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diff --git a/1730.txt b/1730.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..123e1e2 --- /dev/null +++ b/1730.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10744 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Michael, Brother of Jerry, by Jack London + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Michael, Brother of Jerry + + +Author: Jack London + +Release Date: April 28, 2005 [eBook #1730] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MICHAEL, BROTHER OF JERRY*** + + + + + + +Transcribed from the 1917 Mills & Boon edition by David Price, email +ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + + +MICHAEL, BROTHER OF JERRY + + +FOREWORD + + +Very early in my life, possibly because of the insatiable curiosity that +was born in me, I came to dislike the performances of trained animals. It +was my curiosity that spoiled for me this form of amusement, for I was +led to seek behind the performance in order to learn how the performance +was achieved. And what I found behind the brave show and glitter of +performance was not nice. It was a body of cruelty so horrible that I am +confident no normal person exists who, once aware of it, could ever enjoy +looking on at any trained-animal turn. + +Now I am not a namby-pamby. By the book reviewers and the namby-pambys I +am esteemed a sort of primitive beast that delights in the spilled blood +of violence and horror. Without arguing this matter of my general +reputation, accepting it at its current face value, let me add that I +have indeed lived life in a very rough school and have seen more than the +average man's share of inhumanity and cruelty, from the forecastle and +the prison, the slum and the desert, the execution-chamber and the lazar- +house, to the battlefield and the military hospital. I have seen +horrible deaths and mutilations. I have seen imbeciles hanged, because, +being imbeciles, they did not possess the hire of lawyers. I have seen +the hearts and stamina of strong men broken, and I have seen other men, +by ill-treatment, driven to permanent and howling madness. I have +witnessed the deaths of old and young, and even infants, from sheer +starvation. I have seen men and women beaten by whips and clubs and +fists, and I have seen the rhinoceros-hide whips laid around the naked +torsos of black boys so heartily that each stroke stripped away the skin +in full circle. And yet, let me add finally, never have I been so +appalled and shocked by the world's cruelty as have I been appalled and +shocked in the midst of happy, laughing, and applauding audiences when +trained-animal turns were being performed on the stage. + +One with a strong stomach and a hard head may be able to tolerate much of +the unconscious and undeliberate cruelty and torture of the world that is +perpetrated in hot blood and stupidity. I have such a stomach and head. +But what turns my head and makes my gorge rise, is the cold-blooded, +conscious, deliberate cruelty and torment that is manifest behind ninety- +nine of every hundred trained-animal turns. Cruelty, as a fine art, has +attained its perfect flower in the trained-animal world. + +Possessed myself of a strong stomach and a hard head, inured to hardship, +cruelty, and brutality, nevertheless I found, as I came to manhood, that +I unconsciously protected myself from the hurt of the trained-animal turn +by getting up and leaving the theatre whenever such turns came on the +stage. I say "unconsciously." By this I mean it never entered my mind +that this was a programme by which the possible death-blow might be given +to trained-animal turns. I was merely protecting myself from the pain of +witnessing what it would hurt me to witness. + +But of recent years my understanding of human nature has become such that +I realize that no normal healthy human would tolerate such performances +did he or she know the terrible cruelty that lies behind them and makes +them possible. So I am emboldened to suggest, here and now, three +things: + +First, let all humans inform themselves of the inevitable and eternal +cruelty by the means of which only can animals be compelled to perform +before revenue-paying audiences. Second, I suggest that all men and +women, and boys and girls, who have so acquainted themselves with the +essentials of the fine art of animal-training, should become members of, +and ally themselves with, the local and national organizations of humane +societies and societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals. + +And the third suggestion I cannot state until I have made a preamble. +Like hundreds of thousands of others, I have worked in other fields, +striving to organize the mass of mankind into movements for the purpose +of ameliorating its own wretchedness and misery. Difficult as this is to +accomplish, it is still more difficult to persuade the human into any +organised effort to alleviate the ill conditions of the lesser animals. + +Practically all of us will weep red tears and sweat bloody sweats as we +come to knowledge of the unavoidable cruelty and brutality on which the +trained-animal world rests and has its being. But not one-tenth of one +per cent. of us will join any organization for the prevention of cruelty +to animals, and by our words and acts and contributions work to prevent +the perpetration of cruelties on animals. This is a weakness of our own +human nature. We must recognize it as we recognize heat and cold, the +opaqueness of the non-transparent, and the everlasting down-pull of +gravity. + +And still for us, for the ninety-nine and nine-tenths per cent. of us, +under the easy circumstance of our own weakness, remains another way most +easily to express ourselves for the purpose of eliminating from the world +the cruelty that is practised by some few of us, for the entertainment of +the rest of us, on the trained