Chapter Four.
The Explosion.
Bigley wanted no further telling, but started off at full speed diagonally down the slope, while Bob, who was all animation and good temper again, seized the iron bar, and began to look out for a suitable place for the charge.
“Hadn’t we better wait and see if he can get the powder?” I ventured to say.
“Not we,” said Bob. “He’ll be sure to get it, and then—oh, I say, Sep, it will be a game!”
Once more I began to feel misgivings as to whether it would be such a game; but I said nothing, only looked on sometimes at Bob, who, in imitation of what he had seen at the quarries, or the places where they blasted out shelves in the cliff-side for houses to be built, was busy driving in a hole right under the big rock by means of the bar, and sometimes at where Bigley was shuffling and sliding down the side of the Gap till he disappeared behind the shed.
“If he gets the powder I wouldn’t put much in,” I said.
“Why not?”
“Because it may be dangerous.”
“There, get out! Just as if I didn’t know what I’m doing. I’ve watched the quarry-men lots of times.”
“Will it split the rock?” I asked.
“All depends how you put your charge,” said Bob very sagely. “I’m going to make it lift the rock, and drop it down over the side, and then away it’ll go and sweep a lot of those big bits with it, just as if they were skittles, and they’ll all go down like a big clatter stream to the bottom.”
“Here’s a better place here,” I said, crawling down on the opposite side of the rock.
“No, it ain’t,” said Bob in his opiniated manner, and without looking. “It ain’t half so good. This is the place. Now go and look, and see if old Big’s coming back.”
I rose up again, and shading my eyes looked down to the cottage, beyond which the sea was glittering in the sun.
“No,” I said; “not yet. Yes, he is: here he comes.”
“Has he got it?” cried Bob.
“I don’t know,” I replied, “he’s so far-off; but he has got something. He’s waving his handkerchief.”
“Here, hi! Stop! Don’t do that!” cried Bob, jumping up and throwing his arms about. “You’ll spill all the powder. There’s an old stupid. He don’t take any notice.”
“Why, how can he at all that distance away? You couldn’t make him hear if he was only a quarter as far.”
Bob did not reply, but sat down watching, and I did the same, while poor old Bigley came panting and toiling up the slope in the hot sun.
“Oh, isn’t he jolly slow,” cried Bob. “I wish I’d gone myself. It’ll take him all day.”
“You’d have lain down and gone to sleep before you were half-way up the hill,” I said maliciously, and Bob tightened his lips.
“Go on,” he said sourly. “I know what you want. You want to fall out, but I sha’n’t. I hate a fellow who always wants to get up a fight. I came here to-day to see if we couldn’t have a bit of fun, so I sha’n’t quarrel. Oh, I say, what a while he is! He’s just like old Teggley Grey’s horse, only he ain’t so quick.”
Poor old Bigley wasn’t quick, certainly, for it was hot, and hard climbing to where we were perched. To have come straight up was next to impossible: the only way was to come sidewise, getting a little higher as you walked along; and toiling industriously at his task, Bigley at last reached the foot of the piled-up mass where we were waiting.
“Oh, I say, come up. Be quick. What a while you have been!” said Bob. “Got it?”
“Oh, it’s all very well to talk,” panted Bigley wiping his forehead, “sitting down there so quietly. It’s hot.”
“Never mind about it’s being so hot,” cried Bob. “Have you got it?”
“Got what?”
“Did you ever hear such a chap?” cried Bob. “The powder.”
“Why, of course I have. Didn’t I go on purpose to get it?”
We both thought that the intention was not always followed by the deed, but we said nothing in our anxiety to get the material for our experiment; and as Bigley had come to a halt, we had to go down about a hundred feet to help him climb up the rest of the way, when he drew out a pint tin can full of powder, the flint and steel, and a piece of rag, which he had taken the precaution to damp in the stream and then wring out before starting back.
We set to work at once making the damp rag into a fuse by rubbing it well with the coarse-grained gunpowder, and then, it being decided that we could not do better than leave the powder in the tin canister, whose opening answered admirably for the insertion of the rag fuse, Bob set to work to enlarge the hole he had made till it was big enough to admit the charge.
Then with great care the end of the rag was thrust into the powder, and held there with a piece of slaty chip, sufficient length of the rag being left to reach out beyond the side of the stone.
Next Bob took the tin and thrust it into its place far under the rock, and the only remaining thing to do was to light the fuse and get well out of the way.
“Who’s going to nick the steel?” I said.
“Well,” said Bob coolly, “as I’ve done nearly all the rest of the work you may as well do that.”
I felt a moment’s hesitation, nothing more, and taking the flint, steel, and tinder-box, with a brimstone match, I went down on my knees beside the stone, where the piece of rag lay out ready, and after a great deal of nicking I made one of the sparks I struck fall into the tinder-box, and, after the customary amount of blowing, produced enough glow to ignite the tip of the brimstone-dipped match, which by careful shading fluttered and burned with a blue flame nearly invisible in the noontide light.
It was an extremely risky proceeding, for we had dropped some of the powder in among the short dry moss and stones, and then, too, the rag was drying fast, and it was quite within the range of possibilities that when I lit one end it might communicate too rapidly with the powder in the canister, and the explosion would take place before I could get out of the way.
But Bob Chowne and Bigley were standing only a couple of yards behind me, ready to dodge behind some of the great rocks on the comb of the ridge, and I believe that in those days I possessed so much of the Spartan fortitude which pervaded our school, that I would sooner have been blown up than show fear. So I sheltered my match, bending lower and lower, till I could bring it to a level with the powder-smeared rag, which caught at once, and began to sparkle and scintillate, sending up a thin blue flame at the same time.
That was enough, and throwing the match away, I began to back towards the lookers-on, but hearing a scuffling noise among the stones, I looked round to see that they were both running.
“Come on!” shouted Bob. “Look sharp, Sep!”
As they had begun to run it seemed to be no shame for me to do the same, so I darted after them, and found them just on the other side of the ridge, lying down behind some of the great rocks.
“That’s right,” cried Bob. “Creep close; nothing can hurt us here. Are you sure you left the thing burning?”
“Quite,” I said. “It must be off directly.”
