THE STORYTELLER

Taranaki Daily News, 21 August 1915, Page 9

THE STORYTELLER

THE COWARDLY CALF. (ByXlmore Elliot Peake, in Mnnaey's.) The Rev. Homer Pettigrew's idea of discipline, like all his ideas, was as inflexible as iron. It was based in part upon his sternly repressed eliildhood — though he himself had no suspicion that it had beea repressed—in part upon the Old Testament. He preached it from the pujnjt; he drilled it into the cars of parents on his ■parochial calls; he had even published a pamphlet, at his own expense, upon it. Finally, he put it into practice on a son born to him rather late in life, by a wife twenty years his junior. Pettigrew himself had no music in his soul, and could never certainly distinguish "Yankee Doodle" from Dixie"; to he decided that his son should be a violinist, thereby disproving some pernicious thcorie* of heredity. At the age of seven; therefore, Bantry began his lessons.

The boy was of a wonderfully sunny, tractable : , disposition, like his mother; and he slaved with the bow for nearly a year without a murmur. But with hinv-as also with his mother —the limit of forbearance w»s a sharp one. Forced past it, rcbelUon flamed in his breast witk a fury which the Rev. Homer Pettigrew could only characterise as demoniacal; Thus it happened that one day Bantry stuck his violin in the furnace and then calmly informed his father of the fact. * Mr. Pettigrew seized his hat. Half an hour later he thrust a new instrument into his son's hands, and sentenced him to three days' confinement in his room, with two hours' practice each morning and afternoon. "Arc you sorry?" the Roman father concluded. The boy, with the face of a seraph, haloed in wavelets of eom-eolored hair, answered respectfully, without a trace of anger or resentment: "3fo, s'r. And I never will be. And I'll die in that room before I'll say I am when I'm not!" It was very little progress that the clergyman made on his sermon that morning. Yet Bantry—and this was the baffdng feature of his case—continued his lessons and his practice as faith-, fully as if nothing had happened. six months after this incident Bantry trrfdged slowly along in the dense midsummer shade of the maples, his cheeks still cool and glossy from the wash-cloth. and his damp hair striated by the brush. In one hand he carried a violin-ease, ™ * ue other a music-roll, »nd out of respect to his teacher he wore shoes and stockings and his Sunday straw hat. It was a d.'owsy, droning afternoon which tinged his thoughts with a sweet sadness —for he was something of a poet even at this tender age. Scented zephyrs fingered his Wow; cicadas whirred above his head; a turkey-buzzard circled in the blue vault of heaven; cocks crowed 'azily in the d'stanee; ami presently the low, tremuJous blast of a steamboat, still miles away floated to liU ears. Through the umbrageous frame of trees at the end of the street the blades of a corn-field waved and glistened like banners of an army, and beyond this lay a shimmering reach of the Ohio river—that enchanted stream upon which Bantry's fancy had launched a thousand airy barques destined for the mysterious islands of uncharted seas. As he neared Miss Perryman's old brick house, smothered in Virginian creeper, the dismal ping-pang-pong of a piano slightly out of tune and operated by a slow, uncertain hand, drifted out the parlor-windows. Bantry's imagination pictured the dusky interior, with little Lucy Ledbetter at the instrument, a penny at the back of each hand, to

