toiled up to the track. And
he added, kindly, as the sight of Ned's pale face and tattered back
impressed him: "Get in the first coach, lad. Help him in, Jack."
With a boost from the brakeman Ned safely landed upon the vestibuled
platform. At the same instant, as though he had touched a concealed
lever, the train started, so eager was it to be again under way.
Ned, with Tom steadying him, entered the coach, and sat meekly in
the seat next to the door. The conductor came to interview them, and
curious passengers crowded around; the news that "a boy has been shot"
had spread adown the long line of aisles.
Tom answered a multitude of questions; and Ned, too, had his share. He
told everybody, in reply to their queries, that he felt all right, but
in truth his shoulder was beginning to throb and sting.
Presently a physician came through, and after a keen look into Ned's
face, and a light fingering of the arm and shoulder, pronounced no
bones broken; and being told that the victim was going only to Beaufort
gave it as his opinion that the wound should wait, rather than be
examined on the train.
Over the bridge rumbled the train; and in a moment Ned and Tom, two
forlorn figures, descended at the depot.
Their car had stopped beyond the depot crowd, and nobody noticed them
emerge from the vestibule, upon the bricks below. Tom, who had halted a
limited train, was equal to this next crisis.
The hacks and 'buses were at the other end of the depot, but across the
wide brick walk he saw Luke Denee's white horse and veteran express
and transfer wagon, with Luke himself standing by it, waiting for
whatever hauling the train might have brought him.
"Oh, Mr. Denee! Mr. Denee!" called Tom, running forward. "Won't you
carry Ned Miller up town--he's been shot!"
"What's that?" inquired Luke, bustling forward. "Ned Miller? Where is
he--why, bless my soul!" catching sight of Ned himself. "Who shot him?"
"I did. My gun went off by accident," explained Tom, wearily; he was
growing tired of confessing it so often. "He ought to be got to a
doctor right away."
"You bet I'll take him, and we'll get him there in a jiffy," assured
Luke. "Golly the grog and the great horn spoon, Ned boy--did Tom take
you for a goose, or a snipe, or what?"
"A what, I guess," replied Ned, as Luke helped him into the rear of the
wagon, and settled him upon a trunk. The train was pulling out, and
from every window the passengers' faces stared out upon them.
Barely waiting for Tom, with the two guns, to leap into the wagon, Luke
plumped upon the seat and lifting the lines clucked vigorously to his
white horse. The report of Ned's plight was now being repeated from
mouth to mouth through the depot and vicinity, and as the wagon rolled
away and turned down the street it was followed by a murmur and many
eyes.
With Ned sitting upon the trunk, and Tom standing beside him to steady
him, and Luke laying the whip on his astonished steed, the wagon
rattled down the thoroughfare. Scenting something wrong, the people
whom it passed gazed after it in wonder.
"Where to? Which doctor?" asked Luke, over his shoulder.
"Dr. Mathews--he's the one the Millers use," directed Tom. "Is that all
right, Ned?"
Ned nodded.
Dr. Mathews' office was at his house, and luckily they caught him in.
Ned was wearing a hunting coat, and an ordinary coat under it. The
doctor put him in a chair, and not saying "by your leave" swiftly
and skilfully cut away the layers of cloth, and ripping up the shirt
underneath laid bare the shoulder.
Tom, gazing, beheld a group of little round, blue holes, and some
smears of blood.
"Oh, dear!" he groaned. "Isn't that awful!"
The doctor was delicately inserting a slender steel probe into one of
the holes. Ned, hunched over, holding his breath and clenching his
teeth, feared a sorry time.
"Does it hurt you much?" asked the doctor, gently exploring with the
probe.
"N-n-no, it doesn't," replied Ned, relieved. He could not feel the
probe at all.
"Numb, eh?" remarked the doctor. "Well, that's good."
"Is it very bad, doctor?" asked Ned.
"Not a bit of it!" assured the doctor, cheerfully. "Just a flesh wound,
and in a week or so you'll be as well as ever! You've been struck by
only--let's see--ten, eleven, thirteen--by thirteen shot, and they're
on top of the shoulder-blade, every one of them, so far as I can tell."