I don’t know whether Bigley was aware of the fact, but he crept close between two rocks and behaved just as an ostrich is said to do, for he stuck his head right in and then seemed to consider that he was quite safe.
Suddenly, as we were listening impatiently for the explosion, an idea occurred to me.
“I say,” I said, “what’s the good of all this? We sha’n’t see the stone go down.”
Bob started up in a sitting position, and gave Bigley a tremendous slap which made him follow suit.
“Why, you are a chap!” he said as the idea came home to him too. “Why didn’t you say so sooner?”
“I didn’t think of it,” I replied.
“Oh!” exclaimed Big dolefully, “what was the use of me taking all that trouble about the powder. I’m hot yet with climbing.”
“It’s all Sep Duncan’s fault,” cried Bob. “I never did see such a chap as he is. Well, what’s to be done now?”
“Let’s go on the top again and see it go,” cried Big.
“Oh, no,” I said, “it wouldn’t be safe till the powder’s gone off.”
“You mean it wouldn’t have been safe if I’d done what you wanted,” cried Bob triumphantly. “I say, Big, he wanted me to put the powder under the stone on the other side, so that when it went off it would have blown the stone over this side instead of down into the Gap, only I wouldn’t.”
“Well, it does seem a pity after taking all that trouble,” cried Bigley dolefully. “I say, isn’t it time it started?”
“Yes,” said Bob in his sour way. “I don’t believe old Sep lighted the rag.”
“That I’m sure I did, and it was smoking fast when I came away.”
“Ran away, you mean, you coward!”
“Ho—ho—ho!” laughed Bigley.
“What are you laughing at, stupid?” said Bob.
“At you. Didn’t you say to me, ‘come on, Big, let’s run for it now. It’s all alight.’”
“Well, I thought it was then, old clever-shakes. Don’t you be so precious ready with your tongue.”
“Here, don’t make all this bother,” I said pettishly. “I did light the rag, and it has gone out again. Never mind, I can soon get another light.”
“Let’s wait a minute first,” said Bob cautiously.
It was good advice, and we did wait I suppose quite a minute, but to us it seemed more than five, and considering now that it was quite safe, I jumped up and we went back to the ridge, looking eagerly towards the place where the stone hung over the Gap, but it was hidden from us by the great blocks we had run round, or else probably we might have seen what we smelt—the thin blue stream of smoke that curled up from beneath the great block.
As it was, our noses and not our eyes saved us, for I being in front, and just about to pass on to the open edge of the Gap, stopped suddenly and said:
“I can smell burning. Can’t you?”
“I can smell the tinder,” said Bob. “Go on and—”
He did not finish his speech, for the earth shook beneath our feet, and we saw a flash and a great puff of smoke, and quite a hurricane of bits of slate and stone and earth came flying by our ears, turning us into statues for the moment. Then I bounded forward, followed by my companions, to stand beneath a broad canopy of smoke that floated inland, and just in time to see the great stone go rumbling and bounding down the precipitous place like a pebble, gathering force moment by moment, till it seemed to glance from a stone and make one tremendous leap of quite a couple of hundred feet right into a clump of rugged masses of rock half-way down the precipice, and these it scattered and drove before it in one great avalanche of débris down and down and down till the bottom was reached, and what had increased into quite a little landslip settled into its new home with a sullen roar.
Chapter Five.
We Dine with a Smuggler.
We three boys stood gazing down at our work with a feeling closely akin to awe, staring at the rushing stone cataract which kept throwing off masses of grey foam which were great pieces of rock bouncing and leaping and bounding down as if delighted at being set free to move after being fixed to the earth since who could say when? No one spoke, no one moved till all was still below, and then, while I was wondering what my father would say, Bigley Uggleston suddenly made us start by tossing up his cap and shouting “Hooray!”
This roused Bob, who began to smile.
“I thought that would move it,” he said coolly. “Why, what’s the matter with you, Sep? Here, Big, look at him; he’s quite white. Here’s a game! He’s frightened.”
“No, I’m not,” I said stoutly. “I was only thinking about what my father will say when he sees what we’ve done.”
“Get out! Hark at him. One can’t come down to the Gap now without old Sep Duncan dinning it into your ears about his father, and what he’ll say, and all to show how proud he is, just because an old chap has bought a bit of land down by the sea. Why, what harm have we done?”
“Torn all that ragged place down the bottom of the cliff,” I said dolefully. “It wasn’t like that before.”
“And what of it? Who’s to know but what the stone tumbled down by itself? Nobody heard.”
We looked guiltily round, but the Gap was perfectly solemn and silent, the only thing suggesting life after the two cottages and the lugger being the vessels out at sea between us and the Welsh coast.
“But it seems such a pity!” I said ruefully. “I didn’t think the stone would make so much of a mark coming down.”
“There he goes again!” sneered Bob. “Afraid of spoiling his father’s estate. Oh, arn’t we proud of two sides of a hole and a water-gully!”
I had some reason for my remarks, for as I looked down there below us, where the great mass had struck so heavily, there appeared to be a smooth grey patch as if the surface had been scraped away.
“Hi! Look, look!” cried Bigley. “See the rabbits!” We looked, and could see at least a dozen little fellows that had been scared out of their holes, scuttling about among the stones, their white cottony tails showing quite plainly in the clear air. But these soon disappeared, and the others yielding to my desire to go down and see what mischief had really been done by the fall, we all began to slip and slide and stumble down the precipitous place, keeping as nearly as we could in the course taken by the stone, till we came upon the bare-looking spot.
It was just as it had struck me; the great rock we had sent down had started a number more, and they had literally scraped off all the loose surface pieces and earth, and scoured the valley slope for a space of about three yards wide and fifty feet in depth down to the ancient rock. Below this the valley grew less steep, and the stone slide had had less force, beginning after a time to leave fragments behind, so that the place seemed little changed, except here half-way up the slope.
“Tchah!” exclaimed Bob; “nobody will notice this, and if they saw it from down below they wouldn’t take the trouble to climb up.”
His words seemed full of truth, for it seemed to me that nothing but the sheep and rabbits was likely to come rambling and climbing up here; so, feeling more at my ease, I began to look about with the eyes of curiosity to see if there was anything to be found.