nwkc her hold it level with the keyboard, and her tongue between her teeth j while Miss Ferryman, prematurely grey and ghastly with face-powder, stood in the background and sepukhrally counted: "One—two—three—four!" Hia turn came next; but to-day the thought of exchanging the hot, sun-dis-tilled fragrance of outdoors for the close air of the tightly shuttered house seemed to pinch hia nostrils. So, instead of going inside to wait, as usual, he dropped down in the tall foxtail-grass which flourished between the sidewalk and street. Soon there hove in sight a group of boys whose potkets and waists bulged with apples. "Come on and go swimmin", Bant!" sang out Stub Hatch. ''We're goin' down to the sandbar, and then we're goin' to hunt papaws and blackberries, and Backer here is goin' to show us a burablee's nest, and if we kin kill Vm off 'thout gittin' stung we'll eat all the honey." "I've got to take my lesson," answered Bantry soberly. "Aw. come on! You ain't never been swimm'n' in the river yet, and it's twice as much fun as the crick. There ain't no mud nor snakes in the river, and you kin dive >with your eyes open and gee everything. Once I sen a fish as Eig as little Chick there. It was i. ullhead, and it had hoins as big as a cow's, pretty near." "You kin see eels, too," added Iry Fankboner. "And once my brother seen a steamboat wha had blowcd up and sunk," ventured little Ohick, and then shrank li&ck ashamed at the burst of laughter from the older boys. Bantry did not laugh, but gazed longingly at the green Kentucky hills rising from the river's farther edge. As yet lie swam only "dog fashion," and crossing the swimming-hole in the creek wai )iis greatest natatorial exploit. One of the golden daydreams that swarmed beneath his curly thatch was to perfect Ills art until some day he could invite his father and mother for a boat-ride, suddenly dive overboard in the middle of the stream, and then, while his parents were divided between admiration apd dismay, boldly strike out for shore with that graceful over-hand stroke which the big boys practised. "Come on!" urged Stub, crunching an apple. Bantry shook his head. "I'd like to, but I've got to take my lesson." • "Whfttter you want to take lessons on a fiddle fur, anyway!" demanded the /rrimy little Hun known as Backerdoubtless with reference to the quid of tobacco which now bulged in hin cheek. "Nobody but niggers play on fiddles." "That isn't true," answered Bantry with an angry flusu. "I've heard white men play on 'em myself. Besides, this isn't » fiddle. It's a violin."

"What's the dii?" Bantry pondered his answer". • "A violin costs twice m much." '•But you told me once, Uant. you didn't like lessons," put in Stub Hatch. "1 don't." "Then what do you take 'em fur?" '•Because my father and mother want me. to." " 'Fraid of gitUn' licked, uh?' : taunted Backer. "His dad don't never lick hiiu," volunteered Stub, with the authority of one living across the alley from the parsonage bain, ''ilo only shuts him up in a room, and he could climb out of the winder, but he won't." "Then what is the cowardly calf afraid of?" retorted Backer with rising insolence. "I'll bet it's the deep water. Why, even little Chick here ain't afraid of that—are you, Chick? He can't swim, cither. We're goin' to learn him today." "I'm not a cowardly calf, and I'm not afraid of the deep water," declared Bantry. "Prove it!" sneered Backer. 'J'll bet you dursn't swim out over your head." "Take him up, Bant!" prompted Stub, cunningly. "Hide youo fiddle in them bushes. Xobody'll ever lipow you didn't take your lesson except old Me Perryman, and you can tell her you was sick." Bantry knew better. He knew that God would blow it. and eventually his parents, for he had no idea of deceiving them, or of telling Alias Ferryman a lie. Yet the next moment, with that reckless indifference to the penalties of disobedience which was occasionally the despair of his father and mother, he shoved his violin and music-roll under a trumpetvine which sprawled over the picket fence, and set off with his vradoer». 11. The way, after leaving the road, was along a lane where tumblebugs som.Tsaulted over their unmanageable balls, grasshoppers sprang up with clicking wing-cases, and clouds of white butterflies drifted hither and thither; them past an abandoned sawmill that was the reputed haunt, in Boyland, of thieves and counterfeiters; down a fieri* c'aybank, and then through a waist-high patah of jimson-weed to the rand-bar. I _ -Bantry removed b.'s shoes and stockings with studied deliberation, so as to finish undressing alone;—ashamed, not of his naikedness, but of his underwear! Then he scampered across the sand and mingled his white body with the nutbrown skins of the others. "Come on out now!" challenged Backer, spurting water from his mouth like a young whale. "I'm coming," answered Bantry defiantly. The two contestants waded out neck deep; then, pawing the water furiously, thrashing and splashing with their feet, while their wet, sleek, seal-like heads bobbed up and down, they struggled for supremacy.