animals, who, after all, are only lesser +animals than we on the round world's surface. It is so easy. We will +not have to think of dues or corresponding secretaries. We will not have +to think of anything, save when, in any theatre or place of +entertainment, a trained-animal turn is presented before us. Then, +without premeditation, we may express our disapproval of such a turn by +getting up from our seats and leaving the theatre for a promenade and a +breath of fresh air outside, coming back, when the turn is over, to enjoy +the rest of the programme. All we have to do is just that to eliminate +the trained-animal turn from all public places of entertainment. Show +the management that such turns are unpopular, and in a day, in an +instant, the management will cease catering such turns to its audiences. + +JACK LONDON + +GLEN ELLEN, SONOMA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA, + +December 8, 1915 + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +But Michael never sailed out of Tulagi, nigger-chaser on the _Eugenie_. +Once in five weeks the steamer _Makambo_ made Tulagi its port of call on +the way from New Guinea and the Shortlands to Australia. And on the +night of her belated arrival Captain Kellar forgot Michael on the beach. +In itself, this was nothing, for, at midnight, Captain Kellar was back on +the beach, himself climbing the high hill to the Commissioner's bungalow +while the boat's crew vainly rummaged the landscape and canoe houses. + +In fact, an hour earlier, as the _Makambo's_ anchor was heaving out and +while Captain Kellar was descending the port gang-plank, Michael was +coming on board through a starboard port-hole. This was because Michael +was inexperienced in the world, because he was expecting to meet Jerry on +board this boat since the last he had seen of him was on a boat, and +because he had made a friend. + +Dag Daughtry was a steward on the _Makambo_, who should have known better +and who would have known better and done better had he not been +fascinated by his own particular and peculiar reputation. By luck of +birth possessed of a genial but soft disposition and a splendid +constitution, his reputation was that for twenty years he had never +missed his day's work nor his six daily quarts of bottled beer, even, as +he bragged, when in the German islands, where each bottle of beer carried +ten grains of quinine in solution as a specific against malaria. + +The captain of the _Makambo_ (and, before that, the captains of the +_Moresby_, the _Masena_, the _Sir Edward Grace_, and various others of +the queerly named Burns Philp Company steamers had done the same) was +used to pointing him out proudly to the passengers as a man-thing novel +and unique in the annals of the sea. And at such times Dag Daughtry, +below on the for'ard deck, feigning unawareness as he went about his +work, would steal side-glances up at the bridge where the captain and his +passengers stared down on him, and his breast would swell pridefully, +because he knew that the captain was saying: "See him! that's Dag +Daughtry, the human tank. Never's been drunk or sober in twenty years, +and has never missed his six quarts of beer per diem. You wouldn't think +it, to look at him, but I assure you it's so. I can't understand. Gets +my admiration. Always does his time, his time-and-a-half and his double- +time over time. Why, a single glass of beer would give me heartburn and +spoil my next good meal. But he flourishes on it. Look at him! Look at +him!" + +And so, knowing his captain's speech, swollen with pride in his own +prowess, Dag Daughtry would continue his ship-work with extra vigour and +punish a seventh quart for the day in advertisement of his remarkable +constitution. It was a queer sort of fame, as queer as some men are; and +Dag Daughtry found in it his justification of existence. + +Wherefore he devoted his energy and the soul of him to the maintenance of +his reputation as a six-quart man. That was why he made, in odd moments +of off-duty, turtle-shell combs and hair ornaments for profit, and was +prettily crooked in such a matter as stealing another man's dog. Somebody +had to pay for the six quarts, which, multiplied by thirty, amounted to a +tidy sum in the course of the month; and, since that man was Dag +Daughtry, he found it necessary to pass Michael inboard on the _Makambo_ +through a starboard port-hole. + +On the beach, that night at Tulagi, vainly wondering what had become of +the whaleboat, Michael had met the squat, thick, hair-grizzled ship's +steward. The friendship between them was established almost instantly, +for Michael, from a merry puppy, had matured into a merry dog. Far +beyond Jerry, was he a sociable good fellow, and this, despite the fact +that he had known very few white men. First, there had been Mister +Haggin, Derby and Bob, of Meringe; next, Captain Kellar and Captain +Kellar's mate of the _Eugenie_; and, finally, Harley Kennan and the +officers of the _Ariel_. Without exception, he had found them all +different, and delightfully different, from the hordes of blacks he had +been taught to despise and to lord it over. + +And Dag Daughtry had proved no exception from his first greeting of +"Hello, you white man's dog, what 'r' you doin' herein nigger country?" +Michael had responded coyly with an assumption of dignified aloofness +that was given the lie by the eager tilt of his ears and the good-humour +that shone in his eyes. Nothing of this was missed by Dag Daughtry, who +knew a dog when he saw one, as he studied Michael in the light of the +lanterns held by black boys where the whaleboats were landing cargo. + +Two estimates the steward quickly made of Michael: he was a likable dog, +genial-natured on the face of it, and he was a valuable dog. Because of +those estimates Dag Daughtry glanced about him quickly. No one was +observing. For the moment, only blacks stood about, and their eyes were +turned seaward where the sound of oars out of the darkness warned them to +stand ready to receive the next cargo-laden boat. Off to the right, +under another lantern, he could make out the Resident Commissioner's +clerk and the _Makambo's_ super-cargo heatedly discussing some error in +the bill of lading. + +The steward flung another quick glance over Michael and made up his mind. +He turned away casually and strolled along the beach out of the circle of +lantern light. A hundred yards away he sat down in the sand and waited. + +"Worth twenty pounds if a penny," he muttered to himself. "If I couldn't +get ten pounds for him, just like that, with a thank-you-ma'am, I'm a +sucker that don't know a terrier from a greyhound.