My companions followed my example, and we examined the places that had been scoured bare, to see that they were very much like the cliffs down by the shore, being evidently of the slate common there, a coarse grey slate, stained with markings of lavender and scarlet pink, which, where it was freshly fractured, glistened in the sun like some portions of a wood-pigeon’s breast.
There was nothing else to see, and my companions went on climbing down, while I lingered for a few minutes picking up a bit of broken stone here and another there, to throw them away again, all but one bit which looked dark and shiny, something like a bit of Welsh coal, only it wasn’t coal, and that I put in my pocket.
“Come on!” shouted Bob; “we’re going down to the shore.”
I hurried after them, and we went lower and lower till we reached the little river, which ran glistening and rippling over the stones.
We had no tackle but our hands, and so the little trout that revelled in the clear water escaped that day; but we were obliged to stop at every swirling pool where the water grew deep and dark, to have a good stare at the little speckled beauties, and lay plots against their happiness.
These pauses took up a good deal of time, so that it was about one o’clock when we reached Uggleston’s cottage, and, as it happened, just as its tenant was coming up from his boat, having just landed from some expedition along the coast.
He was not alone, for old Binnacle Bill, as we called him, was behind, carrying the oars and the mast with the little sail twisted round, so as to put them in Uggleston’s lean-to shed.
As we drew nearer I began to wonder what sort of a reception we were going to receive from old Jonas Uggleston; and it struck me very forcibly then, how strange it seemed that he should be the father of my school-fellow, who was always well dressed, that is as school-boys are, while he was just like an ordinary fisherman of the coast, with rough flannel trousers rolled up, big fisherman’s boots, blue worsted shirt, and an otter-skin cap, from beneath which his grisly hair stuck out in an untended mass, while his beard, that was more grisly still, half covered his dark-brown face.
He was a stern, fierce-looking man, with large dark eyes that seemed to ferret out everything one was thinking about, and as he came up he looked at us all searchingly in turn.
“Hallo, father! Been along the coast?” cried Bigley, striding up to him; and there was just a faint kind of smile on Jonas Uggleston’s face as his son shook hands and then took his arm in a way that seemed to come like a surprise to me, for it seemed so curious that my school-fellow Bigley could like that fierce, common-looking man.
“Hallo, Big!” growled old Jonas grimly, “keeping your holidays then. Who’ve you got here? Oh! It’s you, young Chowne, is it? Ah! I was coming over to see your father ’bout my foot as I got twisted ’tween two bits o’ rock—jumping; but it’s got better now. Home from school?”
“Yes, sir; we came home yesterday,” said Bob, staring hard at old Uggleston’s mahogany hands.
“And who’s this, eh? Oh, young Cap’n Duncan, eh?” continued the old fellow, turning to me as if he were not sure. “So you’ve come home from school, eh?”
“Yes, sir,” I said; “I came with them yesterday.”
“Well, I know that, don’t I?” he said sharply. “Think folk as don’t go to school don’t know nothing, eh?”
“Oh, no, sir,” I said apologetically.
“’Cause they do, you know. And so we must buy the Gap, must we, and get to be landlords, must we, and want to turn parties as has lived here twenty or thirty years or more out of their houses and homes, must we? Now, look ye here, young gent, what I’ve got to say is—Bah! What a fool I am,” he cried, smiting his open left hand with his fist. “What am I talking about? ’Tar’n’t his fault.”
I was standing aghast and wishing myself a long way off, when his whole manner changed and he patted me on the shoulder.
“’Tar’n’t your fault, my lad, ’tar’n’t your fault. So you’ve come home for the holidays, eh?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Hah! Bigley, my big babby, often talks about you when he writes to me, lad. You’re mates, eh?”
“Oh, yes,” I said, finding his tone roughly kind now. “We sleep in the same room.”
“Hah, yes! Well, and what have you chaps been about?”
“Oh, climbing about, and down by the stream, father,” put in Bigley quickly.
“And you ar’n’t hungry a bit, eh, lads? Well, I am,” he said, without waiting for us to speak. “Let’s go in and see what Mother Bonnet has got for us.”
I was for hanging back, and so was Bob, who was jealous of the extra notice taken of me; but old Jonas Uggleston took hold of us both by the shoulders and marched us before him as if we were prisoners, and regularly pushed us in at the low door and into the low rustic-looking room, with its floor formed of big rough slabs of slate, and its whitewashed walls hung with all kinds of fishing gear and odds and ends, that looked very much as if they had come from different wrecks, so out of keeping were they with the plain, homely room, smelling strangely of sea-weed with a dash of fish.
“And I thought there’d be something ready to eat,” said old Jonas. “That’s right, Big, put some chairs to the table, and come to an anchor all of you.”
He smiled grimly as he thrust both Bob and me into chairs and then turned to his son.
“Take the big pitcher, boy, and fill it from the cider barrel. It’s in the back place yonder. Good cider won’t hurt boys. It’s only like drinking apples ’stead o’ chewing of ’em. I’m going to dip my hands. Back directly.”
He nodded and left the room with his son, leaving Bob and me staring at each other across the table.
“Don’t it seem rum,” he whispered, “having no table-cloth?”
I said it did, but then the table was beautifully clean, and so were the silver table-spoons, and the silver mug at the end where old Jonas sat. While, to make the table thoroughly attractive to us hungry boys, who had been walking all the morning, there was a good-sized cold salmon on a big dish; a great piece of cold ham; a large round loaf that looked as if it had been baked in a basin, and a plate of butter and a dish of thick yellow cream.
These substantial things had a good effect upon Bob Chowne, whose face began to look smooth and pleasant, and who showed his satisfaction farther by kicking me under the table, for he was afraid to make any more remarks, because we could hear Jonas Uggleston, in some place at the back, blowing and splashing as if he were washing himself in a bucket; and of this last there was no doubt, for we heard the handle rattle, then a loud splash, as if he had thrown the dirty water out of the window, and the bucket set down and the handle rattling again.
This made Bob kick me again painfully, and he grinned and his eyes seemed to say, “No jug and basin, and no washstand.”
Just then Bigley came in with a great brown jug of cider, smiling all over his face.
