CHAPTER III
_In which Clarence and his companion, the Butcher’s Boy, discourse, according to their respective lights, on poetry and other subjects, ending with a swim that was never taken and the singing of Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay for the last time._
“That was great,” said Abe, enthusiastically, as he led the way up asteep and winding path. “You dished that feller easy. How did you doit?”
“I just tackled him.”
“What’s that?”
“Don’t you know anything about football?”
“Naw!”
“Well, when a chap on the other side has the ball and is running up thefield with it and you want to stop him, you make a dive at his knees andclasp your arms right above ’em; and the faster he’s going, the harderhe’ll fall.”
“I’d like to learn that game,” remarked Abe with some show ofenthusiasm.
“What a nice little stream that is,” continued Clarence, waving his handtowards a tiny streamlet beside their upward path. “I like the sound ofrunning water, don’t you? There ought to be a waterfall somewhere abouthere.”
“There is; it’s furder up.”
“Are you fond of Tennyson, Abe?”
“Eh? What’s that? Another game?”
“He’s a poet.”
“A what?”
“A poet: he writes verses, you know.”
“I don’t read nothin’.”
“Well, listen to this:
“‘I come from haunts of coot and hern, I make a sudden sally And sparkle out among the fern To bicker down a valley!’”
“Sally is a girl’s name,” said Abe, whose brows had grown wrinkled fromconcentrated attention.
“I don’t think you quite got the idea of those lines,” said Clarencesuavely. “But just listen to this:
“‘I chatter, chatter as I flow To join the brimming river; For men may come and men may go, But I go on forever.’”
“Say that again, will you?”
Clarence obligingly and with some attention to elocution repeated thefamous stanza.
“Who said that?” asked Abe.
“Tennyson.”
“What was he chattering for?”
“He wasn’t chattering; it was the brook that chattered.”
“Well, why didn’t he say so, then? He said, ‘_I chatter._’”
“Oh, hang it! He put those words into the mouth of the brook.”
“But a brook ain’t got no mouth.”
“Yes; but he put himself in place of the brook. He just imagined whatthe brook would say, if it could talk. Listen once more.” And for thethird time and still more melodramatically Clarence gave voice to thequatrain.
“Tennysee was a fool. The idea of a feller taking himself to be a brook.Why, if he _was_ a brook, he couldn’t talk anyhow.”
“Abe, you’re hopeless.”
“See here, don’t you call me no names.”
“You’re a literalist!”
“You’re another, and you’re a liar!”
“Oh!” cried Clarence, gurgling with delight, “here are the PicturedRocks, sure enough. And a cave!”
Beside the stream, a vast bed of rocks in veritable war-paint, hollowedat the centre into a rather large cavern, greeted the eyes of theastonished youth. The colors in horizontal layers were gay andwell-defined, red being predominant.
“This is where the Injuns used to come for their paint,” explained Abe,forgetting his grievance in the pleasure of being a cicerone. “They usedto come down this path and daub themselves up, and then cross the riverto Wisconsin, and shoot the Injuns on the other side with their bows andarrers.”
Clarence was examining the surface of the rock. It was easy to rub awaythe outer part of the soft layers.
“Say, Abe, let me paint you. I think you’d make a fine Indian.” AndClarence with a handful of red sand sprang smilingly at his guide.
“You go on and paint yourself,” growled Abe, backing quickly. As aresult, he missed his footing, slipped and fell into the tiny stream,where he sat for several seconds before it occurred to him to rise.
“Ha, ha, ha!” screamed Clarence. His silvery laughter, clear and sweet,was caught up by the echoes and came back translated into the merrimentof elfland.
Much as the echoes seemed to appreciate his burst of glee, it did notappeal at all to the wrathful guide. His face had grown red as aturkey-cock’s; his fists doubled, and he was on the point of assaultingthe unsuspecting Clarence.
“Oh, hark, oh, hear!” cried Clarence with a gesture and in a voice sohigh and ringing that Abe was startled, and paused in the execution ofhis revenge.
