CHAPTER V
_In which Ben, the gypsy, associates himself with the Bright-eyed Goddess in carrying out her will upon Master Clarence Esmond, and that young gentleman finds himself a captive_.
It was the time when the night-hawk, soaring high in air and circlingwantonly, suddenly drops like a thunderbolt down, down till nearing theground it calls a sudden halt in its fall, and cutting a tremendousangle and letting out a short sound deep as the lowest string of a bassviolin shoots up into the failing light of the evening; it was the timewhen the whippoorwill essays to wake the darkening sky with hisinsistent demands for the beating of that unfortunate youth, poor Will;it was the time when the sun, having left his kingdom in the westernsky, stretches forth his wand of sovereignty from behind his curtainsand touching the fleecy clouds changes them into precious jewels, ruby,pearl, and amethyst; it was, in fine, the time when the day is done andthe twilight brings quiet and peace and slumber to the restless world.
However—and the exception proves the rule—it did not bring quiet andpeace and slumber to Master Clarence Esmond. In fact, it so chanced thatthe twilight hour was the time when he was deprived of these verydesirable gifts; for his sleep was just then rudely broken.
First, a feeling of uneasiness came upon his placid slumbers. It seemedto him, in those moments between sleeping and waking, that a verybeautiful fairy, vestured in flowing white, and with lustrous andshining eyes, appeared before him. She gazed at him sternly. “Oh, it’syou, is it?” murmured Clarence. “I’ve been looking for you, star-eyedgoddess. Be good enough, now you’re here, to supply me with one or twofirst-class adventures in good condition and warranted to last.” Inanswer to which, she of the starry eyes extended her wand and struck hersuppliant a smart blow on the forehead. As she did this, the light inher eyes went out, her form lost its outline, fading away after themanner of a moving picture effect into total darkness.
Clarence’s eyes then opened; it was not all a dream—the loose boardabove him had fallen and struck him on his noble brow. Also, althoughhis eyes were open, he could see very little. Almost at once he realizedwhere he was. Almost at once he recalled, with the swiftness thought isoften capable of, the varied events of the day. Almost at once, heperceived that the boat, no longer drifting, was moving swiftly asthough in tow.
Clarence sat up. There was a splashing of the water quite near the boat.He rubbed his eyes and peered into the gathering darkness. A brown hand,near the prow, was clasped to the gunwale. Then Clarence standing uplooked again. From the hand to the arm moved his eyes; from the arm tothe head. Beside the boat and swimming vigorously was a man, whom,despite the shadows of the evening, Clarence recognized as young andswarthy. They were rapidly nearing shore.
“Say!” cried Clarence. “Look here, will you? Who are you?”
The swimmer on hearing the sound of the boy’s voice suspended hisswimming, turned his head, and seeing standing in what he had supposedto be an empty boat, a young cherub arrayed in a scanty suit of blue,released his hold and disappeared under the water as though he had beenseized with cramp.
The boat freed of his hand tilted very suddenly in the other direction,with the result that the erect cherub lost his balance so suddenly thathe was thrown headlong into the waters on the other side.
Simultaneously with Clarence’s artless and unpremeditated dive, thestrange swimmer came to the surface. He had thought, as our youngadventurer subsequently learned, that the figure in the boat was aghost. But ghosts do not tumble off boats into the water; neither doghosts, when they come to the surface, blow and sputter and cough andstrike out vigorously with an overhand stroke, which things the supposedghost was now plainly doing. The stranger, therefore, taking heart ofgrace, laid the hand of proprietorship upon the boat once more. Clarencefrom the other side went through the same operation.
“What did you spill me for?” he gasped.
“I didn’t know anyone was in the boat,” returned the stranger with aslightly foreign accent. “When you stood up and spoke, I was plumbscared.”
“I really think I’m rather harmless,” remarked the boy, blithely. “Neveryet, save in the way of kindness, did I lay hand on anybody—well hardlyanybody. Where are we anyhow?”
“We’re on the Mississippi River,” returned the other guardedly.
“Oh, thank you ever so much. I really thought we were breasting thebillows of the Atlantic.”
Meanwhile, they had drawn within a few feet of the shore, on whichClarence now cast his eyes. On a sloping beach in a grove surrounded bycottonwoods blazed a ruddy fire. Standing about it but with their eyesand attention fixed upon the two swimmers was a group consisting of aman a little beyond middle age, a woman, apparently his wife, a youngerwoman, a boy a trifle older and larger than Clarence, a girl of twelve,and five or six little children. In the camp-fire’s light Clarenceperceived that they were, taking them all in all, swarthy, black-haired,clad like civilized people, and yet in that indescribable wild way ofwhich gypsies possess the secret.
“Come on,” said the man, as the boat touched the shore.
“Excuse me,” said Clarence politely, “but I’m not dressed to meetvisitors. The water is fine anyway; and it’s not near so dangerous asit’s cracked up to be. Can’t you get a fellow at least a pair oftrousers?”
“You’ll stay here, will you?”
“I certainly will,” answered the youth, turning on his back andfloating. “I’ve had enough of being out on the Mississippi to last mefor several weeks at the very least. Go on, there’s a good fellow,—andget me something to put on.”
