"It's a mighty good thing for us, Mort Hopkins, we took such an early
start."
"Say, Quill, what do we want of those rollers?"
"Guess you'll find out 'fore we get the _Ark_ around the dam."
"That's so. All ready? Shove her, now. Here we go. Don't she travel!"
"Mort, what was that long word you went to the foot on yesterday?"
"Me-an-der-ing."
"And you called it 'mean-drying,' and spelled it wrong. Tell you what,
we're just going to meandrew now 'fore we get back."
"Guess Taponican Creek'll give us all the twists we want. It's as
crooked as a ram's horn."
"Tisn't much wider some places, but the _Ark_ will squeeze through 'most
anywhere."
It would not, indeed, have required much of a flood to float a skiff of
that size; but she was a pretty one, and it was no work at all for two
stout boys of from twelve to thirteen years of age to "pole her along."
There was not enough water where they now were to encourage the use of
oars, but a pair of them lay in the stern, beside the fishing-poles and
the bait and luncheon.
The day was one of those truly wonderful Saturdays that come to country
boys in summer, and Mort Hopkins and Quill Sanders had all but slighted
their breakfasts to get the early start they were now so pleased with.
"Mort, if Taponican Creek runs out of Pawg Lake, we'll find the place
where it does."
"Guess we will. It's there, somewhere."
"We won't stop to fish along."
"No, sir! Not one of the boys knows where we're going."
"If they'd ha' known, they'd all have come, and chucked the _Ark_
jam-full."
Mere passengers were not wanted on board of a ship that was clearly
bound on a voyage of discovery. Extra cargo of any kind would have been
bad for the fortunes of such a vessel.
The boys did not pole their boat up stream for more than twenty minutes
before they came to a place where the banks gave the Taponican room to
spread itself. Of course the wider it spread what water it had, the
thinner the water became.
Right in the middle of a sparkling field of gurgling ripples the _Ark_
ran suddenly aground.
"Overboard, Quill!" shouted Mort. "Guess Columbus had to wade before he
found much."
"Noah didn't."
"His ark had a roof on it."
"Shove her, now. There she goes."
Their trousers were rolled up about as high as they would go, and the
water was not very cold. The _Ark_ drew less when its entire crew was
out of it.
"Ah! ugh! Crab."
"Nipped you, did he? Oh, phew! what a clam shell! Stepped right down on
it. Catch your crab?"
"He let go. Can't see him. Didn't he give my heel a dig, though! They're
the ugliest, sassiest--"
"Jump in. She'll float now."
"Shove, or she'll go back, and get aground again."
"There's the dam. Now we've got a job on hand."
The dam was not a high one, but no two boys of their size could have
lifted the _Ark_ over it. Quill Sanders had thought of that, and the
little craft was pulled ashore at a spot where farmers coming to the
mill drove down to water their horses.
"There's just a good road all around from here to the pond. Now for the
rollers, Mort."
Two bits of round poles, about three inches thick and four feet long,
were a great help in getting the _Ark_ up the slope, but it was slow
work for all that. No man in Corry Centre could have hired any two small
boys to undertake it. Quill and Mort did it all the more eagerly because
no living being would have given them a cent for doing it.
The miller came out, indeed, to shout after them:
"Hullo, boys, what're ye up to?"
"Going to Pawg Lake," said Quill, proudly. "Your old dam's in the way,
and we're a-dodgin' 'round it."
"Pawg Lake! I declare! Do ye spect to ever git back agin?"
"Guess we do," said Mort. "Bring you anything when we come?"
"Ye-es. Fetch the lake right along. Bring me the upper eend of the
creek. You'll find it lyin' right there."
"Guess we will," said Mort. "Now, Quill, h'ist her. Shove!"
How they did shove! But the old miller came out into the road and took
the _Ark_ by the head, and after that about all the boys had to do was
to change the rollers forward as the strong-armed fat old fellow dragged
the light skiff along.
"There, boys. You're a plucky brace of spring chickens. In with her,
now. She's afloat agin."
"Thank you, Mr. Getty."
"Don't forget to fetch me back Pawg Lake, when you find it. An' the
crooked eend of the creek."
"Crooked?" said Quill. "Tell you what, I guess we'll have to meandrew
pretty much all the way."
"Andrew what? Oh yes. Guess you will. Go it! Good-by."
Off they went, and now their time had come for actual rowing. The upper
pond of Corry Centre was well known to be a deep one. It was
wonderfully, perilously far from its smooth surface to the home of the
eels on its weedy bottom in some places. It lay in a narrow valley,
however, between the slopes of steep hills, and it was long rather than
wide.
"Isn't this a big thing, Mort? I was never out on any such voyage as
this before. Were you?"
"Don't believe anybody else ever was. Not around here. It's a new
thing."
"Wonder what the boys'll say? Mort, we might hold on here long enough to
catch a fish or two."
"No, sir-ree! We'll just meandrew till we get to Pawg Lake."
They were pulling nicely along just then, quite a distance above the
mill and near the eastern shore of the pond, when a clear, pleasant
voice sang out to them:
"Hey, boys! Put me across the pond, please?"
The manner and the accent of that hail were offensively correct and
polite, and there at the edge of the woody bank stood a young man of
middle size. He carried a joint rod instead of a fish-pole; he had a
sort of butterfly net on a stick, and everything about him was nice and
expensive to that degree which always arouses the hostility of country
village boys. Still, these two were on their good behavior that morning,
and their hearts were a little warm over the conduct of Mr. Getty. The
_Ark_ was pulled ashore and the stranger was taken on board.
"Straight across, please. Nice boat you have. Capital fun for bright
young fellows like you. Spending your day out of school on the water?
Good idea."
"Course it is," said Mort, but Quill Sanders added:
"I say, mister, got any fish in your basket yet?"
