The Eagle Cliff by Robert Michael Ballantyne (read e book TXT) 📖

amusin', Junkie, wass it not?"

"Yes, Tonal', it was; but it won't be very amusin' for me to go all the rest of the day bareheaded."

Donald sympathised with his friend on this point, and assured him that he would have divided his cap with him, as Junkie had divided his lunch, but for the fact that he never wore a cap at all, and the ragged hair would neither divide nor come off. After this they resumed their work of dogging the fisher's steps.

It would require a volume to relate all that was said and done on that lovely afternoon, if all were faithfully detailed; but our space and the reader's patience render it advisable to touch only on two points of interest.

As the day advanced the heat became overpowering, and, to escape from the glare of the sun for a little, the fisher took shelter under some very tall bracken on the bank near a deep pool. In order to secure a slight feeling of pleasurable expectation while resting, he put on a bait-cast, dropped the worm into the deepest part of the pool, propped up his rod with several stones, and then lay down to watch. The turf happened to be soft and level. As a natural consequence the tired man fell sound asleep.

"What's to be done noo, Junkie?"

"I don't know, Tonal'."

To make matters more exasperating, at that moment the rod began to bend and the reel to spin jerkily.

"A fush!" exclaimed Donald.

"Looks like it," returned his friend drily.

"I better gee a yell an' wauken him," suggested Donald.

"Ye'd better no'," said Junkie, shaking his fist.

"Yonder iss the end o' yer bonnet stickin' oot o' his pooch, what-e-ver," said Donald.

"You'd better lie low an' keep still," said Junkie; and, without further explanation of his intentions, he went softly down the bank and crept towards the sleeper, taking advantage of every stone and root and bush as he went along. Really, for a first attempt, it was worthy of the child of a Pawnee brave.

MacRummle was a heavy sleeper, so Junkie had no difficulty in recovering his cap. Putting it on, he returned the way he had come.

"That wass cliver, man," said the admiring Donald, when his friend rejoined him.

Junkie accepted the compliment with a dignified smile, and then sat down to wait; but it was a severe trial of patience to both of them, for the old man slept steadily on, and even snored. He seemed, in short, to have fairly gone to bed for the night.

"What say ye to bomb stanes at 'um?" suggested Donald.

"An' kill 'im, maybe," returned Junkie, with sarcasm in his eye.

"Heave divits at 'um, then."

"Ay; that's better."

Accordingly, the two urchins tore up a mass of turf which was much too heavy to heave.

"Let's row'd," suggested the active-minded Donald.

As this also met the approval of Junkie, they carried the "divit," or mass of turf, to the bank just above the sleeper, and, taking a careful aim, let it go. The bank was not regular. A lump diverted the divit from its course, and it plunged into the pool, to the obvious discomposure of the fish, which was still at intervals tugging at the line. Another divit was tried, but with similar result. A third clod went still further astray. The bombardment then became exciting, as every kind of effort does when one begins to realise the beneficial effect of practice.

"I can see how it is," whispered Junkie, as he carefully "laid" the next gun. "If we keep more to the right, it'll hit that lump o' grass, glance into the hollow, and--"

He stopped abruptly, and both boys stood in crab-like attitudes of expectation, ready to fly, for the divit took the exact course thus indicated, and bounding down the bank, hit MacRummle fair on his broad back.

The guilty ones dived like rabbits into the bracken.

"Bless me!" exclaimed the old gentleman, jumping up and shaking the dry earth off. "This is most remarkable. I do believe I've been asleep. But why the bank should take to crumbling down upon me is more than I can understand. Hallo! A fish! You don't deserve such luck, Dick, my boy."

Winding in the line in a way which proved that the divit had done him no harm, he gave utterance to an exclamation of huge disgust as he drew an eel to the bank, with the line entangled hopelessly about its shiny body. This was too much for MacRummle. Unable to face the misery of disentanglement, he cut the line, despatched the eel, attached a new hook, and continued his occupation.

At the head of the pool in question the bank was so precipitous and high that the boys could see only the top of the rod swinging gracefully to and fro as the patient man pursued his sport. Suddenly the top of the rod described a wild figure in the air and disappeared. At the same moment a heavy plunge was heard.

"Hech! he's tum'led in the pool," gasped Donald.

They rushed to the overhanging edge of the cliff and looked down. Sure enough MacRummle was in the water. They expected to see him swim, for Junkie knew he was an expert swimmer; but the poor man was floating quietly down with the current, his head under water.