Tn a very short time, however—to Banfcry at least—the expanse of water become as lonesome as the bosom of the deep; the shouts of the boys behind grew faint; the shore-lino receded —or seemed to recede—by leaps and bounds; and the high bank, with its plumes of corn, began to sink low upon the horizon. So, remembering that it was just as far back as out, he turned ingloriously about. Backer immediately followed suit, for be too was tired and short of breath, and his triumphant crow fizzled in & gurgle as he shipped a mouthful of water. But wTien he reached wading depth again, he badgered his rival mercilessly. Bantry, : ilent and crestfallen, but with a glitter in his eyes which warned the others not to duck him, as Backer suggested, sat down in the shallow water to rest. The victor repaired to his scant heap of clothing to invigorate himself with a chew, in which he was joined by Stub Hatch. For a few minutes the pahbasked in the sun like lizards; then Backer rolled over and over in the sand. His innocent-looking gambols brought him close to Bantry's clothes, whereupon he swiftly seized the waist and tied a knot in the sleeve. But before he could tighten it sufficiently to make Bantry "chaw beans," Stub snatched the garment out of his liands. "You want the kid's mother to ketch on he's been swimmin'?" he demanded, with loyal indignation. Recalling the promised swimming lesson for Chick, the two returnee? to the water; but after ducking the little fellow a few times, they tired of the sport. Directing him to use a near-by fence-rail for a float, they turned their restless minds to such stunts as diving without holding their noses, opening their eyes under water, and knocking stones under water. Tn the midst of it every hoy was brought suddenly upright, like ,a' startled turtle, by a piercing .(-.cream. Looking waterward they beheld little Chick clinging desperately to his rail, already far beyond their reach, and drifting further every instant. The water, so recently a playmate, suddenly became a sinister, fearsome thing, full of dead men's bones and nameless horrors. For •* moment the boys stood paralysed; then, panic-strick-en, they rushed pell-mell for shore and leaped into'their ilothes with frenzied haste. As with a covey of startled quail, all sense of organisation was lost. Each was for himself'in the mad scramble to put the dreadful scene behind him. They scaled the bank without regard to paths, plunged over, under, or through the barbed-wire fence, and disappeared in the corn. Bantry alone remained, a statue in ivory at the waters edge, his frightcifed eyes fixed upon his hapless companion. An inveterate day-dreamer, lie dreamed even in this crucial moment. lie saw himself cutting the water, hand over hand, with the speed and grace of a dolphin. The sliore was lined with people, Chick's mother in the foreground, and his own parents near by. He heard his father's encouraging shout: lie waved a jaunty acknowledgment. Then, seizing Chick as'the little fellow sank for the third and last time, he swam slowly but calmly back to safety with one arm. It was all as vivid as if etcher, upon his brain by lightning; but quickly it dissolved, like a magic-lantern .--cene. and grim reality took its place. There was this difference, though—lie was now purged of fear, and stood panoplied with a stout heart and clear head for the rescue. He scanned the bank in either direction for a boat. Xono was in sight. Certain that he would find one soon, he &houted to Chick to bold fast, and then

raced along the bar, down-stream, cutting his feet on mussel-shells and hurled his naked body through thickets of widow and hazelnut, but unconscious of the pain. Beyond the 'bar lay a mud-flat, hardbaked and veined with cracks, and ending in a long, narrow spit which stuck out into the river. Beached on the point of this spit Bantry spied a little punt, such as the men used in running thei:- trout-lines. A spurt at full speed, a run into the water alongside the boat, a final thrust and leap, and he found himself embarked, some roods below Chick f.nd almost as far out. T.w» discovery that there were iio oars in the boat dismayed him for an instant; then, seizing a rusty tin bafin used for bailing, he paddled madly, intercepted the floating ra'l by good 1r.c1., and after a struggle which all but cajKlxed the craft, he man-handled Chick o-.tr t ;, e "jmwale. 111. For an interval the pair lay in the bottom of the punt, panting and exhausted; then the younger boy 'began to snivel. "Wliat are you crying fori" demanded Baniry indignantly. "You're paved!" "iTow wo goin' to git (o r'.isre?" wbiwi Oh'ck. 'Taddie, of course." "W'iiai with?" , What, indeed? The basin had disappeared. After a blank moment I'antry answered stoutly: 'With our hands." They tried it, with promising succes~: Iml Twe*«ntly, striking a "crossing" —where the channel, influenced by a bend below, left the Illinois shore in a long oblique for the opposite side— the current neutralised their puny efforts and bore them steadily outward. When r.ear the Kentucky shore, they rev.iined paddling; but soon another crowing intervened, and when the sun dipt-ei behind a tall headland they found themselves near the middle of the nrile-wicfr stream.