“I say, I am glad father has asked you to stop,” he said. “We’ll get him to let us have the boat after dinner.”
Just then old Jonas came in without his otter-skin cap, combing the thick grisly fringe round his head, the top of which was quite bare; and directly after from another door—for there were doors nearly everywhere, because Jonas Uggleston had built the cottage very small at first and then kept on adding rooms, and kitchens, and wash-house with stores—Mother Bonnet came in, an elderly plump woman, who always put me in mind of a cider apple when it was ripe.
Mother Bonnet was Binnacle Bill’s wife, and lived at the cottage on the other side of the stream, but she came and “did for” Master Uggleston, as she called it; that is to say, she cooked and kept the house clean; and she bore in hand a dish of hot new potatoes, which were very scarce things with us and a deal thought of by some people for a treat.
She nodded to us all in turn, and was going away again, when Jonas shouted “Winegar,” and Mother Bonnet hurriedly produced a big black bottle from a corner cupboard, and placed it upon the table.
That was about as rough a dinner as Bob Chowne and I had ever sat down to, but how delicious it was!
“’Live last night,” said Jonas, digging great pieces of the salmon off with a silver spoon, and supplying our plates.
“You catch him, father?” said Bigley.
“Yes, Big. Weir.”
“Weir,” I thought to myself. “Weir? What does he mean by weir?”
“Eat away, my lads,” cried Jonas Uggleston. “Big: have off some bread.”
“When did you finish the weir, father?” said Bigley, with his mouth full, in spite of all Dr Stacey had said.
“Seccun April, boy. You can work it a bit, now you’re down.”
Bigley looked at us with eager eyes, but we were too busy to pay much attention, though I was anxious to see a weir that would catch salmon, and ready to ask questions as soon as the dinner was done.
“Pour out the cider, lad. It’s a fresh cask, and it’s good. I bought some at Squire Allworth’s sale.”
Bigley began to pour out for us, old Jonas having pushed his silver mug to my side, while he took a brown one from a shelf for his and Bob’s use; and I was feeling sorry that he should have given me the silver mug, because Bob would not like it, when, just as old Jonas mentioned Squire Allworth’s sale, his face changed again, and I saw his scowl as he looked at me.
“He’s thinking about my father buying the Gap,” I said to myself; but forgot it all directly, for the fierce look passed away as the old man lifted his cup.
“Taste it, boys, and it’ll make you think of being in the sunshine in an orchard, with the sun ripening the apples. Now then: salmon getting bony. Who’ll have some ham?”
We all would, and we were quite ready afterwards to attack and finish off a pot of raspberry jam which Mother Bonnet brought in with a smile; and the raspberry jam, the beautiful butter and bread, and the cream worked such an effect upon Bob Chowne that he exclaimed suddenly:
“Oh, don’t I wish Dr Stacey would give us dinners like this!”
Old Jonas uttered a hoarse harsh laugh, which made me feel uncomfortable, for he did not look as if he were laughing, but as if he were in a very severe and angry fit with somebody.
“There,” he said, when we had quite done, “be off, boys, now. I’m going to be busy.”
“Yes, father,” said Big. “May we have the boat and go out for a sail?”
Old Jonas turned sharply round on him, and looked as if he were going to knock his son down, so fierce was his aspect.
“No!” he roared.
“No, father?” faltered Bigley.
“No!” said old Jonas, not quite so fiercely. “Do you think I want to spend all next week on the look-out to find you chaps when you’re washed ashore—drowned?”
“Oh, father! Just as if it was likely!”
“Haw, haw!” laughed old Jonas, and it did not seem like a laugh, but as if he were calling his son bad names. “You can manage a boat all of you, can’t you, and row and reef and steer? Get out. Books is in your way, and writin’, and sums, not boats.”
“But father—”
“Hold your tongue. I don’t want to lose my boat, and I don’t want to lose you. May be useful some day. Doctor wants his boy too, teach him to make physic; and I ar’n’t no spite again’ young Duncan here, so I dunno as I partic’lar wants him throw’d up on the beach with his pockets full o’ shrimps; so, No. Now be off. Go and look at the weir.”
Chapter Six.
A Sea-side Weir.
“It’s of no good,” said Bigley, as we tramped down over the rough sand and pebbles. “When he says ‘no’ he means it. We could have managed the boat all right. I say, I’ll get him some day to let Binnacle Bill take us, and we’ll buy some twisty Bristol for him, and make him spin yarns.”
“But where’s the weir?” I said, as we were getting close down to where the sea was breaking, and where the fresh-water of the little river came bubbling up from among the boulders after its dive down below, and was now mingling with the salt water of the sea.
“Where’s the weir?” cried Bigley. “Why, this is it.”
“This?” said Bob, “why it’s only a lot of hurdles.” So it appeared at first sight, but it was ingeniously contrived all the same for its purpose; and in accordance with the habits of the salmon and other fish that are fond of coming up with the tide to get into fresh-water, and run up the different rivers and streams.
It was a very simple affair, and looked to be exactly what Bob had said—a lot of old hurdles. But it was strongly made all the same, and consisted of a couple of rows of stout stakes driven down into the beach, just after the fashion of the figure on the opposite page, with one row towards the sea, and the other running up beside where the stream water bubbled up and towards the shore. In and out of these stakes rough oak boughs were woven so closely, that from the bottom to about four feet up, though the water would run through easily enough, there was no room for a decent-sized fish to go through, while down at the bottom all this was strengthened by being banked up with stones inside and out, and all carefully laid and wedged in together, and cemented with lime.
Now when the tide was up all these posts and hurdles were covered with water, and as the fish swam up to meet the fresh stream, a great many would sometimes be over the ground inclosed by the weir, searching about for food washed down by the stream, or for the little shrimps and other water creatures that hung about the hurdles, which were a favourite place too with mussels, which cling to such wood-work by thousands. Now though they are easily frightened it does not seem as if fish have much brain, for sometimes they stopped swimming about inside these hurdles till the tide had run down as low as the tops of the posts, and then, feeling it was time for them to be off with the tide, they’d start to swim off, but only to find themselves shut in.
Sometimes it would be a shoal of grey mullet, sometimes a salmon or two that had tried to get up the stream, and could not get by the pebble bar; and there they would be swimming about, not feeling their danger till it was too late.