--Sure, ten pounds, in +any pub on Sydney beach." + +And ten pounds, metamorphosed into quart bottles of beer, reared an +immense and radiant vision, very like a brewery, inside his head. + +A scurry of feet in the sand, and low sniffings, stiffened him to +alertness. It was as he had hoped. The dog had liked him from the +start, and had followed him. + +For Dag Daughtry had a way with him, as Michael was quickly to learn, +when the man's hand reached out and clutched him, half by the jowl, half +by the slack of the neck under the ear. There was no threat in that +reach, nothing tentative nor timorous. It was hearty, all-confident, and +it produced confidence in Michael. It was roughness without hurt, +assertion without threat, surety without seduction. To him it was the +most natural thing in the world thus to be familiarly seized and shaken +about by a total stranger, while a jovial voice muttered: "That's right, +dog. Stick around, stick around, and you'll wear diamonds, maybe." + +Certainly, Michael had never met a man so immediately likable. Dag +Daughtry knew, instinctively to be sure, how to get on with dogs. By +nature there was no cruelty in him. He never exceeded in peremptoriness, +nor in petting. He did not overbid for Michael's friendliness. He did +bid, but in a manner that conveyed no sense of bidding. Scarcely had he +given Michael that introductory jowl-shake, when he released him and +apparently forgot all about him. + +He proceeded to light his pipe, using several matches as if the wind blew +them out. But while they burned close up to his fingers, and while he +made a simulation of prodigious puffing, his keen little blue eyes, under +shaggy, grizzled brows, intently studied Michael. And Michael, ears +cocked and eyes intent, gazed at this stranger who seemed never to have +been a stranger at all. + +If anything, it was disappointment Michael experienced, in that this +delightful, two-legged god took no further notice of him. He even +challenged him to closer acquaintance with an invitation to play, with an +abrupt movement lifting his paws from the ground and striking them down, +stretched out well before, his body bent down from the rump in such a +curve that almost his chest touched the sand, his stump of a tail waving +signals of good nature while he uttered a sharp, inviting bark. And the +man was uninterested, pulling stolidly away at his pipe, in the darkness +following upon the third match. + +Never was there a more consummate love-making, with all the base intent +of betrayal, than this cavalier seduction of Michael by the elderly, six- +quart ship's steward. When Michael, not entirely unwitting of the snub +of the man's lack of interest, stirred restlessly with a threat to +depart, he had flung at him gruffly: + +"Stick around, dog, stick around." + +Dag Daughtry chuckled to himself, as Michael, advancing, sniffed his +trousers' legs long and earnestly. And the man took advantage of his +nearness to study him some more, lighting his pipe and running over the +dog's excellent lines. + +"Some dog, some points," he said aloud approvingly. "Say, dog, you could +pull down ribbons like a candy-kid in any bench show anywheres. Only +thing against you is that ear, and I could almost iron it out myself. A +vet. could do it." + +Carelessly he dropped a hand to Michael's ear, and, with tips of fingers +instinct with sensuous sympathy, began to manipulate the base of the ear +where its roots bedded in the tightness of skin-stretch over the skull. +And Michael liked it. Never had a man's hand been so intimate with his +ear without hurting it. But these fingers were provocative only of +physical pleasure so keen that he twisted and writhed his whole body in +acknowledgment. + +Next came a long, steady, upward pull of the ear, the ear slipping slowly +through the fingers to the very tip of it while it tingled exquisitely +down to its roots. Now to one ear, now to the other, this happened, and +all the while the man uttered low words that Michael did not understand +but which he accepted as addressed to him. + +"Head all right, good 'n' flat," Dag Daughtry murmured, first sliding his +fingers over it, and then lighting a match. "An' no wrinkles, 'n' some +jaw, good 'n' punishing, an' not a shade too full in the cheek or too +empty." + +He ran his fingers inside Michael's mouth and noted the strength and +evenness of the teeth, measured the breadth of shoulders and depth of +chest, and picked up a foot. In the light of another match he examined +all four feet. + +"Black, all black, every nail of them," said Daughtry, "an' as clean feet +as ever a dog walked on, straight-out toes with the proper arch 'n' small +'n' not too small. I bet your daddy and your mother cantered away with +the ribbons in their day." + +Michael was for growing restless at such searching examination, but +Daughtry, in the midst of feeling out the lines and build of the thighs +and hocks, paused and took Michael's tail in his magic fingers, exploring +the muscles among which it rooted, pressing and prodding the adjacent +spinal column from which it sprang, and twisting it about in a most +daringly intimate way. And