A man's gauge is not a boy's. The two naked, shivering atoms of human flotsam scanned the fair face or the river w. : th boding as dismal as any ghipwreck■•d mariner's. The rosy sur.sel clouds wore the sinister aspect of a couilagrai[or. (■'. world*, Maiiiin;.' the !.:■;!>• a senfed the menacing in.v;k of r.!ii;;!es; Woody red. The bunks lay at an appalling distance. The cornfields prcpenot.ra.blc fastnesses. The howl of a clog became the screaming of a-'panther. A farmer's far-away i'Co l-ass! 00-lxiss!" for the evening milking wa.s rnJetsken for the signal of Indians. The rumble of a distant train could be nothing less the. wooded hills seemed dark and imtlian the thunder of a Niagara below, waiting to swallow them up. The "jug-o'-ram, jug-o'-rum" of a harmless bullfrog was magnified into the bellow.of a leviathan, lurking in some dark, watery cavern beneath.

They would have wept under trivial provocation, but the cataclysmic character of this disaster froze their tears at the fountainheafd. and they sat vis-a-vis in the boat with solemn, drawn faces lit up by dilated pupils. Chick's spidery little body was drawn into a knot for warmth. "Are we near Xoo Orleans yet?" he hoarsely whispered, after a long silence.

"Oh. now," answered Bantry, with his superior geography. "I don't believe we've passed Cairo yet. I was there once with father and mother, to our church conference, and there was lots of steamboats and wharfs that we'd be sure to see." At the mention of mother, Chick's chin quivered. "Once when I went blackberryin', and didirt git home till after dark, mammy cried. Y'ou reckon she's cryin' now?"

A sudden lump in his own throat shut off Bantry's answer for a moment. "I don't think so. The boys will tell her and my mother, too, that we're safe in a boat. And probably my father will telegraph down the river for somebody to con™ out and got us, like they did when that woman floated by on a house, during the flood," Chicle cast a fearsome glance over the dusky waters. "How kin they sec us in the dark?" "They'll have lanterns, and we can see them, if they can't sec us." "Do you sec 'em yet anywhere?" "Xo, it isn't time." Another silence followed. "How long does it take people to starve to death?" asked Ohick. "Two or three days," answered Bantry, at a venture. "How long is it now?" "Why, it isn't half a day yet," return, ed Bantry sharply, for these questions uncomfortably stirred his own latent fears. "We've got to go to bed and wake up again before it's a day." "I'd be in bed now if I was home," said Chick mournfully. It was indeed a small boy's bedtime. The late summer twilight was deepening into night, blurring the shores and magnifying the bluffy into mountains. Stars popped out overhead, farmers' lamps glowed at intervals, and presently the clustered lights of a hamlet swam into view. When the boat came opposite thorn the boys shouted lustily, but their thin, piping voices could not have carried half the distance. There was no response, and the lights slowly receded at the rear. Chick, complaining of the cold, began to whimper again, but checked himself when Bantry dropped to his knees and clasped his hands. "Oh. God!"—'Bantry's voice rone, tremulous but clear—"Oh, Cod, take care of Chick and me. Send somebody to pick us up and take us home again. But if they don't come, keep us from being afraid, for Christ's sake, Amen!" He resumed bis seat. Chick awaited the miracle curiously. "Whv don't He do it?" he finally asked. Bautrv did not answer for a moment. "He hasn't had time. Maybe Ho won't do it because you didn't pray. Suppose you do." Chick's face crimsoned. "I don't know how. You do it fur me." "That wouldn't count. It's ea.sv. Just =ay what 1 said." "1 forgil what you said." ''Then I'll say It again, and you say if after me. Kneel clown! Now—'Oh Cod!' Why don't you say it?" "If f say the same thing He'll know I'm just copyin' you!" "That don't make aiiv difference. Sav it. 'Oh, Cod!'" "'•Oh, Cod!'" faltered Chicle, The limping prayer was scarcely finished .when the long-drawn, sonorous blast of a steamboat's chime-whistle came vibrating up the river. Both boys emitted a startled cry, Soon the boat's hoarse, labored exhaust became audible, and after a while she swept gloriously around the bend below—a floating city, beaded with lights from stem to stern, black smoke pouring from her twin stacks, a fierce glare leaping intermittently from her furnace-doors, and her great side-wheels beating the water thunderously.