First of all they would try to get through the hurdles, and there they would keep on trying till some wise one amongst them thought that by swimming round the ends at A or B they would reach the open sea.
Sometimes they would do this and escape. They all follow one another like sheep in a flock; but generally they do not try to get round the ends till it is too late, for while there is still plenty of water at C there is very little at B and none at all at A, and the consequence is that the fish are left splashing when the tide goes out, in a few little shallow pools, where there is nothing to do but scoop them out with a bit of a net.
The tide was getting well down, and the hurdles were nearly all bare, but there was too much water for us to see whether there were any fish left, and so we stood on first one big boulder, and then upon another, as they were left dry, every now and then making a bold leap on to a rock, to stand there surrounded by water, and now and then obliged to jump back to avoid a wetting.
But at last the hurdles and stones at the sea end of the weir were completely left by the tide, so that we could walk down, and then, as the water shallowed more and more in the triangular inclosure, we looked out eagerly for fish.
“There they are—lots of ’em!” cried Bob excitedly, for he was too much interested to be disagreeable and say unpleasant things.
“Oh, those are only little ones,” cried Bigley, as the little silvery fry kept flashing out of the surface. “They’ll all go out through the holes. You’ll see none of them will be left.”
And so it proved; for as the water in the inclosure sank lower and lower the small fry were seen no more, but a swirl here and there showed that one, if not more, good-sized fish were left, and in the anticipation of a good catch we hopped about from stone to stone, and clambered along the hurdles.
“Hooray!” shouted Bob, who was now in a high state of delight, “isn’t this better than learning our jolly old hic—haec—hoc, eh, Sep?”
“I should think so.”
“Oh!”
There was a shout and a splash and we two roared with laughter, for Bigley had just then made a jump to gain a stone standing clear of the falling water, when, not allowing for the slippery sea-weed that grew upon it in a patch, his feet glided over the smooth stone and he came down in a sitting position in the water, which flew out in spray on all sides.
“Here! Hi! Net!—net!” shouted Bob. “Come on, Sep, here’s such a big one—a Bigley big one. It’s a shark, I know it is. Look at his teeth!”
“It’s all very well to laugh,” said Bigley, getting up and standing knee-deep in the water to squeeze the moisture out of the upper part of his clothes, “but how would you like it?”
“Ever so,” cried Bob; “I’m as hot as hot. Mind how you go near him, Sep, he’ll bite. Oh, don’t I wish I had a boat-hook, I’d fetch him out.”
“I don’t care. It’s only sea-water. I don’t mind,” grumbled Bigley wading about in the pool. “I say, boys, here’s a salmon and a whole lot of mullet.”
“Where, where?” cried Bob, and, without a moment’s hesitation he jumped in and waded towards Bigley.
“There! Can’t you see ’em? There they go!” cried Bigley pointing.
“No.”
“Why, out yonder! They’re lying there quiet now amongst the stones.”
“Oh, won’t I give it you for this, old Big!” cried Bob. “There are no fish there at all. You gammoned me to make me come in and get my legs wet like yours are. Never mind, I’ll serve you out.”
“Why, there are some fish,” cried Bigley indignantly.
“Don’t you believe him, Sep,” said Bob. “It’s all nonsense.”
“Yes, there are,” I said from where I had climbed over the deepest part by clinging to the hurdles, “I can see them.”
“Oh no, you can’t, my lad. You’d like me to come splashing through the water there for you to laugh at me, but it won’t do. There isn’t a single fish in the place, only old Bigley—old Babby as his father calls him. I say, Sep, what a game! Did you ever see such a babby?”
“Don’t do that,” said Bigley sharply.
“Don’t do what?—splash you?” cried Bob. “There—and there.”
He suited the action to the word, and scooping up the water, he sent it flying over our tall schoolmate.
“You know what I mean,” said Bigley, speaking in a low angry tone such as I had never before heard from him.
“Why, what do you mean?” cried Bob offensively. “Do you want me to thrash you?”
“I want you to leave my father alone, and what he says to me,” said Bigley sharply. “I don’t mind your making fun of me. I don’t mind what you call me; but that’s his name he has always used since I was a little baby, and you’ve no business to say it.”
“Ha—ha—ha!” laughed Bob, “here’s a game. Do you hear, Sep! He says he was once a little baby. I don’t believe it. Ha—ha—ha!”
Bigley did not take any notice, and I did not join in the laugh, so Bob made a movement as if he were going to wade out of the pool, and his lips parted to say something disagreeable. I knew as well as could be that he was going to say that he should go home if we were about to turn like that; but his legs were wet, and the walk home was long, and not pleasant to take alone. And then there were the fish in the pool to catch, and in spite of his expressions of unbelief he knew that there must be some. So he altered his mind, and changed his tone.
“I didn’t want to upset you, Big, old matey,” he said. “I didn’t, did I, Sep Duncan? Here, what’s the good of quarrelling when it’s holidays? There, I won’t call you so any more.”
Bigley’s face cleared in a moment, and with a couple of splashes he was at Bob’s side with one hand extended, and the other upon his school-fellow’s shoulder.
“It’s all right,” he said quickly. “Shake hands, and let’s get the fish. There, I’ll go for the prawn net and a basket.”
He ran splashing out of the water, and up over the boulders towards the cottage, leaving me and Bob together.
“I wouldn’t be as big as he is,” said Bob, “and I wouldn’t have such a nasty temper for thousands of pounds. Here, what are you grinning at?”
“At you.” For there was something so comic in his speech, coming as it did from the most ill-tempered boy in the school—Dr Stacey had often said so, and Bob proved it every day of his life—that I burst into a hearty laugh.
Bob stood knee-deep in the water staring hard at me. For the first few moments he looked furious; then he seemed to grow sulky, and then in a low surly voice he said:
“I say, Sep, it isn’t true, is it?”
“Isn’t what true?”
“About the—about what old stay-sail said?”
“About you being disagreeable?”
“Yes. It isn’t true, is it?”
I nodded.
“I don’t believe it,” he said impetuously. “I’m as good-tempered a chap as anybody, only people turn disagreeable with me. Well, you are a pretty mate to turn against me like that.”