Michael was in an ecstasy, bracing his +hindquarters to one side or the other against the caressing fingers. With +open hands laid along his sides and partly under him, the man suddenly +lifted him from the ground. But before he could feel alarm he was back +on the ground again. + +"Twenty-six or -seven--you're over twenty-five right now, I'll bet you on +it, shillings to ha'pennies, and you'll make thirty when you get your +full weight," Dag Daughtry told him. "But what of it? Lots of the +judges fancy the thirty-mark. An' you could always train off a few +ounces. You're all dog n' all correct conformation. You've got the +racing build and the fighting weight, an' there ain't no feathers on your +legs." + +"No, sir, Mr. Dog, your weight's to the good, and that ear can be ironed +out by any respectable dog--doctor. I bet there's a hundred men in +Sydney right now that would fork over twenty quid for the right of +calling you his." + +And then, just that Michael should not make the mistake of thinking he +was being much made over, Daughtry leaned back, relighted his pipe, and +apparently forgot his existence. Instead of bidding for good will, he +was bent on making Michael do the bidding. + +And Michael did, bumping his flanks against Daughtry's knee; nudging his +head against Daughtry's hand, in solicitation for more of the blissful +ear-rubbing and tail-twisting. Daughtry caught him by the jowl instead +and slowly moved his head back and forth as he addressed him: + +"What man's dog are you? Maybe you're a nigger's dog, an' that ain't +right. Maybe some nigger's stole you, an' that'd be awful. Think of the +cruel fates that sometimes happens to dogs. It's a damn shame. No white +man's stand for a nigger ownin' the likes of you, an' here's one white +man that ain't goin' to stand for it. The idea! A nigger ownin' you an' +not knowin' how to train you. Of course a nigger stole you. If I laid +eyes on him right now I'd up and knock seven bells and the Saint Paul +chimes out of 'm. Sure thing I would. Just show 'm to me, that's all, +an' see what I'd do to him. The idea of you takin' orders from a nigger +an' fetchin' 'n' carryin' for him! No, sir, dog, you ain't goin' to do +it any more. You're comin' along of me, an' I reckon I won't have to +urge you." + +Dag Daughtry stood up and turned carelessly along the beach. Michael +looked after him, but did not follow. He was eager to, but had received +no invitation. At last Daughtry made a low kissing sound with his lips. +So low was it that he scarcely heard it himself and almost took it on +faith, or on the testimony of his lips rather than of his ears, that he +had made it. No human being could have heard it across the distance to +Michael; but Michael heard it, and sprang away after in a great delighted +rush. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +Dag Daughtry strolled along the beach, Michael at his heels or running +circles of delight around him at every repetition of that strange low lip- +noise, and paused just outside the circle of lantern light where dusky +forms laboured with landing cargo from the whaleboats and where the +Commissioner's clerk and the _Makambo's_ super-cargo still wrangled over +the bill of lading. When Michael would have gone forward, the man +withstrained him with the same inarticulate, almost inaudible kiss. + +For Daughtry did not care to be seen on such dog-stealing enterprises and +was planning how to get on board the steamer unobserved. He edged around +outside the lantern shine and went on along the beach to the native +village. As he had foreseen, all the able-bodied men were down at the +boat-landing working cargo. The grass houses seemed lifeless, but at +last, from one of them, came a challenge in the querulous, high-pitched +tones of age: + +"What name?" + +"Me walk about plenty too much," he replied in the beche-de-mer English +of the west South Pacific. "Me belong along steamer. Suppose 'm you +take 'm me along canoe, washee-washee, me give 'm you fella boy two stick +tobacco." + +"Suppose 'm you give 'm me ten stick, all right along me," came the +reply. + +"Me give 'm five stick," the six-quart steward bargained. "Suppose 'm +you no like 'm five stick then you fella boy go to hell close up." + +There was a silence. + +"You like 'm five stick?" Daughtry insisted of the dark interior. + +"Me like 'm," the darkness answered, and through the darkness the body +that owned the voice approached with such strange sounds that the steward +lighted a match to see. + +A blear-eyed ancient stood before him, balancing on a single crutch. His +eyes were half-filmed over by a growth of morbid membrane, and what was +not yet covered shone red and irritated. His hair was mangy, standing +out in isolated patches of wispy grey. His skin was scarred and wrinkled +and mottled, and in colour was a purplish blue surfaced with a grey +coating that might have been painted there had it not indubitably grown +there and been part and parcel of him. + +A blighted leper--was Daughtry's thought as his quick eyes leapt from +hands to feet in quest of missing toe- and finger-joints. But in those +items the ancient was intact, although one leg ceased midway between knee +and thigh. + +"My word! What place stop 'm that fella leg?" quoth Daughtry, pointing +to the space which the member would have occupied had it not been absent. + +"Big fella shark-fish, that fella leg stop 'm along him," the ancient +grinned, exposing a horrible aperture of toothlessness for a mouth. + +"Me old fella boy too much," the one-legged Methuselah quavered. "Long +time too much no smoke 'm tobacco. Suppose 'm you big fella white +marster give 'm me one fella stick, close up me washee-washee you that +fella steamer." + +"Suppose 'm me no give?" the steward impatiently temporized. + +For reply, the old man half-turned, and, on his crutch, swinging his +stump of leg in the air, began sidling