At this inspiring sight, the excited urchins leaped to their feet. If we only had a match and some paper, we could signal her!" cried Chick, who, .like every river-town boy, had seen many a boat brought to by such & device. ''Maybe she'll come close enough to see us anyhow," answered Bantry hopefully. It soon looked as if she were coming too e'ose for comfort; and the alarmed kds, long before they could have seen or heard, wildly waved their arms and b'.iried t'iieir puny voices, against the upj'oi.;- of t'i.-e boat. In the midst of it all a cone of white light E-lwt heavenward from the hurri-cane-deck, trembled uncertainly for an iiislant, and then, describing a great arc, descended to earth. It leaped along the bank like a {riant in seven-league boots, flooding every object, with a. spectral glare and metamorphosing trees, fences and ■haystacks into ghostly simulacra of their daylight selves. Then it shimmered on the water, and started across the river front Die Kentucky fo tin". Illinois shore. It 'passed over the little punt, binding the boys and leaving white specks floating before their eyes. But the next instant it hailed and came back again to fie punt, and this time it stood sti.il, as if to Sore the occupants through and through. A riiudiering b'ast leaped from the whistle. The boys, who had 'lung their selves downward to await their! fate, leaped to their feet and again waved their naked. j.rms. Engine-bells jangled; the mighty paddle-whec-'s ceased their thundering: the vessel swung to one s : -Je, and a, 'mat was lowered, with two darkles at the oars and an oflieer in the stern-unccH A minute or two later t'.se lads were hoisted into the host, and their little p.;>it continued its loneiy journey down the river without a crsv. . IV. A curious group oi' passengers cluster- .-::[ tUwit tlie ca'..'l■).:« on the boiler-deck, nwsi'.irig the rciuni oi the rescuers; and when the boys:, blue with cold, were 'iai;.-!s.l ii.j, they were greeted with a '•■'-.■>!!, well!" exclaimed the captain. "Wb.viv do you hail from':'' ' iVn'ro from Harodslown," answered n."nfry. shrinking out of sight of the ladies in the background. 'Does votir boat run that far!" "a'c-s," answered the captain, smiling. "Hut how came you boys in this fix?" Bantry explained briefly and added:, "If you will take us home, my father wii! pay the fare." ''There is no charge for homing shipwrecked sailors on this boa't," the captain said. "Kow tell me your father's name and I'll send him a telegram from the; next landing, so he can meet you at the wharf. How about supper?" "We ain't had none," piped up Oiiick, ■promptly, "And we can't set down to no table 'thouten clothes. But I s'pose we kin eat in bed, like paw does the day maw washes ids shirt." The captain laughed. "We'll see what we can do for you in the way of clothes." Taking one of their hands in oacli of his, he piloted them through the friendly, smiling group of crew ,tnd passengers, ascended the companionway to the cabin deck, and ushered them into a stateroom. Boys' clothes, however, proved to be one of the few things not included in the Big .Sandy's stock of supplies; and when the. youngsters reappeared, each swaddled in a man's bluc-tlannel shirt, they more than faintly resembled scarecrows. But after the stewardess bad rolled the sleeves back and pinned the tails, fore and alt, around their legs, in rough imitation of baggy trousers, their appearance was much improved; and when she kissed both of them and seated them at a table, they actually smiled. The long, narrow saloon, panelled with state-room doors on either side, set with a row of white-clothed tables, and decorated with arches of gilded fretwork, presented a fascinating vista. At every rilroke of the engines the prism-fringed chandeliers tinkled musically, and every blast from the whistle above set up a • pleasant vibration inside one. Above all, n. delightful warmth pervaded the room, in which tlie toys almost visibly expanded. This process of expansion was carried still further when the darky waiter set supper before tliem —coffee, hot rolls, fried chicken, baked potatoes, sliced peaches and cream, and a plate of assorted cakes. The climax was reached when a beautiful, laughing young woman came down the saloonVith the frou-frou of silken vestures, sat down before a piano, and began to play and sing for them. "Gee 'Whillikims!" exclaimed Chick thickly, from behind a nut-brown ch'cken thigh, "Won't Stub and Backer wish they was here when we tell 'em? I never had no eatin's like this!" "I have—out at grandma's once, in .the country," answered Bantrv. '-But I 'like this better," It was over all too soon. Indeed, they could scarcely believe their ears when the captain informed them that the next landing was theirs. But fhev had one mare thrill; for as the steam'boat, wjith clanging engine bells and slowly-reversed paddle-wheels, forged up to the Harrodstown wharf, it seemed as if the whole town had turned out to welcome them. livery face was recognisable in the searchlight's glare. In the foreground ■stood .Mr. and Mrs. Pettigrew, and beside them Chick's mother, with a shawl over her head. Also, for a wonder Cluck's father was there, quite sober and in a clean shirt. But, best of all, were flub and Backer, open-mouthed' and open-eyed, and too awed bv the grandeur of the occasion to answer Bantry's shout. _ The parents met their children at the loot of the stage-plank, amid a rousliiocheer. The eyes of Chick's mother were red ami swollen, ami she burst into fresh ears as she pressed her boy to her breast Mrs. Pettigrew did not orv when she kissed Bantry. but her lip's twisted oddlv as sho smiled. The Bcv. Homer I'ettlgrew kissed bis son rather hastily, and then hurried him and his mother into Harrodstown's only hack-nn ancient vehicle which, like it's driver, had seen butter days. To Bantry It was still u very grand'affair, in spite of its (lacked glass doors and faded green upholstery, and it had a distinctly novel smell inside. Yet he would have preferred to walk, as ChieT; did, in spite of his bizarre costume, for it was not often that such a crowd turned out to meet a boy. Once inside the vehicle, Alicia Pelti,giew enclosed her son tig-htlv in her arms. As he felt her quiver, he forgave her for not crying like Chick's mother. Then lie told his story. When it was finished his father said gravelv: "For some six hours to-dav your mother and I believed you to 'be dead. What our suffering was you will never know unless, perchance, 'some day you believe a son of your own to be dead, under circumstances which would always leave a tarnish on his name." "You mean saving Chick?" demanded Bantry in aja?,p«ment