“I don’t turn against you, Bob, and I don’t mind your being disagreeable,” I said; “but you asked me, and I told you the truth.”
Bob stood quite still and thoughtful, as if he were watching the fishes, and he began to whistle softly a very miserable old tune that the shepherds sang out on the moor—one which always suggested winter to me and driving rain and cold bleak winds.
“Look here!” I said, for the water was draining away fast out of the pool now, the stones that banked up the bottom of the woven hurdle-work being visible here and there.
But Bob did not move. He stood there with his hands deep in his pockets and the water up to his knees still, the part where he was being deeper, and he kept on whistling softly to himself.
“Why can’t you look, Bob?” I said. “You can see the fishes quite plain.”
“I don’t want to see ’em,” he replied sulkily. “When are you going home?”
“Oh, not forever so long; not till tea-time. Here comes Big!”
Bob did not look round, but his ears seemed to twitch as the sound of our schoolmates’ heavy tread came over the stones, for he lumbered along at a trot with a big maund, as we called the baskets there, in one hand, a great landing-net in the other. But as Bigley came to the edge of the pool Bob waded out and said in a low quiet voice:
“Shall I carry the basket?”
We both stared, for in an ordinary way Bob would have shouted, “Here, give us hold of the net,” and snatched at it or anything else in his desire to take the lead.
“No, no,” cried Bigley, though. “You two chaps are visitors. You have the first go, Bob, and then let Sep Duncan try. But it’s no use yet.”
He was quite right; there was too much room for the fish to dart about, and so we stood here, and crept there, to watch them as they glided about among the swaying sea-weed, all brown and olive-green, and full of bladder-like pods to hold them up in the water. Sometimes there was a rush, and a swirl in the pool. At another time we could catch sight of the silvery side of some fish as it turned over and glided through the shoal. Then for a few minutes all would be perfectly still and calm—so still that it was hard to imagine that there was a fish left in the place.
And all the time the tide kept on retiring, and the water in the pool lowering, till all at once there was a tremendous rush, a great silvery fish flashed out into the air, and then fell flat upon its side, making the drops fly sparkling in the sun.
“Salmon,” cried Bigley, “and a big one.”
“Well, let’s catch him, then,” cried Bob excitedly, the gloomy feeling forgotten now in the excitement of the scene.
“Go on!” cried Bigley, handing him the net, and armed therewith Bob began to wade about, hunting the salmon from side to side of the pool, under my directions, for being high up on the dry, I could see the fish far better than those who were wading.
But it was all labour in vain. Twice over Bob touched the salmon, but it was too quick for him, and flung itself over the net splashing him from head to foot, but only encouraging him to make fresh exertions.
“Here, you come and try!” he cried at last. “You’re not tired. Do you hear? You come and try, Sep Duncan. They’re the slipperiest fishes I ever saw.”
I shook my head. I was dry, and meant to keep so now, and said so.
“It’s of no use to try,” said Bigley, “not till the water’s nearly gone. You can’t catch ’em.”
“Why, you knew that all along!” I cried.
“To be sure I did; but you wouldn’t have believed me if I’d said so. Let’s wait. In half an hour it will be all right, and we can get the lot.”
So we waited impatiently, wading and creeping from stone to stone, and trying to count the fish in the weir pool; but not very successfully, for some we counted over and over again, and others were like the little pig in the herd, they would not stand still to be counted.
All at once it seemed as if a big retiring wave left room for nearly all the water left to run out, and though another wave came and drove some back, the next one took it away, leaving room for the weir to drain, and with a shout of triumph we charged down now at the luckless fish, which were splashing about in about six inches of water among the sea-weed and stones.
I forgot all about not meaning to get wet, for I was in over my boot-tops directly. But what did it matter out there in the warm sunshine and by the sea!
It was rare sport for us, though it was death to the fishes. But the weir was contrived to obtain a regular food supply, and we thought of nothing but catching the prisoners and transferring them to the basket.
Bob was pretty successful with the net, but he only caught the mullet. The honour of capturing the eleven-pound salmon, for such it proved to be, was reserved for Bigley and me, as I managed to drive the beautiful silvery creature right up on to the stones, and there Bigley pounced upon it, and bore it flapping and beating its tail to the basket.
As we worked, the remainder of the water sank away, leaving only a pool of an inch or so deep, and from which Bob fished three small mullet, the total caught being eleven, the largest five pounds, and the salmon eleven, the same number of pounds as there were mullet.
We bore our capture up to the cottage in triumph, where old Jonas presented me and Bob with a fine mullet a piece, the salmon and the rest being despatched at once by Binnacle Bill to Ripplemouth for sale.
It was now getting so near tea-time that we set off for home, it being understood that Bigley was to come with us as far as my home, where we were all to have tea, after which he was to set off one way, and I was to go the other; that is to say, walking part of the way home with Bob.
This I did; but when we set off I could not help feeling how much pleasanter it would have been to have gone with Bigley, for I did not anticipate any very pleasant walk. And I was right; for, whether it was the new bread, or the strength of our milk and water, I don’t know—all I do know is, that Bob was as sour as he could be, and insisted upon my carrying his mullet, because he said I should have nothing to carry going home.
Chapter Seven.
I Startle my Father.
My father was first up next morning, and had been out for an hour before I went down the garden to join him, and found him walking the quarter-deck.
You must not think by these words that he was on board a ship. Nothing of the kind. He called by that name a flat place at the bottom of the garden just at the edge of the cliff, where there was a low stone wall built to keep anyone from falling over a couple of hundred feet perpendicular to the rocks and beach below.
This was my father’s favourite place, where he used to spend hours with his spy-glass, and along the edge of the wall, all carefully mounted, were six small brass cannon, which came out of a sloop that was wrecked below in the bay, and which my father bought for the price of old metal when the ship was broken up and sold.
I used to think sometimes that he ought to have called the place the battery, but he settled on the quarter-deck, and the quarter-deck it remained.
Always once a year on his birthday he would load and fire all the cannons, and it was quite a sight; for he used to call himself the crew and load them and prime them, and then send me in for the poker, which had all the time been getting red-hot in the kitchen.