"Not one, my boy. No luck at all this morning."
"Guess you won't catch any 'round here, with all that there fancy
rigging."
"Think not? Ah, here we are. Put me ashore. Will a dime apiece do?"
He held out a couple of bits of shining silver as he spoke, but he had
already stirred the pride of the crew of the _Ark_.
"No, thank you," said Quill Sanders. "We're on a voyage of discovery. We
won't take pay for any kindnesses we do to the natives we meet."
"You don't say! Voyage of discovery. New World. All that sort of thing.
Arctic circle. North Pole. Sandwich Islands."
"No, sir-ree!" exclaimed Mort. "We're bound for Pawg Lake. All the way
up the Taponican."
"That's this mighty stream, I suppose, and Pawg Lake is at the
mysterious end of it. Boys, it isn't of any manner of use. I'm not a
native. Only stopping in the village for a week. You've got to take me
on board the--the what's her name?"
"The _Ark_," said Mort, with much dignity, "and we're not calling for
passengers."
"Passengers? Oh no, I'm one of the crew. I'd ship before the mast if
there was one. Just let me take those oars and work my watch on deck.
Then I'll go below while you take yours."
He had again seated himself, even while he was speaking, and Mort
Hopkins hardly knew why he didn't resist the sudden seizure of those
oars.
Then there came a surprise to both of them, for the stranger made the
_Ark_ spin around, and get her head up stream, and glide away over the
water, after a fashion to which she was entirely unaccustomed.
"Quill," said Mort, "he can row."
"Mister," said Quill, "did you bring any lunch with you?"
"I did, my young friend. I am provisioned for the voyage. Is it a long
one?"
"All the way up Taponican Creek, and it just meandrews."
"You don't say! Have to tack around the short corners, and all that
sort of thing. Are the natives at all dangerous?"
"Never been there," said Mort, "'cept once, when father and Uncle Hiram
and the Dutch house-painter went to Pawg a-fishin', and took me along."
"Did they catch anything?"
"Guess they did; but they had things to catch 'em with. Something better
than that there whip-stalk and a spool o' thread."
"They were wise men. We will see what we can do when we get there. Nice
boat this is. I can make her meandrew all the way. If we don't discover
something, it won't be our fault."
"He just can row," began Quill to Mort, but at that moment the stranger
began to pull a little more slowly, and they could hardly believe their
ears. He struck into a ringing, musical song that kept time with the
oars. That was surprise enough, but what made it bad was that they could
not understand one word he was singing.
"Quill," whispered Mort, "I was pop sure he wasn't born in this country.
He's a foreigner."
They were out of the pond now, and there was no question whatever of the
crookedness with which the creek wound its way in and out among the
pastures and meadows. There was nowhere a very strong current, and the
boys were a little surprised to find their favorite stream at once so
deep and so narrow. Its character was very different from any it was
able to earn below the pond and down through the village.
"It's awful clean, though," said Quill, "and there's any amount of trees
and bushes along the banks."
"Boys," exclaimed the stranger at last, "I'm going to try one of these
shady hollows for a trout. Quill, you take an oar, and paddle me along
slowly into that black-looking cove up yonder. I'll show you something
new. Mort, you get back into the stern."
"He knows our names," muttered Mort.
But it was no fault of theirs if he did not. He gave Quill a few more
directions, and then he stood well forward, with the light graceful rod
they had called a "whip-stalk" poised in his right hand. The wind was
gently blowing up stream, and the stranger said, very quietly:
"That'll do. Steady, now."
And then they heard the faint hum of the reel on his rod, and a gossamer
flight of fine line, with three little bits of fuzzy things at the end
of it, each about the size of a small gray moth, dropped on the water as
light as thistle-down.
It was a beautiful cast, if the boys had but known it, and the flies
alighted in a spot of dark water almost under the bank, where a little
eddy made a faint ripple on the surface.
[Illustration: "SOMETHING BRIGHT AND VIGOROUS SPRANG CLEAR OUT OF THE
WATER."]
Splash! Something bright and vigorous sprang clear out of the water!
"Struck! I'll get him. Steady, Quill; don't pull a stroke. He's a heavy
one this time. I must give him all the line he wants. He's off up
stream."
How that reel did buzz, and how the excited boys did watch the motions
of their new acquaintance!
"He'll run all the way to Pawg," said Mort.
"Not with that hook in him," said Quill. "See! he's a-winding him up
again."
The reel was a "multiplier," and the line came in swiftly enough, for
the fisherman had "snubbed" his victim, and turned him toward the boat.
Out and in, again and again, went the line, but at last the boys had
seen the prize, and knew it was a bigger speckled trout than they
supposed Taponican contained.
"Here he comes! Now for the net!"
Both his young friends had long since decided that that machine was
designed for "catching minnies," but now its round loop was skillfully
thrust under the exhausted fish, as he allowed himself to be dragged
alongside. No strain on the slender line. Only a quick, easy "lift," and
then a beauty of a trout, more than a pound in weight, lay flopping on
the bottom of the _Ark_.
"Whoop! hurrah!"
"Isn't he a buster?"
"Just look at his spots, Quill."
"We never catch 'em, 'cause they feed on flies, and you have to scoop
'em in."
"Now, boys, more fun."
They were ready for it, and there was plenty of it all the way to Pawg.
The trout were biting freely, and every eddy and circling pool on which
the interesting stranger's flies alighted yielded up its share of
glittering spoil.
"This is your lake? Upon my word, it's a pretty one. There's an island
right out in the middle. Boys, we must go and discover that island.
It'll be a good place to eat our lunch in. Did you know it was about
time for seamen like us to eat something? It hadn't occurred to me
before, but I am as hungry as a bear!"
[TO BE CONTINUED.]