hippity-hop into the grass hut. + +"All right," Daughtry cried hastily. "Me give 'm you smoke 'm quick +fella." + +He dipped into a side coat-pocket for the mintage of the Solomons and +stripped off a stick from the handful of pressed sticks. The old man was +transfigured as he reached avidly for the stick and received it. He +uttered little crooning noises, alternating with sharp cries akin to +pain, half-ecstatic, half-petulant, as he drew a black clay pipe from a +hole in his ear-lobe, and into the bowl of it, with trembling fingers, +untwisted and crumbled the cheap leaf of spoiled Virginia crop. + +Pressing down the contents of the full bowl with his thumb, he suddenly +plumped upon the ground, the crutch beside him, the one limb under him so +that he had the seeming of a legless torso. From a small bag of twisted +coconut hanging from his neck upon his withered and sunken chest, he drew +out flint and steel and tinder, and, even while the impatient steward was +proffering him a box of matches, struck a spark, caught it in the tinder, +blew it into strength and quantity, and lighted his pipe from it. + +With the first full puff of the smoke he gave over his moans and yelps, +the agitation began to fade out of him, and Daughtry, appreciatively +waiting, saw the trembling go out of his hands, the pendulous +lip-quivering cease, the saliva stop flowing from the corners of his +mouth, and placidity come into the fiery remnants of his eyes. + +What the old man visioned in the silence that fell, Daughtry did not try +to guess. He was too occupied with his own vision, and vividly burned +before him the sordid barrenness of a poor-house ward, where an ancient, +very like what he himself would become, maundered and gibbered and +drooled for a crumb of tobacco for his old clay pipe, and where, of all +horrors, no sip of beer ever obtained, much less six quarts of it. + +And Michael, by the dim glows of the pipe surveying the scene of the two +old men, one squatted in the dark, the other standing, knew naught of the +tragedy of age, and was only aware, and overwhelmingly aware, of the +immense likableness of this two-legged white god, who, with fingers of +magic, through ear-roots and tail-roots and spinal column, had won to the +heart of him. + +The clay pipe smoked utterly out, the old black, by aid of the crutch, +with amazing celerity raised himself upstanding on his one leg and +hobbled, with his hippity-hop, to the beach. Daughtry was compelled to +lend his strength to the hauling down from the sand into the water of the +tiny canoe. It was a dug-out, as ancient and dilapidated as its owner, +and, in order to get into it without capsizing, Daughtry wet one leg to +the ankle and the other leg to the knee. The old man contorted himself +aboard, rolling his body across the gunwale so quickly, that, even while +it started to capsize, his weight was across the danger-point and +counterbalancing the canoe to its proper equilibrium. + +Michael remained on the beach, waiting invitation, his mind not quite +made up, but so nearly so that all that was required was that lip-noise. +Dag Daughtry made the lip-noise so low that the old man did not hear, and +Michael, springing clear from sand to canoe, was on board without wetting +his feet. Using Daughtry's shoulder for a stepping-place, he passed over +him and down into the bottom of the canoe. Daughtry kissed with his lips +again, and Michael turned around so as to face him, sat down, and rested +his head on the steward's knees. + +"I reckon I can take my affydavy on a stack of Bibles that the dog just +up an' followed me," he grinned in Michael's ear. + +"Washee-washee quick fella," he commanded. + +The ancient obediently dipped his paddle and started pottering an erratic +course in the general direction of the cluster of lights that marked the +_Makambo_. But he was too feeble, panting and wheezing continually from +the exertion and pausing to rest off strokes between strokes. The +steward impatiently took the paddle away from him and bent to the work. + +Half-way to the steamer the ancient ceased wheezing and spoke, nodding +his head at Michael. + +"That fella dog he belong big white marster along schooner . . . You give +'m me ten stick tobacco," he added after due pause to let the information +sink in. + +"I give 'm you bang alongside head," Daughtry assured him cheerfully. +"White marster along schooner plenty friend along me too much. Just now +he stop 'm along _Makambo_. Me take 'm dog along him along _Makambo_." + +There was no further conversation from the ancient, and though he lived +long years after, he never mentioned the midnight passenger in the canoe +who carried Michael away with him. When he saw and heard the confusion +and uproar on the beach later that night when Captain Kellar turned +Tulagi upside-down in his search for Michael, the old one-legged one +remained discreetly silent. Who was he to seek trouble with the strange +ones, the white masters who came and went and roved and ruled? + +In this the ancient was in nowise unlike the rest of his dark-skinned +Melanesian race. The whites were possessed of unguessed and unthinkable +ways and purposes. They constituted another world and were as a play of +superior beings on an exalted stage where was no reality such as black +men might know as reality, where, like the phantoms of a dream, the white +men moved and were as shadows cast upon the vast and mysterious curtain +of the Cosmos. + +The gang-plank being on the port side, Dag Daughtry paddled around to the +starboard and brought the canoe to a stop under a certain open port. + +"Kwaque!" he called softly, once, and twice. + +At the second call the light of the port was obscured apparently by a +head that piped down in a thin squeak. + +"Me stop 'm, marster." + +"One fella dog stop 'm along you," the steward whispered up. "Keep 'm +door shut. You wait along me. Stand