Chapter 2

"Papa," he demanded, "I want to go out on the booms."

"Haven't time to-day, Bobby," replied Mr. Orde. "You just play around."

But Jim Denning would not have this.

"Can't start 'em in too early, Jack," said he. "I bet you'd been fished out from running logs before you were half his age."

Mr. Orde laughed.

"Right you are, Jim, but we were raised different in those days."

"Well," said Denning, "work's slack. I'll let one of the men take him."

At the moment a youth of not more than fifteen years of age was passing from the cook house to the booms. He had the slenderness of his years, but was toughly knit, and already possessed in eye and mouth the steady unwavering determination that the river life develops. In all details of equipment he was a riverman complete: the narrow-brimmed black felt hat, pushed back from a tangle of curls; the flannel shirt crossed by the broad bands of the suspenders; the kersey trousers "stagged" off a little below the knee; the heavy knit socks; and the strong shoes armed with thin half-inch, needle-sharp caulks.

"Jimmy Powers!" called the River Boss after this boy, "Come here!"

The youth approached, grinning cheerfully.

"I want you to take Bobby out on the booms," commanded Denning, "and be careful he don't fall in."

The older men moved away. Bobby and Jimmy Powers looked a little bashfully at each other, and then turned to where the first hewn logs gave access to the booms.

"Ever been out on 'em afore?" asked Jimmy Powers.

"Yes" replied Bobby; then after a pause, "I been out to the swing with Papa."

They walked out on the floating booms, which tipped and dipped ever so slightly under their weight. Bobby caught himself with a little stagger, although his footing was a good three feet in width. On either side of him nuzzled the great logs, like patient beasts, and between them were narrow strips of water, the colour of steel that has just cooled.

"How deep is it here?" asked Bobby.

"Bout six feet," replied Jimmy Powers.

They passed an intersection, and came to an empty enclosure over which the water stretched like a blue sheet. Bobby looked back. Already the shore seemed far away. Through the interstices between the piles the wavelets went _lap_, _lap_, _slap_, _lap_! Beyond were men working the reluctant logs down toward the lower end of the booms. Some jabbed the pike poles in and then walked forward along the boom logs. Others ran quickly over the logs themselves until they had gained timbers large enough to sustain their weight, whence they were able to work with greater advantage. The supporting log rolled and dipped under the burden of the man pushing mightily against his implement; but always the riverman trod it, first one way, then the other, in entire unconsciousness of the fact that he was doing so. The dark flanks of the log heaved dripping from the river, and rolled silently back again, picked by the long sharp caulks of the riverman's boots.

"Can you walk on the logs?" asked Bobby of his companion.

"Sure," laughed Jimmy Powers.

"Let's see you," insisted Bobby.

Jimmy Powers leaped lightly from the boom to the nearest log. It was a small one, and at once dipped below the surface. If the boy had attempted to stand on it even a second he would have fallen in. But all Jimmy Powers needed was a foothold from which to spring. Hardly had the little timber dipped before he had jumped to the next and the next after. Behind him the logs, bobbing up and down, churned the water white. Jimmy moved rapidly across the enclosure on an irregular zigzag. The smaller logs he passed over as quickly as possible; on the larger he paused appreciably. Bobby was interested to see how he left behind him a wake of motion on what had possessed the appearance of rigid immobility. The little logs bobbed furiously; the larger bowed in more stately fashion and rolled slowly in dignified protest. In a moment Jimmy was back again, grinning at Bobby's admiration.

"Look here," said he.

He took his station sideways on a log of about twenty inches diameter, and began to roll it beneath him by walking rapidly forward. As the timber gained its momentum, the boy increased his pace, until finally his feet were fairly twinkling beneath him, and the side of the log rising from the river was a blur of white water. Then suddenly with two quick strong stamps of his caulked feet the young riverman brought the whirling timber to a standstill.

"That's birling a log," said he to Bobby.

They walked out on the main boom still farther. The smaller partitions between the various enclosures were often nothing but single round poles chained together at their ends. On these Bobby was not allowed to venture.

"How deep is it here?" he asked again.

"Bout thirty feet," replied Jimmy Powers.