“Did you hear ’em?”
“Hear what?”
“The echoes. They’re the horns of elfland, you know.”
“The what!” exclaimed Abe. He had a dread of the unknown word.
“The horns of elfland faintly blowing.”
“You’re blowing yourself. Here you”——Abe stooped, picked up a smalltwig and placed it on one shoulderband of his blue overalls—“Knock thatchip off’n my shoulder!”
Clarence surveyed his offended companion severely.
“Abe, come on; let’s go up. You know, I owe you a dollar. If you were toput one of my beautiful blue eyes into mourning, I think I’d claim thatdollar for damages and then where would you be?”
“Well, then, you stop using them big words.”
“All right, Abe.”
With an occasional shout to set the wild echoes flying, the two pursuedtheir steep upward way. For the most part, there was no conversation.
When they reached the waterfall, nothing would do Clarence but at therisk of life and limb to get under the hollow rock, over which fell thewater in a wide but thin stream, and, extending his head and opening hismouth, catch what drops he could as they fell.
“Abe!” he suddenly said, “I think I know now where the goddess ofadventure lives.”
“Eh? What?”
“If ever I wish to communicate with that bright-eyed lady, I’ll addressmy letters thus:
“‘To the Goddess of Adventure, The Bright-eyed Waterfall, Pictured Rocks, Iowa, U. S. A.’”
“You drop that goddess of adventure. I don’t believe in no suchfoolishness as that.”
“All right, Abe, if you don’t believe in her, she doesn’t exist. Now forthe top.”
Up they went, with quick steps and, as regards Clarence, steadybreathing. Abe was puffing. Loose living had reached out into the futureand gained for him the “far off interest of years.” Abe belonged to thatsteadily increasing class of Americans who, growing up withoutrecognition of any law of God or man are destined to be short-lived inthe land.
Presently, they were at the summit.
“Look,” cried Abe, his sulkiness yielding momentarily to a spark ofenthusiasm. He led the way forward a few feet and paused.
“Oh-h-h-h-!” cried Clarence.
Far, far below, the river rolled its flashing length, the broad river,silvery in the sun, the broad river with its green wooded islands, itslagoons, its lesser streams, its lakes. To the southeast another body ofwater, yet more silvery, emptied itself into the Mississippi. Besideboth and around both and all the way that eye could see up and down theMississippi River rose the full-bosomed hills, older than the Pyramids,holding their secrets of the past in a calm not to be broken till theday of judgment. Between the hills and the river, on the Wisconsin side,lay the valley, rich in golden grain, dotted here and there with granaryand farm-house. It was in very deed a panorama beautiful in each detail,doubly so in its variety.
“What river is that?” asked Clarence.
“What! Don’t you know that? I thought from the way you were talking thatyou knew everything. That’s the Wisconsin River.”
“You don’t say! Why, that’s where Marquette came down. Think of tha
t,Abe. Marquette came down that river and discovered the upperMississippi. He must have passed right near to where we’re standing.”
“I’ve been round this river all my life, and I never heard of noMarquette. Who was he?”
“He was a priest.”
“A Catlic?”
“Yes, and a Jesuit.”
“I hate those dirty Catlics,” growled Abe, spitting savagely.
Behold, gentle reader, Abe’s religion. He hated Catholics, and in doingso felt consciously pious. He belongs, it must be sadly confessed, tothe largest church in the backwoods of America; the Great UnletteredChurch. So worldly a thing as a railroad has been known to put theirreligion to flight.
“I’m not a Catholic myself,” said Clarence, losing for the moment hislight manner, “and I believe they’re superstitious and away behind thetimes; but I don’t hate them. Anybody who reads books knows that therehave been splendid men and women who were good Catholics. A Church thathas lived and kept fully alive for nineteen hundred years is not to besneezed at.”
“Sneezed at! What do you want to sneeze at it for? What good would thatdo? We ought to blow it up.”