by! Now!" + +With a quick catch and lift, he passed Michael up and into unseen hands +outstretched from the iron wall of the ship, and paddled ahead to an open +cargo port. Dipping into his tobacco pocket, he thrust a loose handful +of sticks into the ancient's hand and shoved the canoe adrift with no +thought of how its helpless occupant would ever reach shore. + +The old man did not touch the paddle, and he was unregardless of the +lofty-sided steamer as the canoe slipped down the length of it into the +darkness astern. He was too occupied in counting the wealth of tobacco +showered upon him. No easy task, his counting. Five was the limit of +his numerals. When he had counted five, he began over again and counted +a second five. Three fives he found in all, and two sticks over; and +thus, at the end of it, he possessed as definite a knowledge of the +number of sticks as would be possessed by the average white man by means +of the single number _seventeen_. + +More it was, far more, than his avarice had demanded. Yet he was +unsurprised. Nothing white men did could surprise. Had it been two +sticks instead of seventeen, he would have been equally unsurprised. +Since all acts of white men were surprises, the only surprise of action +they could achieve for a black man would be the doing of an unsurprising +thing. + +Paddling, wheezing, resting, oblivious of the shadow-world of the white +men, knowing only the reality of Tulagi Mountain cutting its crest-line +blackly across the dim radiance of the star-sprinkled sky, the reality of +the sea and of the canoe he so feebly urged across it, and the reality of +his fading strength and of the death into which he would surely end, the +ancient black man slowly made his shoreward way. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +In the meanwhile, Michael. Lifted through the air, exchanged into +invisible hands that drew him through a narrow diameter of brass into a +lighted room, Michael looked about him in expectancy of Jerry. But +Jerry, at that moment, lay cuddled beside Villa Kennan's sleeping-cot on +the slant deck of the _Ariel_, as that trim craft, the Shortlands astern +and New Guinea dead ahead, heeled her scuppers a-whisper and garrulous to +the sea-welter alongside as she logged her eleven knots under the press +of the freshening trades. Instead of Jerry, from whom he had last parted +on board a boat, Michael saw Kwaque. + +Kwaque? Well, Kwaque was Kwaque, an individual, more unlike all other +men than most men are unlike one another. No queerer estray ever drifted +along the stream of life. Seventeen years old he was, as men measure +time; but a century was measured in his lean-lined face, his wrinkled +forehead, his hollowed temples, and his deep-sunk eyes. From his thin +legs, fragile-looking as windstraws, the bones of which were sheathed in +withered skin with apparently no muscle padding in between--from such +frail stems sprouted the torso of a fat man. The huge and protuberant +stomach was amply supported by wide and massive hips, and the shoulders +were broad as those of a Hercules. But, beheld sidewise, there was no +depth to those shoulders and the top of the chest. Almost, at that part +of his anatomy, he seemed builded in two dimensions. Thin his arms were +as his legs, and, as Michael first beheld him, he had all the seeming of +a big-bellied black spider. + +He proceeded to dress, a matter of moments, slipping into duck trousers +and blouse, dirty and frayed from long usage. Two fingers of his left +hand were doubled into a permanent bend, and, to an expert, would have +advertised that he was a leper. Although he belonged to Dag Daughtry +just as much as if the steward possessed a chattel bill of sale of him, +his owner did not know that his anaesthetic twist of ravaged nerves +tokened the dread disease. + +The manner of the ownership was simple. At King William Island, in the +Admiralties, Kwaque had made, in the parlance of the South Pacific, a +pier-head jump. So to speak, leprosy and all, he had jumped into Dag +Daughtry's arms. Strolling along the native runways in the fringe of +jungle just beyond the beach, as was his custom, to see whatever he might +pick up, the steward had picked up Kwaque. And he had picked him up in +extremity. + +Pursued by two very active young men armed with fire-hardened spears, +tottering along with incredible swiftness on his two spindle legs, Kwaque +had fallen exhausted at Daughtry's feet and looked up at him with the +beseeching eyes of a deer fleeing from the hounds. Daughtry had inquired +into the matter, and the inquiry was violent; for he had a wholesome fear +of germs and bacilli, and when the two active young men tried to run him +through with their filth-corroded spears, he caught the spear of one +young man under his arm and put the other young man to sleep with a left +hook to the jaw. A moment later the young man whose spear he held had +joined the other in slumber. + +The elderly steward was not satisfied with the mere spears. While the +rescued Kwaque continued to moan and slubber thankfulness at his feet, he +proceeded to strip them that were naked. Nothing they wore in the way of +clothing, but from around each of their necks he removed a necklace of +porpoise teeth that was worth a gold sovereign in mere exchange value. +From the kinky locks of one of the naked young men he drew a hand-carved, +fine-toothed comb, the lofty back of which was inlaid with +mother-of-pearl, which he later sold in Sydney to a curio shop for eight +shillings. Nose and ear ornaments of bone and turtle-shell he also +rifled, as well as a chest-crescent of pearl shell, fourteen inches +across, worth fifteen shillings anywhere. The two spears ultimately +fetched him five shillings each from the tourists at Port Moresby. Not +lightly may a ship steward undertake to maintain a six-quart reputation. + +When he turned to depart from the