Bobby for an instant felt a little dizzy, as though he were on a high building. All this fabric on which he moved suddenly seemed to him unreal, like a vast cobweb in suspension through a void. It was a brief sensation, and little defined in his childish mind, so it soon passed, but it constituted while it lasted a definite subjective experience which Bobby would always remember. As he looked back, the buildings of the river camp, lying low among the trees, had receded to a great distance; apparently at another horizon was the dark row of piling that marked the outer confines of the booms; up and down stream, as far as he could see, were the logs. Bobby suddenly felt very much alone, with the blue sky above him, and the deep black water beneath, and about him nothing but the quiet sullen monsters herded from the wilderness. He gripped very tightly Jimmy Powers's hand as they walked along.

But shortly they turned to the left; and after a brief walk, mounted the rickety steps to the floor of the hut where dwelt old man North, and the winch for operating the swinging boom. Old man North was short, dark, heavy and bearded; he smoked perpetually a small black clay pipe which he always held upside down in his mouth. His conversation was not extensive; but his black eyes twinkled at Bobby, so the little boy was not afraid of him. When he saw the two approaching, he reached over in the corner and handed out a hickory pole peeled to a beautiful white.

"The wums is yonder," said he.

Bobby put a fat worm on his hook and sat down in the opposite doorway were he could dangle his feet directly over the river. Where the shadow of the cabin fell, he could see far down in the water, which there became a transparent fair green. Close to the piles, on the tops of which the hut was built, were various fish. Jimmy leaned over.

"Mostly suckers," he advised. "Yan's a perch, try him."

Bobby cautiously lowered his baited hook until it dangled before the perch's nose. The latter paid absolutely no attention to it. Bobby jiggled it up and down. No results. At last he fairly plumped the worm on top of the fish's nose. The perch, with an air of annoyance, spread his gills and, with the least perceptible movement of his tail, sank slowly until he faded from sight.

"Better let down your hook and fish near bottom," suggested Jimmy Powers.

Bobby did so. The peace of warm afternoon settled upon him. He dangled his chubby legs, and tried to spit as scientifically as he could, and watched the waving green current slip silently beneath his feet. Beside him sat Jimmy Powers. The fragrant strong tobacco smoke from North's pipe passed them in wisps.

"I'd like to walk on logs," proffered Bobby at last, "It looks like lots of fun."

"Oh, that's nothin'," said Jimmy Powers, "You ought to be on drive."

The boys fell into conversation. Jimmy told of the drive, and the log-running. Bobby listened with the envy of one whose imagination cannot conceive of himself permitted in such affairs. He was entirely absorbed. And then all at once the peace was shattered.

"Yank him, Bobby, yank him!" yelled Jimmy.

"Christmas! he's a whale!" said old North.

For, without wavering, the tip of the hickory pole had been ruthlessly jerked below the water's surface, and the butt nearly pulled from Bobby's hands.

Bobby knew the proper thing to do. In such cases you heaved strongly. The fish flew from the water, described an arc over your head, and lit somewhere behind you. He tried to accomplish this, but his utmost strength could but just lift the wriggling, jerking end of the pole from the water.

"Give her to me!" cried Jimmy Powers.

"Le' me 'lone," grunted Bobby.

He planted the butt of the pole in the pit of his stomach, and lifted as hard as ever he could with both hands. His face grew red, his ears rang, but, after a first immovable resistance, to his great joy the tip of the bending, wriggling pole began to give. Slowly, little by little, he pulled up the fish, until he could make out the flash of its body darting to and fro far down in the depths.

"Black bass!" murmured Jimmy Powers breathlessly.

And then just as his size and beauty were becoming clearly visible, the line came up with a sickening ease. The interested spectators caught a glimpse of white as the fish turned.

Bobby let out a howl of disappointment.

"Oh _gee_, that's hard luck!" cried Jimmy Powers.

"Bet he weighed four pounds," proffered North curtly.

But at this instant a faint clear whistle sounded from about the wooded bend of the river above.

"Boat coming," said North, "Clear out of the way, boys."