"Xo, no," answered Air. Pettigrew hastily. "That was a very brave and fine thing to do. I referred to your skipping your lesson and going swimming clandestinely. We are grateful to Almighty God for preserving you, yet your disobedience leaves our hearts sore. I presume, though, you have already been sufficiently punished for it." "Why, no," answered Bantry frankly. "I expected you to punish me." "Do you mean you have felt no shame, no remorse?" queried the father incredulously. "Xo, sir. I didn't have time. And I didn't know you and mother were suffering. I thought the boys would tell you I was safe in the boat." "But surely you have some compunctions over doing forbidden things, such as the boy in that story-book I bought you felt over going sailing on Sunday and drowning his companion." "I didn't drown my companion. I saved him from drowning." "Don't you think, perhaps, Homer, that we had better wait till morning to thrash these questions out?" asked Alicia, dropping her cheek on Bantry's head. "He 'lias been through so much to-day that I hardly think him responsible for all 3ic says." "Oh, yea, T am, mother," declared Bantry. "Only I don't, feel like father does about some things." "What, for instance?" asked Pettigrew wrlonsly. IRintry reflected a moment. "I believe God sent me in swimming to-day to save Cluick, because if I hadnt been there he would have drowned. The other boys ran away." He may have been mistaken, but he fane'ed he felt his mother's lips move in a smile, though why, he did not know. His father did not answer at once. "Yon believe, then, that God works good through bad—that he makes vice serve virtue? I don't think you ever drew such theology from any sermon of mine." "Well," said Bantry, after a moment, "He sent Satan to make the boils come ■out on Jo-b, didn't he?" Pettigrew evaded tile question. "I think perhaps your mother is right. We will defer any further discussion of this subject, until to-morrow. A night's rest may straighten you up." "Yes, sir," came the obedient assent. The tone evidently touched some chord in the father's breast, for he added, more tenderly than before: "But I want to repeat that we are proud of your heroism, and are very thankful to have you back, with us again, safe and sound." "So am I," answered.. .'Bftntfy, with a happy smile. "It's awful lonesome in a boat, after dark, without any oars!"