"Banged his heed, what-e-ver!" cried Donald, jumping up and bounding down the bank to the lower and shallow end of the pool. Quick though he was, Junkie outran him; but the unfortunate MacRummle was unintentionally quicker than either, for they found him stranded when they got there.

Running into the water, they seized him by the hair and the collar of his coat, and dragged him into the shallow part easily enough, but they had not strength to haul him ashore.

"Fetch a divit, Tonal'--a big one, an' I'll keep up his head."

One of the masses of recent artillery was fetched, and the fisher's head was gently pillowed on it, so as to be well out of the water.

"There's no cut that I can see," said Junkie, inspecting the head critically; "he's only stunned, I think. Noo, Tonal', cut away to the hoose. Run as ye never ran before and tell them. I'll stop beside him for fear his heed slips in again."

Donald went off like a shot. Junkie went a few steps with him, intending to fetch another divit. Looking back, he saw what made him sink into the heather, and give a low whistle. Donald heard it, stopped, and also hid himself, for MacRummle was seen trying to rise. He succeeded, and staggered to dry land, when, sitting down on a stone, he felt himself all over with an anxious expression. Then he felt a lump on the back of his head, and smiled intelligently. After that he squeezed as much water out of his garments as he could, quietly took down his rod, ascertained that the fish in his basket were all right, then looked with some perplexity at the big divit lying in the shallow close to where he stood, and finally, with a highly contented expression of countenance, wended his way homeward.

The two boys gave him time to get well out of sight in advance, and then followed his example, commenting sagely as they went, on the desirability of possessing pluck in old age, and on the value of the various lessons they had learned that day.


CHAPTER TEN.


A WILDISH CHAPTER.

It was the habit of our three friends--Bob Mabberly, John Barret, and Giles Jackman--during their residence at Kinlossie, to take a stroll together every morning before breakfast by the margin of the sea, for they were fond of each other's company, and Mabberly, as a yachtsman, had acquired the habit of early rising. He had also learned to appreciate the early morning hours as being those which present Nature in her sweetest, as well as her freshest, aspect--when everything seems, more than at other periods of the day, to be under the direct influence of a benignant Creator.

It was also the habit of Captain McPherson and his man, James McGregor, to indulge daily in similar exercise at about the same hour, but, owing probably to their lives having been spent chiefly on the sea, they were wont to ramble up a neighbouring glen in preference to sauntering on the shore.

One bright calm morning, however, when the sky was all blue and the loch was like a mirror, the two seamen took it into their heads to desert the glen and ramble along the shore. Thus it came to pass that, on returning homeward, they encountered our three friends.

"It iss fery strange that we should foregather this mornin', Mr Mabberly," said the skipper, after greeting the young men; "for Shames an' me was jist speakin' aboot ye. We will be thinkin' that it iss foolishness for hum an' me to be stoppin' here wastin' our time when we ought to be at oor work."

"Nonsense, Captain," said Mabberly; "surely you don't think that taking a holiday in a pleasant place like this is wasting time. Besides, I don't consider you free from your engagement to me. You were hired for the trip, and that includes land as well as water, so I won't give you your discharge till you have had a long rest, and recruited yourselves after the shock to your nervous systems occasioned by the wreck and the swim to shore!"

A grim smile played on the skipper's iron features when reference was made to his nerves, and a flicker of some sort illumined the wooden visage of McGregor.

"You are fery kind, sir," returned the skipper; "but we don't like to be receivin' pay for doin' nothin'. You see, neither Shames nor me cares much for fushin' in the burns, or goin' after the deer, an' there's no chance o' raisin' the yat from the pottom o' the sea, so, if you hev no objection, sir, we will be goin' by the steamer that arrives to-morrow. I thought I would speak to you to-day, for we will hev to start early in the mornin', before you're up, for it iss a long way we'll hev to go. Iss it not so, Shames?"

"Oo, ay," replied the seaman, with more than ever of the nasal twang; "it iss a coot many miles to where the poat comes in--so the poy Tonal' wass tellin' me, what-e-ver."

Mabberly tried to persuade the men to remain a little longer, but they were obdurate, so he let them go, knowing well that his father, who was a wealthy merchant and shipowner, would see to the interests of the men who had suffered in his son's service.

As they retraced their steps to the house the skipper gave Giles Jackman some significant glances, which induced him to fall behind the others.

"You want to speak with me privately, I think, skipper?"

"Yes, sir, I do," replied the seaman, with some embarrassment. "But it iss not fery easy nor pleesant to do so. A man does not like to speak of another man's failin's, you see, but as I am goin' away I'm obleeged to do it. You will hev noticed, sir, that Ivor Tonalson iss raither fond