He began at once to operate the winch which drew the long slanting swing boom out of the channel, for the River was navigable water, and must not be obstructed. In a moment appeared the _Lucy Belle_, a shallow-draught, flimsy-looking double decker, with two slim smokestacks side by side connected by a band of fancy grill-work, a walking beam, two huge paddle boxes and much white paint. She sheered sidewise with the current around the bend, and headed down upon them accompanied by a vast beating of paddle wheels. Bobby could soon make out atop the walking-beam, the swaying iron Indian with bent bow, and the piles of slabs which constituted the _Lucy Belle_'s fuel. Almost immediately she was passing, within ten feet or so of the hut. The water boiled and eddied among the piles, rushing in and sucking back. A fat, ruddy-faced man in official cap and citizen's clothes leaned over the rail.

"Well, you made her to-day," shouted North.

"Bet ye," called the man with a grin. "Only aground once."

The _Lucy Belle_ swept away with an air of pride. She made the trip to and from Redding, forty miles up the River, twice a week. Sometimes she came through in a day. Oftener she ran aground.

Now Bobby reverted to his original idea.

"I'd like to walk on the logs," said he.

"Well, come on, then," said Jimmy Powers.

They retraced their steps along the booms until near the shore.

"You don't want to try her where she's deep," explained Jimmy Powers, "'Cause then if you should fall in, the logs would close right together over your head, and then where'd you be?"

Bobby shuddered at this idea, which in the event continued to haunt him for some days.

"There's a big one," said Jimmy Powers. "Try her."

Bobby stepped out on a big solid-looking log, which immediately proved to be not solid at all. It dipped one way, Bobby tried to tread the other. The log promptly followed his suggestion--too promptly. Bobby soon found himself about two moves behind in this strange new game. He lost his balance, and the first thing he knew, he found himself waist deep in the water.

Jimmy Powers laughed heartily; but to Bobby this was no laughing matter. The penalties attached both by nature and his mother were dire in the extreme. He foresaw sickness and spankings, both of which had been promised him in the event of wet feet merely, and here he was dripping from the waist down! In any other surroundings or with any other company he would have wept bitterly. Even in the presence of Jimmy Powers his lower lip quivered; and his soul filled to the very throat with dismay. Jimmy Powers could not understand his very evident perturbation. If took a great deal of explanation on Bobby's part; but finally there was conveyed to the young riverman's understanding a slight notion of the situation. To the child the day seemed lost; but Jimmy Powers was more resourceful. He surveyed his charge thoughtfully.

"You're all right, kid," he announced at last. "Your collar's all right, and your hair ain't wet. The rest'll dry out so nobody will know the diff'."

Bobby brightened.

"Won't I catch cold?" he asked doubtfully.

"This kind of weather? Naw!" said Jimmy Powers with scorn. "You rustle in to the cook shanty and get Corrigan to let you sit by the stove."

Bobby said farewell to his guide, and presented himself to the cook.

"I fell in," he announced, "can I sit by the stove?"

"Sure" said Corrigan hospitably. "Take a cracker-box and go over by the wood box. Tryin' to ride a log?"

"Yes" confessed Bobby.

"Well, you want to look out for them," warned Corrigan a little vaguely. He produced the customary cooky. Bobby sat and steamed, and munched and told about the fish he had almost caught. He liked Corrigan because the latter talked to him sensibly, without ill-timed facetiousness, as to an equal. In a moment Duke thrust his muzzle in the door. Bobby looked hastily down. His clothes were quite dry.

"Don't tell Papa," he begged.

For answer Corrigan portentously winked one eye, and went on peeling potatoes. After a moment Mr. Orde appeared at the door.

"Bobby here?" he inquired. "Oh yes! Come on, youngster."

Bobby showed himself with considerable trepidation; but apparently Mr. Orde noticed nothing wrong, and the little boy's spirits rose. The team was waiting, and they mounted the buggy at once. Duke fell in behind them soberly. For him the freshness of the expedition was over. It was now merely a case of get back home.

"Have a good time?" asked Mr. Orde.