Then he used to take the poker from me, and I used to stop my ears. But as soon as I stopped my ears, he used to frown and say, “Take out the tompions, you young swab!”
So I used to take out the tompions—I mean my fingers—and screw up my face and look on while with quite a grand air my father, who was a fine handsome man, with a fresh colour and curly grey hair, used to stand up very erect, give the poker a flourish through the air, and bring the end down upon a touch-hole.
Then bang! There would be a tremendous roar, and the rocks would echo as the white smoke floated upwards.
A quarter of a minute more and bang would go another gun, and so on for the whole six, every one of them kicking hard and leaping back some distance on to the shingle.
When all were fired, my father used to push them on their little carriages all back into their places; then he used to “bend,” as he called it, the white ensign on to the halyards, and run it up to the head of a rigged mast which stood at the corner, and close to the edge of the cliff, and after this shake hands with himself, left hand with right, and wish himself many happy returns of the day.
It was not his birthday that one on which I ran down the garden to join him; but there he was by his guns, busy with his spy-glass sweeping, as he called it, the Bristol Channel and talking to himself about the different craft.
“Hallo, Sep, my boy!” he said; “here’s a morning for a holiday landsman—or boy. Well, I didn’t see much of you yesterday.”
“No, father,” I said; “I was out all day with Doctor Chowne’s boy and young Uggleston.”
“Rather a queer companion for you, my boy, eh? Uggleston is a sad smuggler, they say; but let’s see, his boy goes to your school?”
“Yes, father, and he’s such a good fellow. We went to his house down in the Gap, and had dinner, and Mr Uggleston was very civil to me, all but—”
“Well, speak out, Sep. All but what?”
“He spoke once, father, as if he did not like your having bought the Gap.”
“Hah! Very likely; but then you see, Sep, I did not consider myself bound to ask everybody’s permission when I was at the sale, much more Mr Jonas Uggleston’s, so there’s an end of that.”
“He seemed to think he would have to turn out and go, father,” I said, looking at him rather wistfully, for it appeared to me as if it would be a great pity if old Uggleston and Bigley did have to turn out, because we were such friends.
“If Mr Jonas Uggleston will behave, himself like a Christian, and pay his rent,” said my father, “he’ll go on just the same as he did under old Squire Allworth, so he has nothing to complain about whatever.”
“May I go and tell him that, father!” I said eagerly.
“No: certainly not.”
“I mean after breakfast, father.”
“So do I, my boy,” he replied. “Don’t you meddle with such matters as that. So you had a good look round the place, eh?”
“Yes, father.”
“See many rabbits?”
“Yes, father, plenty.”
“That’s right. I want to keep that place for a bit of shooting, and I’m thinking of buying a bigger boat, Sep, and I shall keep her there.”
“Oh!” I cried, “a bigger sailing boat?”
“Yes, a much bigger one, my boy—big enough to take quite a cruise. You must make haste and get finished at school, my lad, and then I can take you afloat, and make a sailor of you, the same as your grandfather and great-grandfather used to be.”
“Yes, I should like to be a sailor, father,” I said.
“Ah, well, we shall see,” he replied; “but that is not the business to see to now. The first thing is to take in rations, so come along and have breakfast.”
I was quite willing, and in a few minutes we were seated in the snug cottage parlour with the window open, and the scent of the roses brought in by the breeze off the sea.
“Why, Sep,” said my father, after I had been disposing of bacon and eggs and milk for some time, “how quiet you are! Isn’t the breakfast so good as you get at school?”
“Heaps better, father;” for schools were very different places in those days to what they are now.
“Then what makes you so quiet?”
“I was thinking how nice it would be if it was always holidays.”
“With the sun shining warmly like it is now, and the sky blue, and the sea quite calm, eh?”
“Yes, father.”
“You young goose—I mean gander,” he said laughing. “Pleasure that has not been earned by hard work of some kind is poor tasteless stuff, of which everybody would soon tire; and as to its being always hot and sunshiny, why, my dear boy, I’ve been out in the tropics when the sky has been for weeks without a cloud, the seams oozing pitch, and the rails and bolts and bell all so hot you could not touch them, and we would have given anything for a thick mist or a heavy rain, or a good puff of cool wind. No, no, my dear boy, England and its climate are best as they are. In all my travels I never found a better or more healthy place; and as to the holidays—bah! Life was not made for play. Kittens are the most playful things I know, but they soon give it up, and take to work.”
“Yes, father,” I said with a sigh, “but school exercises are so hard.”
“The better lad you when you’ve mastered them. It’s hard work to learn to be a sailor, but the more credit to the young man who masters navigation, and gets to know how to thoroughly handle a ship; better still how to manage his men, for a crew is a very mixed-up set of fellows, Sep.”
“Yes, father, I suppose so. But I am trying very hard at school.”
“I know you are, Sep. Have another egg—and that bit of brown. You’ve got room, I know. Make muscle.”
He helped me to what I was by no means unwilling to take, and then continued:
“Of course you are trying hard, and I know it. Otherwise I shouldn’t have been so glad to see you home for the holidays you’ve earned, and be ready to say to you, ‘Never mind about holiday lessons, I don’t approve of them, my lad; put them aside and I’ll make excuses for you to the doctor. Work as hard as you can when you are at school, and now you are at home, play as hard as you can.’ We must have a bit of fishing. I’ve got some new lines, and a trammel net to set, and we’ll do a good deal of boating. You sha’n’t stand still for want of something to do. What’s that?”
“Only a stone, father,” I replied, for in pulling out my handkerchief, the piece that I had put in my pocket on the previous day flew out, and fell with a crash in the fireplace.
“What do you want with stones in your pocket?” he said rather crossly, as he rose and picked up the piece to throw it out of the window; but, as soon as he had it in his hand, its appearance took his attention. He turned it over, weighed it in his hand, and then held it more to the light.
I went on eating my breakfast and watching him closely, for I did not want to lose that piece of stone, and I was afraid that he would ask me more questions about it, sooner than bear which I was ready to see him throw the piece of rock out of the window, when, if he threw it far enough, the chances were that it would go over the cliff and fall upon the beach.
Just as I feared, the questions came as he put on his glasses and examined the fragment more closely.
“Where did you get this, Sep?” he said—“on the beach?”