active young men, who, back to +consciousness, were observing him with bright, quick, wild-animal eyes, +Kwaque followed so close at his heels as to step upon them and make him +stumble. Whereupon he loaded Kwaque with his trove and put him in front +to lead along the runway to the beach. And for the rest of the way to +the steamer, Dag Daughtry grinned and chuckled at sight of his plunder +and at sight of Kwaque, who fantastically titubated and ambled along, +barrel-like, on his pipe-stems. + +On board the steamer, which happened to be the _Cockspur_, Daughtry +persuaded the captain to enter Kwaque on the ship's articles as steward's +helper with a rating of ten shillings a month. Also, he learned Kwaque's +story. + +It was all an account of a pig. The two active young men were brothers +who lived in the next village to his, and the pig had been theirs--so +Kwaque narrated in atrocious beche-de-mer English. He, Kwaque, had never +seen the pig. He had never known of its existence until after it was +dead. The two young men had loved the pig. But what of that? It did +not concern Kwaque, who was as unaware of their love for the pig as he +was unaware of the pig itself. + +The first he knew, he averred, was the gossip of the village that the pig +was dead, and that somebody would have to die for it. It was all right, +he said, in reply to a query from the steward. It was the custom. +Whenever a loved pig died its owners were in custom bound to go out and +kill somebody, anybody. Of course, it was better if they killed the one +whose magic had made the pig sick. But, failing that one, any one would +do. Hence Kwaque was selected for the blood-atonement. + +Dag Daughtry drank a seventh quart as he listened, so carried away was he +by the sombre sense of romance of this dark jungle event wherein men +killed even strangers because a pig was dead. + +Scouts out on the runways, Kwaque continued, brought word of the coming +of the two bereaved pig-owners, and the village had fled into the jungle +and climbed trees--all except Kwaque, who was unable to climb trees. + +"My word," Kwaque concluded, "me no make 'm that fella pig sick." + +"My word," quoth Dag Daughtry, "you devil-devil along that fella pig too +much. You look 'm like hell. You make 'm any fella thing sick look +along you. You make 'm me sick too much." + +It became quite a custom for the steward, as he finished his sixth bottle +before turning in, to call upon Kwaque for his story. It carried him +back to his boyhood when he had been excited by tales of wild cannibals +in far lands and dreamed some day to see them for himself. And here he +was, he would chuckle to himself, with a real true cannibal for a slave. + +A slave Kwaque was, as much as if Daughtry had bought him on the auction- +block. Whenever the steward transferred from ship to ship of the Burns +Philp fleet, he always stipulated that Kwaque should accompany him and be +duly rated at ten shillings. Kwaque had no say in the matter. Even had +he desired to escape in Australian ports, there was no need for Daughtry +to watch him. Australia, with her "all-white" policy, attended to that. +No dark-skinned human, whether Malay, Japanese, or Polynesian, could land +on her shore without putting into the Government's hand a cash security +of one hundred pounds. + +Nor at the other islands visited by the _Makambo_ had Kwaque any desire +to cut and run for it. King William Island, which was the only land he +had ever trod, was his yard-stick by which he measured all other islands. +And since King William Island was cannibalistic, he could only conclude +that the other islands were given to similar dietary practice. + +As for King William Island, the _Makambo_, on the former run of the +_Cockspur_, stopped there every ten weeks; but the direst threat Daughtry +ever held over him was the putting ashore of him at the place where the +two active young men still mourned their pig. In fact, it was their +regular programme, each trip, to paddle out and around the _Makambo_ and +make ferocious grimaces up at Kwaque, who grimaced back at them from over +the rail. Daughtry even encouraged this exchange of facial amenities for +the purpose of deterring him from ever hoping to win ashore to the +village of his birth. + +For that matter, Kwaque had little desire to leave his master, who, after +all, was kindly and just, and never lifted a hand to him. Having +survived sea-sickness at the first, and never setting foot upon the land +so that he never again knew sea-sickness, Kwaque was certain he lived in +an earthly paradise. He never had to regret his inability to climb +trees, because danger never threatened him. He had food regularly, and +all he wanted, and it was such food! No one in his village could have +dreamed of any delicacy of the many delicacies which he consumed all the +time. Because of these matters he even pulled through a light attack of +home-sickness, and was as contented a human as ever sailed the seas. + +And Kwaque it was who pulled Michael through the port-hole into Dag +Daughtry's stateroom and waited for that worthy to arrive by the +roundabout way of the door. After a quick look around the room and a +sniff of the bunk and under the bunk which informed him that Jerry was +not present, Michael turned his attention to Kwaque. + +Kwaque tried to be friendly. He uttered a clucking noise in +advertisement of his friendliness, and Michael snarled at this black who +had dared to lay hands upon him--a contamination, according to Michael's +training--and who now dared to address him who associated only with white +gods. + +Kwaque passed off the rebuff with a silly gibbering laugh and started to +step nearer the door to be in readiness to open it at his master's +coming. But at first lift of his leg, Michael flew at it. Kwaque +immediately put it down, and Michael subsided, though he kept a watchful +guard. What did he know of