Bobby talked busily all the way in. He told principally of the fish, although the _Lucy Belle_ and Jimmy Powers came in for a share. From time to time Mr. Orde said, "That's good," or, "Yes," which sufficed Bobby. Probably, however, the man heard little of his son's talk. His mind was very busy with the elements of the game he was playing, sorting and arranging them, figuring how to earn and borrow the money necessary to permit his taking advantage of a chance he thought he saw in the western timber lands. He heard little, to be sure, and yet he was in reality wholly occupied with the child prattling away at his side--with his fortune, and his business prospects of thirty years hence.

Under the maples the sun slanted low and golden and mote-laden. Bobby suddenly felt a little tired, and more than a little hungry. He descended from the buggy with alacrity. The wetting was forgotten in the home-coming. Only when washing for dinner did he remember with certain self-felicitation that even his mother had noticed nothing. For the first time it occurred to him that his parents were not omniscient:--that was the evil of the afternoon's experiences. For the first time also it occurred to him that he possessed the ability to meet an emergency without their aid:--that was the good of it. And the good far outweighed the evil.

That night Bobby called upon the Lord to bless those dear to him, as usual; but he offered on his own account an addendum.

"And make Bobby grow up a big man like Jimmy Powers."

II

THE PICNIC

One Saturday, shortly after, everybody was early afoot in preparation for a picnic up the River. Bobby had on clean starched brown linen things, and his hair was parted on one side and very smoothly brushed across his forehead. His mother had been somewhat inclined to the dark green velvet suit with the lace collar, but to his great relief his father had intervened.

"Give the boy a chance," said he, "He'll want to eat peaches and go down in the engine room, and perhaps catch sunfish."

At the wharf, built along the front of the river at the foot of Main Street, they could see, when they turned the corner at the engine-house, the single sturdy stack of the _Robert O_ pouring forth a cloud of gray smoke, while in front of it fluttered the white of the women's dresses.

"We're going to be late," danced Bobby.

"I guess they'll wait for us," replied Mr. Orde easily. "They know what's in this," he smiled, patting the hamper he was carrying.

At the wharf they were greeted by a chorus of exclamations from a large group of people. Mr. and Mrs. Taylor were there, the latter sweet and dainty in one of the very latest creations in muslin; Mr. and Mrs. Fuller with Tad and Clifford; young Mr. Carlin from the bank; Mr. and Mrs. Proctor, and their young-lady daughter wearing a marvellous "waterfall"; Angus McMullen, alone, his father detained professionally; Mrs. Cathcart and Georgie; young Bradford carrying his banjo, his wonderful raiment and his air of vast leisure; Welton, the lumberman, red-faced, jolly, popular and ungrammatical. The women guarded baskets. All greeted the Ordes with various degrees of hilarity. When the noise had died down, a massive and impressive lady, heretofore unnamed, stepped forward. She held a jewelled arm straight before her, the hand drooping slightly, so that, although she was in reality of but medium stature, she gave the impression of condescending from a height.

"Good morning, Mrs. Owen," greeted Mrs. Orde, shaking the proffered hand.

"Good morning, my dear," replied Mrs. Owen regally. She swept slowly sideways to reveal a woman and a little girl of seven or eight years, immediately behind her. "Allow me to present to you my very dear friend, Mrs. Carleton. Mrs. Carleton is from the city, staying at the Ottawa for a few weeks, and I knew you would like the chance to show her some of our beautiful River." Mrs. Carleton, a pretty, modish woman, with the ease of city manner, bowed quietly and murmured her pleasure. The little girl looked half bashfully through a wealth of natural curls at the grown-ups to whom she was presented in the off-hand method one employs with children. She was altogether a charming little girl. Her hair was of the colour of ripe wheat; her skin was of the light smooth brown peculiar to an exceptional blonde complexion tanned in the sun; her mouth was full and whimsical; and her eyes, strangely enough in one otherwise so light, were so black as to resemble spots. Her dress was very simple, very starched, very white. A big leghorn hat with red roses half hid her head. She was shy, that was easily to be seen; but shyness was relieved from the awkwardness so usual and so painful in children of her age by the results of what must have been a careful training. She answered when she was spoken to, directly and to the point; and yet it could not but be evident that her spirit fluttered.