With a not ill-natured grunt of assent, the man walked up the slopingbank. As he passed the watchful group he uttered a few words; whereuponthe larger gypsy boy came down to the shore and fixed a watchful eyeupon the bather, while the others broke up and gave themselves tovarious occupations. Clarence’s rescuer went on beyond the fire, wheretwo tents lay pitched beside a closed wagon—a prairie schooner on asmall scale. After some search in which the young woman assisted him, heissued from the larger tent with a pair of frayed khaki trousers and anold calico shirt.
Returning to the river’s edge, he beckoned the swimmer, who, quick toanswer the call, seized the clothes and darted behind the largestcottonwood. Clarence was dressed in a trice.
“I wish,” he observed, walking up to his rescuer, “to thank you forsaving me. I’ve never been on a big river before; and I was afraid totry swimming. I say,” and as Clarence spoke, he gazed ruefully at hisnether garment, “who’s your tailor?”
“What’s your name, boy?”
“Clarence Esmond, age 14, weight 110 pounds, height five feet two inmy—”
“And how did you come to be in that boat?”
Clarence, involuntarily gazing at his frail craft and noticing that theolder gypsy, assisted by the boy, had already beached it, and was nowgetting ready to give it a new coat of paint, proceeded to tell at somelength his various encounters with the bright-eyed goddess of adventuresince his departure that morning from McGregor. While he was telling hisrather incredible tale all the party gathered about him. Not all, heobserved, were gypsies. The little girl of twelve was as fair-skinned ashimself. She was a beautiful child, with face most expressive of anypassing emotion. It was to her that Clarence presently found he wasaddressing himself. One of his subtle jokes, lost on the gypsies, drew asmile of appreciation from the little girl. She was dainty in herdress—which was in no respect gypsy-like.
“There’s another adventure here,” Clarence reflected. “Where did theyget her?” However, he was content to keep these thoughts to himself. Atthe conclusion of his story, Clarence addressed himself to the youngman.
“And now, sir, where am I?”
“You’re in Wisconsin.”
“Oh, I’ve crossed to the other side, have I? And about how far down theriver am I from the town of McGregor?”
“You are—” began the younger gypsy, when his senior cut him short
, andspoke to him hurriedly for some minutes in a language strange toClarence’s ears.
“I say,” interrupted Clarence, “my folks must be awful anxious about me.Would you mind letting me know how far I am from McGregor? I want to getback.”
“You are over thirty-five miles from McGregor,” said the older man,thoughtfully doubling the actual distance.
“Whew! Where can I get a train? I’ve got to get back.”
“Hold on,” said the elder; “what does your father do?”
“He’s a mining expert.”
“Is he rich?”
“I suppose he is. That’s what people say; and if you get me back, I’llsee that you’re paid.”
Again the two men conferred. Watching them eagerly, Clarence gatheredthese items of information: the elder was called Pete, the younger, Ben;they were not in agreement, coming almost to blows; Pete was the leader.
After further talk the two women were called into council. Suddenly theolder, a withered hag with deep eyes and heavy and forbidding brows,turned to Clarence.
“Your hand!” she said, laconically.
“Charmed to shake with you,” responded the amiable adventurer, extendinghis open palm.
Instead of clasping it, the woman caught it tight, and dragging Clarenceclose to the fire began eagerly to scrutinize the lines on his palm.
“You’ll live long,” she said.
“Not if I have many days like this,” commented Clarence.
“You’ll have lots of wealth.”
“No objection, I’m sure, ma’am.”
“You will learn easy.”
“That’s the very way I propose to learn.”
“You’ll marry three times.”
“Oh, I say; cut out at least two of those wives, won’t you?”
“You’ll have a big family.”
“No objection to children, ma’am.”
Suddenly the woman paused, gazing fixedly at the boy’s palm.
“Oh!” she suddenly screamed. “The cross! the cross! It’s there. I seeit. Say, boy, you’re a Catholic.”
“You’re another,” retorted Clarence, indignantly.
“You are! You are!” And with a cry like that of some wild animal, thewoman ran and hid herself in the larger tent.
“Boy,” said Pete, “we’re going to take care of you.”
“Thank you; but if it’s all the same to you, I’d just as soon take careof myself.”
“You’ll do as I tell you,” said Pete, gazing angrily at the lad. “Youmay be a fraud. We will find out, and if your story is true, we’ll seeabout getting you back to your people.”
“Oh, you will, will you?—Good night!” and with this Clarence turned anddashed up the river. Pete, followed by Ezra, was after him at once. Theold man was quick to catch up with him, and he made this fact known tothe boy by striking him with his closed fist a blow on the mouth whichbrought him flat to the earth. Pete kicked his prostrate prey as he lay,and was about to renew his brutality, when Ben roughly pulled his senioraway.
“Look here!” cried Clarence ruefully, as he picked himself up. “Nexttime you want me to do something, tell me. You needn’t punch ideas inthrough my mouth. I guess I can take a hint as well as the next one.”
“You’d better do what Pete says,” whispered Ben not unkindly. “It’s nouse trying to get away from him. I’ll be your friend.”
“Thank you. By the way, would you call kicks and cuffs adventures?”
The man shrugged his shoulders.
“Well, I was singing the praises of the goddess of adventure thismorning. I wanted to meet her the worst way. Well, I’ve been meeting herall day and I’m kind of tired. If I get my hands on her, I’ll hold herunder water till she’s as dead as a door-nail.”
“Oh, yes!” said the mystified Ben.
But the adventures of that day were not yet over, as Clarence, to hiscost, was soon to learn.
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