"Oh, I'm so glad!" sighed Tom, bursting into tears. Now that the worst
was over, he collapsed.
"Don't cry, Tom, old fellow," begged Ned. "Everything's all right, now."
"Yes, indeed," assured the doctor. "But you had a very, very narrow
escape. The load must have passed between your shoulder and neck--and
if it had swerved a fraction of an inch to the right, or so as to enter
lower, you'd have bled to death long before this."
"Oh, Ned!" exclaimed Tom, aghast at what might have been.
"But it _didn't_ swerve, you know," prompted Ned.
Here Mr. Miller, frightened as he never had been frightened before,
rushed in. Bad news travels fast.
"Ned!" he cried, at the sight of his son under the probe.
"Now that will do, Mr. Miller," cautioned the doctor, smiling to quiet
his fear. "Ned is right side up, and almost ready for another hunt.
He's pretty tough, you must understand."
"Nothing serious?" questioned Mr. Miller.
"Not in the slightest," asserted the doctor, with a belittling shake of
his head, and withdrawing the probe from the last hole. "I'll simply
dress this place with antiseptic, and you can take him home in my
carriage. Just have him keep quiet for a few days, and I think that
he'll soon be as fit as a fiddle."
So Ned was carried home in Doctor Mathews' carriage, his father
driving. Tom was left to bring the guns, and answer queries along the
way.
One would suppose that Mrs. Miller, by this time, would have been so
used to having Ned return after having figured in some hair-breadth
escape, that she would take no especial notice of such a little thing
as thirteen shot in his left shoulder.
But when she witnessed him gingerly clamber down upon the horse-block,
his arm in a sling, she acted as though this was his first, instead of
maybe his hundredth, accident.
Yet the thirteen shot in his shoulder did not concern her so much as
did the rest of the load, that had passed so near, just missing his
neck and his lungs.
Bob followed Ned in from the gate, and sniffing the antiseptic, and
wondering why his master did not respond, as usual, to his energetic
greetings, remained upon the front porch, to consider the new smell,
and ponder over what was up.
Ned's wound did not trouble him much. He got his hurts easily, as a
rule, and just as easily he was rid of them. Young blood is good blood
for healing purposes, as well as for purposes in general.
Tom was constant in his attentions, as were Zu-zu and Mrs. Pearce. They
sent or brought fruit and books and everything that might benefit or
amuse.
Neither of the boys could understand why Tom's gun had exploded, when
it wasn't cocked. However, upon examining the cartridge it was found
that the cap bore a faint dot, where the plunger of the gun had rested
upon it. The cap had been too sensitive, and a light jar had sent it
off.
"Still, I'd no business to have it pointed toward you," asserted Tom,
when Ned tried to excuse him.
"Tom says he guesses you'll never want to go hunting with him again,"
said Zu-zu, one day, on paying a visit to Ned. "He says _he's_ never
going again, either."
"That's all nonsense," vowed Ned. "You tell him so, Zu-zu. He's the
safest fellow in the world to go with, now, he'll be so mighty careful.
My folks think that way, too."
When Zu-zu went home she carried in a little pill box six shot that the
doctor had cut out from just beneath the skin of Ned's back, where they
had come to the surface; and right and left she proudly showed them
among her friends.
Only one thing remains to note. Ten days after the shooting, Mrs.
Miller finally succeeded in tracing to its source an unsavory odor that
had been bothering her, about the house, for some time. She searched
Ned's ill-fated hunting coat, and with a cry of disgust bore it, at
arm's length, into the room where Ned, with the contented Bob beside
him, was sitting.
"What do you think I found?" she asked, thrusting in her hand, and
drawing out, between her finger tips, a mass of feathers.
"It's a plover!" fairly shouted Ned, with a howl of laughter. "That's
what I shot the day I was hurt. I'd forgotten all about it. Ugh! Take
it away!"
"And Tom was so jealous that he shot _you_!" retorted Mrs. Miller,
hurrying out. "Well, his bag was the biggest, I think."