The combination was charming; and Mrs. Orde fell to it at once.

"Celia, my dear," she said kindly, "come with me, we're going to have a nice day together; and I have a little boy named Bobby who will show you everything."

But now the _Robert O_ gave two impatient toots. Everybody ceased greeting everybody else, and began to pile the shawls and lunch baskets aboard. The thick strong gunwale of the _Robert O_ was a foot or so below the chute level from the wharf. The women were helped aboard soberly by the men. Miss Proctor, however, slipped little slips and screamed little screams, while young Mr. Carlin, Bradford and Welton, with galvanized beaming smiles, all attempted to help her. Mrs. Owen marched down the chute, waited calmly and without impatience until all the available men were at hand, and then stepped down majestically with dignity unimpaired.

Long before this, Bobby had quit the altogether uninteresting wharf. The _Robert O_ he had seen many times from a distance, and once of twice near at hand lying at the cribs and piers, but this was his first chance to explore. Accordingly he dropped down to her deck, and, with the natural instinct to see as far ahead as possible, marched immediately to the very prow. The deck proved to slope up-hill strangely, which, in its unlikeness to any floor Bobby had ever walked on, was in itself a pleasure. The hawser around the bitt interested him; and the glimpse he had of the sparkling river slipping toward him from the yellow hills up stream. He could just rest his chin on the rail to look.

Then he turned his gaze aft; and encountered the amused scrutiny of a man leaning on a wheel in a little house. The house had big windows, and on top was an iron eagle with spread wings. Two steps led up to a door on each side; and Bobby without hesitation entered one of these doors.

The inside of the house he found different from any house he had ever been in before; and possessed of a strange fascination. There was the wheel, with projecting handles to every spoke, and above it, racks containing spyglasses, black pipes, tobacco-tins. At hand projected a speaking-tube like that in the back hall at home, and two or three handles connected with wires. Behind the wheel was a broad leather seat; and clothes on nails; and a chart; and a pilot's licence, of which Bobby understood nothing, but admired the round gold seals.

"Well, Bobby, what do you think of it?" asked the man.

Bobby had not had time to look at the man. He did so now and liked him. The first thing he noticed was the man's eyes, which were steady and unwavering and as blue as the sky. Then he surveyed in turn gravely his heavy bleached, flaxen moustache; his hard brown cheeks; the round barrel of his blue-clad body; and his short sturdy legs.

"Think you'd like to run a tug?" inquired this man.

"I don't know," replied Bobby; "what is your name?"

"I'm Captain Marsh," replied the man. He glanced out the open door at the group on the wharf. "If they're going up past the bend to-day, they'll have to get a move," he remarked. "Here, Bobby, want to blow the whistle?"

He lifted the boy up in the hollow of one arm. "There, that's it; that handle. Pull down on it, and let go."

Bobby did so and his little heart almost stopped at the shock of the blast, so loud was it, and so near.

"Now again," commanded Captain Marsh.

Bobby recovered and obeyed. The passengers began to embark.

Captain Marsh watched until the last was safely aboard; then he set Bobby gently to the floor.

"If you want to see out, go sit on the bunk back there," he advised.

Somebody cast off the lines. Captain Marsh pulled the other handle. A sharp tinkling bell struck somewhere far in the depths of the craft. Immediately Bobby felt beneath him the upheaval and trembling of some mighty force. The wharf seemed to slip back. In another moment at a second tinkle of the bell the tug had gathered headway, and the little boy was watching with delight the sandhills and buildings on one side and the other slipping by in regular succession.

Captain Marsh stood easily staring directly ahead of him, and paying no more attention to the child. Bobby sat very straight in his absorption. New impressions were coming to him so fast that he had no desire to move. The slow turn of the great wheel; the throb of the engine; the swift passing of water; the orderly procession of the river banks; the feeling of smooth, resistless motion--these sufficed. How long he might have sat there if undisturbed, it would be hard to say; but at the end of a few moments Angus McMullen looked in at the door.

"What you stayin' here for, Bobby?" he inquired with contemptuous wonder. "Come on out and see the big waves we're making."