“No, father, up on this side of the Gap.”
“Whereabouts?”
“About three hundred yards from Uggleston’s cottage, and half-way up the slope, where the rocks stand up so big on the top.”
“Hah! Yes, I know the place. It was lying on the slope, I suppose?”
“Well, ye–es, father.”
“Humph, strange!” he muttered. “There can’t be any metals there. Somebody must have dropped it.”
I hesitated. I wanted to speak out, but I was afraid, for I did not know what he would say if he heard that we had blown up one of the rocks with gunpowder, and sent all those stones hurtling down the side of the cliff.
“Yes,” continued my father, “somebody must have dropped it. A good specimen—a very good specimen indeed.”
Just then he raised his eyes, and caught me gazing at him wistfully.
“Hallo!” he said, “what does that mean? Why are you looking so serious and strange?”
“Was I, father?”
“Yes, sir: of course you were. No nonsense. Speak out like a man, and a gentleman. Not quite the same thing, Sep, for a gentleman is not always a thorough man; but a thorough man is always a gentleman. Now, what is it?”
I did not answer.
“Come, Sep,” he said sharply, “you’re getting a great fellow now, and I want you, the bigger you grow, the more frank and open. I don’t want you to grow into one of those men who look upon their father as someone to be cheated and blinded in every way, instead of as their truest and firmest friend and adviser. Now, sir, you have something on your mind.”
“Yes, father,” I said slowly.
“Hah! I thought as much. In mischief yesterday?”
“I’m afraid so, father.”
“Well, out with it. You know my old saying, ‘The truth can be blamed, but can never be shamed.’”
“Yes, father.”
“Well, I’m sure my boy could not bear to be shamed.”
“Oh, no, father.”
“Of course not,” he said quietly. “And I’m sure you’ve got manly feeling enough not to be afraid of being blamed; so out with it, sir, and take your punishment, whatever it is, as the son of a sailor should.”
“Yes, father,” I exclaimed with a sort of gasp, and then I told him what we had done with the powder.
“Humph! Nice fellows!” he exclaimed as I ended. “Why, you might have blown each other to pieces. Powder wants using only by an experienced man, and young Chowne, who seems to have played first fiddle, seems to know more about his father’s powders than that out of a keg. Humph! So you blew down one of the lumps of stone?”
“Yes, father.”
“Well, why didn’t you say so at once?” he continued tartly, “and not shuffle and shirk. It was a foolish, monkeyish trick, but I suppose no great harm’s done. What did you do it for?”
“To see the stones rush down, sir,” I said.
“Humph! Well, don’t do so any more.”
“I will not, father,” I said hastily.
“That’s well. Now we will not say any more about it. Many stones come down?”
“Yes, father, they swept a bare place down the side of the cliff right to the old rock.”
“Here, Sep,” said my father excitedly, holding out the lump of mineral, “did you pick this up before or after?”
“After, father; where the rock was swept bare.”
My father looked at me quite excitedly.
“Done breakfast?” he said sharply.
“Yes, father.”
“Put on your hat and come with me to the Gap. Stop a moment. Did your school-fellows notice that piece of rock—did you show it to them?”
“No, father. I was alone when I found it.”
“So much the better. Then, look here, Sep; don’t say anything to them about it, nor about what you see to-day.”
“No, father; but—”
“Don’t ask any questions, boy. I am not sure but you may have made a very important discovery in the Gap. I had no idea of there being any metals there.”
“And are there, father?”
“We are going to see, my boy. So now, keep your counsel. Put on your cap and we will walk over to the Gap at once, when you can show me the exact spot where you found this piece.”
I grew as excited as my father seemed to be, but with this difference, namely, that as I grew warmer he grew more cool and business-like.
After I had given him some better idea of the place where the specimen had been found, he decided that we would not go round by the cliff path, and past Jonas Uggleston’s cottage, but take a short cut over the high moorland ground at the back of the bay, and so on to the Gap, where we could descend just where we lads had blown down the rock.
It was not a long walk that way, though a hilly one, and before half an hour had passed we were close to the edge of the ravine, and directly after on the spot from whence the stone had been dislodged.
Here for the first time I noticed the handle of a hammer in my father’s pocket as he stooped down and examined the place where the rock lay, and then shook his head. “No, not here,” he said. “Go on first.” I led the way and he followed, noting where the rock had bounded off, and then descending to where it had charged the other pieces and rushed on down, baring a portion of the side of the ravine, as I have said, to the very rock.
“Hah!” ejaculated my father suddenly, as he seemed to pounce upon a fragment of stone something like the first I held. “Here’s another, and another, and another,” I said. “Yes, plenty,” he replied rather hoarsely, as he picked up a couple more pieces. “Place them in your pocket, boy.”
As he spoke he looked about him up and down, and ended by uttering another sharp exclamation, for in one place there was a rugged patch of rock just like the fragments we held, and seeming as if the cliff-side there was one solid mass.
“Look here, Sep,” he said quietly; “be smart, and gather up all the rough pieces of common grey slate you can find and throw them about here I’ll help.”
I set to work and he aided me vigorously, with the result that in a short time we had hidden the bright metallic-looking patch, and then he laid his hand upon my arm.
“That will do,” he said. “Now, keep a silent tongue in your head. I’ll talk more to you afterwards. Let’s go home now. Stop,” he cried, starting; “don’t seem to look, but turn your head slightly towards the sea. Your eyes are better than mine. Who’s that standing on the piece of rock over yonder. Can you see?”
“No, father, not yet.”
“Look more to the north, boy. Just over the big rock that stands out of the cliff-side. There’s a man watching us.”
“Yes, I see, father,” I cried.
“Who is it?” he whispered, as he led the way along by the steep slope so that we might descend and go up the Gap by the stream side and reach the shore.
“Yes, I know, I’m sure now,” I cried. “It’s old Jonas Uggleston.”
“Humph! Of all men in the world,” said my father. “Well, the place is my own now, and no one has a right to interfere.”
He walked on silently for a few minutes, and then said softly: “I would rather no one had known yet.” Then aloud to me: “Come, Sep, let’s get home and see what these rocks are made of. I’m beginning to think that you have made a great find.”