“My son,” said Clarence, raising his head, tilting his chin and assuminga paternal air, “I’m beginning to despair of you. A moment ago, youremember, I said you were a literalist. Well, it’s worse than that.You’re a pessimist.”
At this Abe broke into a torrent of profanity. In this particular sortof diction he showed a surprising facility.
“Excuse me, friend,” said Clarence, “for breaking in upon your exquisitesoliloquy; but would you mind telling me what that big building overthere in the distance is? It seems to be across the river fromMcGregor.”
“That,” said Abe with some unction in his tones, “is Champeen College.”
“Champeen College?”
“Yes, the Catlics are trying to run it, but them guys doesn’t even knowhow to spell it. They leave out the H. I saw their boat—a fellow toldme about it—and sure enough they didn’t have no H.”
Clarence pondered for a few moments.
“Look here,” he said presently. “Perhaps you mean Champion College.”
“That’s just what I said; Champeen College.”
“You say Champeen; you mean Champion.”
“That’s what I’ve said all along—Champeen College.”
Again Clarence reflected.
“Oh!” he said, breaking into a smile, “I think I’ve got it. Leaving outthat H you have Campion College. That’s it, I’ll bet; and Campion was awonderful Jesuit priest, famous in history and novel. He died a martyr.”
Hereupon the butcher’s boy proceeded to express his sentiments on theJesuits. He declared them at some length and with no little profanity.
“I think,” observed Clarence calmly, when Abe had stopped more for wantof breath than of language, “that it’s about time to start down, if wewant to have that swim. Be good enough, gentle youth, to lead the way.”
Their descent was along another roadway, south of the one by which theyhad come up. In parts, the path was so steep that it was difficult tokeep one’s foothold.
Abe led sullenly. He was deep in thought. The problem of beginning lifeagain was facing him, beginning life with one pair of ancient overalls,a shirt, a jack-knife, shoes that had seen better days, and, inprospect, the handsome sum of one dollar. There was no question of hisbeginning life at McGregor. There confronted him, indeed, a difficulty,apparently insurmountable, in showing his face there at all. Abe figuredto himself an irate boat-owner waiting at the landing for the person whohad had the boldness to take away his skiff. How, then, he reflected,could he collect his dollar, get Clarence back, and escape unobserved.One plan would be to land below McGregor and let Clarence go the rest ofthe way alone. But even that plan had its risks. Doubtless, there wereboatmen on the river even now in quest of the missing craft. Muchthinking was alien to Abe’s manner of life; continuous thinking,impossible. He left the solution in the lap of the gods, therefore, andstarted conversation with his companion. With Abe, language was not theexpression of, but rather an escape from, thought. So he gabbled away,going from one subject to another with an inconsequence which bridgedtremendous gulfs of subject.
In an unhappy moment, he became foul in his expression. He did not, byreason of being in the advance, see the blush that mantled hiscompanion’s face.
“Suppose you change the subject,” said Clarence, giving, as he spoke,Master Abe a hearty shove with both arms.
If dropping the subject entirely is equivalent to changing it, Abe wasperfectly obedient. At any rate, he certainly changed his base; andbefore the words were well out of Clarence’s mouth, Abe was sliding downthe steep incline at a rate which would have outdistanced the averagerunner. He went full thirty feet before a friendly stump brought him toa pause.
“Look here,” cried Abe, remaining seated where he had come to a stop,and rubbing himself; “What did you mean?”
“You aren’t hurt, are you?” enquired the sailor-clad youth, drawing nearand really looking sympathetic.
“Hurt!” echoed Abe, rising as he spoke “I’m sore; and,” he continued ashe craned his neck to see what had happened to his clothes, “my overallsis torn.”
“So they is,” assented Clarence, his love of mischief once more in theascendant. “How much are those overalls worth?”
“I paid eighty-five cents for them.”
“Very good. I’ll give you two dollars instead of one. Is that allright?”
“Suppose you pay me now,” suggested Abe, holding out his hand.
“No you don’t,” answered Clarence. Our young lover of adventure was notof a suspicious disposition; nevertheless it was plain to him that Abe,once he had the money, would, as like as not, either attempt to takerevenge for the indignities shown him, or desert at once and leave hischarge to shift, as best he might, for himself. In fact, it would bejust like Abe to refuse the further services of the boat. “We’ll takeour swim first, and then when we’re on the boat and in sight of McGregorI’ll pay you the two dollars.”
Still rubbing himself, and muttering savagely under his breath, Abe ledthe way down. The descent was soon accomplished, and presently the twoboys were disrobing.
“My ma told me that I might take a swim this morning,” remarkedClarence, “provided I went in with some person who knew the river well,and who could show me a good place. Do you know the river and how toswim well?”
“I guess I do. Why, I know this river by heart.” Here Abe paused, gazedcarefully at the boat, and suddenly brightened up as though some happythought had found lodgment in his primitive brain. “And look here,” hecontinued impressively, “I want to show you something. You see thatplace where my boat is?”
“Seems to me I do.”
“Well, going _down_ the river from where that boat lays is the mostdangerous spot you can find. It is a risk for the best swimmer—big menswimmers—to go in there.”
“See here, I don’t want to go and get drowned,” protested Clarence. Theyoung gentleman, having doffed his sailor costume, revealed to theadmiring eyes of his companion a beautiful brand new bathing suit ofheavenly blue, evidently put on for this occasion. Clarence had lefthome that morning prepared to go swimming.
“Oh, you won’t get drownded; there’s a place up stream just a littleways that I told you about where a hen could swim. We can row up therein no time. Get in the boat, in the stern, and I’ll row you.”
“As you say, so shall it be, fair sir,” and with this Clarence tumbledinto the boat.
“That’s it,” said Abe, encouragingly, as he proceeded to shove the boatinto the water.
“Hey! You’ve forgotten the oars,” said Clarence.
For answer Abe continued to push the boat.
“The oars! The oars!” cried Clarence.
“You don’t need no oars,” shouted Abe as with a tremendous effort hesent the boat spinning out into the current. “Now, smartie, I’ve fixedyou! You stay
right in there where you are, or you’ll be drownded sure.”
The boat with its solitary occupant was now fully thirty feet from theshore. Clarence, possessed of one single-piece swimming suit and nothingelse in the world, turned pale with alarm.
“What’s the meaning of this?” he cried.
“There ain’t no meaning,” returned Abe, thoughtfully going through thepockets of Clarence’s sailor suit. “You just sit tight and maybe you’llland in St. Louis by the end of the month.”
“Look here, I’ve got to be back at McGregor by twelve o’clock,”remonstrated Clarence, “You’re carrying this joke too far.”
“You’ll not see McGregor today, nor yet tomorrow,” answered Abe, grimly,as he wrapped up in Clarence’s handkerchief the paper money and thesilver which he had found.
Clarence noticed with dismay that his boat, now at least twenty-fiveyards from the shore, was going down the stream at what seemed to him avery rapid rate.
In the meantime, Abe, having securely hid the money, stood on the shoreand grinned triumphantly at the boy in the boat.
“You will use big words, will you? You will try to be funny, will you?You will shove me down the hill; you will come round here showing off inyour dandy clothes! Next time you get a chanst, you won’t be sosmart—Now, what have you got to say for yourself?”
The youth in the current saw that, so far as the butcher’s boy wasconcerned, his case was hopeless. In reply, then, to this question, heopened his pretty mouth, lifted his head proudly, and carolled forth:
“Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay, Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay, Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay, Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay!”
As Clarence was singing, Master Abe, throwing out both hands in agesture of defiance, suddenly bolted into the bushes. He was gone,leaving on the shore his own and Clarence’s clothes.
The deserted youth in the boat came to an end of his singing. He hadsung bravely to the last note. He never sang “Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay”again. Abe was gone: he was alone. Clarence at last gave in. He burstinto tears and wept for some time in sore bitterness of heart.
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