this strange black, save that he was a black +and that, in the absence of a white master, all blacks required watching? +Kwaque tried slowly sliding his foot along the floor, but Michael knew +the trick and with bristle and growl put a stop to it. + +It was upon this tableau that Daughtry entered, and, while he admired +Michael much under the bright electric light, he realized the situation. + +"Kwaque, you make 'm walk about leg belong you," he commanded, in order +to make sure. + +Kwaque's glance of apprehension at Michael was convincing enough, but the +steward insisted. Kwaque gingerly obeyed, but scarcely had his foot +moved an inch when Michael's was upon him. The foot and leg petrified, +while Michael stiff-leggedly drew a half-circle of intimidation about +him. + +"Got you nailed to the floor, eh?" Daughtry chuckled. "Some +nigger-chaser, my word, any amount." + +"Hey, you, Kwaque, go fetch 'm two fella bottle of beer stop 'm along +icey-chestis," he commanded in his most peremptory manner. + +Kwaque looked beseechingly, but did not stir. Nor did he stir at a +harsher repetition of the order. + +"My word!" the steward bullied. "Suppose 'm you no fetch 'm beer close +up, I knock 'm eight bells 'n 'a dog-watch onta you. Suppose 'm you no +fetch 'm close up, me make 'm you go ashore 'n' walk about along King +William Island." + +"No can," Kwaque murmured timidly. "Eye belong dog look along me too +much. Me no like 'm dog kai-kai along me." + +"You fright along dog?" his master demanded. + +"My word, me fright along dog any amount." + +Dag Daughtry was delighted. Also, he was thirsty from his trip ashore +and did not prolong the situation. + +"Hey, you, dog," he addressed Michael. "This fella boy he all right. +Savvee? He all right." + +Michael bobbed his tail and flattened his ears in token that he was +trying to understand. When the steward patted the black on the shoulder, +Michael advanced and sniffed both the legs he had kept nailed to the +floor. + +"Walk about," Daughtry commanded. "Walk about slow fella," he cautioned, +though there was little need. + +Michael bristled, but permitted the first timid step. At the second he +glanced up at Daughtry to make certain. + +"That's right," he was reassured. "That fella boy belong me. He all +right, you bet." + +Michael smiled with his eyes that he understood, and turned casually +aside to investigate an open box on the floor which contained plates of +turtle-shell, hack-saws, and emery paper. + +* * * * * + +"And now," Dag Daughtry muttered weightily aloud, as, bottle in hand, he +leaned back in his arm-chair while Kwaque knelt at his feet to unlace his +shoes, "now to consider a name for you, Mister Dog, that will be just to +your breeding and fair to my powers of invention." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +Irish terriers, when they have gained maturity, are notable, not alone +for their courage, fidelity, and capacity for love, but for their cool- +headedness and power of self-control and restraint. They are less easily +excited off their balance; they can recognize and obey their master's +voice in the scuffle and rage of battle; and they never fly into nervous +hysterics such as are common, say, with fox-terriers. + +Michael possessed no trace of hysteria, though he was more +temperamentally excitable and explosive than his blood-brother Jerry, +while his father and mother were a sedate old couple indeed compared with +him. Far more than mature Jerry, was mature Michael playful and +rowdyish. His ebullient spirits were always on tap to spill over on the +slightest provocation, and, as he was afterwards to demonstrate, he could +weary a puppy with play. In short, Michael was a merry soul. + +"Soul" is used advisedly. Whatever the human soul may be--informing +spirit, identity, personality, consciousness--that intangible thing +Michael certainly possessed. His soul, differing only in degree, partook +of the same attributes as the human soul. He knew love, sorrow, joy, +wrath, pride, self-consciousness, humour. Three cardinal attributes of +the human soul are memory, will, and understanding; and memory, will, and +understanding were Michael's. + +Just like a human, with his five senses he contacted with the world +exterior to him. Just like a human, the results to him of these contacts +were sensations. Just like a human, these sensations on occasion +culminated in emotions. Still further, like a human, he could and did +perceive, and such perceptions did flower in his brain as concepts, +certainly not so wide and deep and recondite as those of humans, but +concepts nevertheless. + +Perhaps, to let the human down a trifle from such disgraceful identity of +the highest life-attributes, it would be well to admit that Michael's +sensations were not quite so poignant, say in the matter of a +needle-thrust through his foot as compared with a needle-thrust through +the palm of a hand. Also, it is admitted, when consciousness suffused +his brain with a thought, that the thought was dimmer, vaguer than a +similar thought in a human brain. Furthermore, it is admitted that +never, never, in a million lifetimes, could Michael have demonstrated a +proposition in Euclid or solved a quadratic equation. Yet he was capable +of knowing beyond all peradventure of a doubt that three bones are more +than two bones, and that ten dogs compose a more redoubtable host than do +two dogs. + +One admission, however, will not be made, namely, that Michael could not +love as devotedly, as wholeheartedly, unselfishly, madly, +self-sacrificingly as a human. He did so love--not because he was +Michael, but because he was a dog. + +Michael had loved Captain Kellar more than he loved his own life. No +more than Jerry for Skipper, would he have hesitated to risk his life for +Captain Kellar. And he was destined, as time went by and the conviction +that Captain Kellar had passed into the inevitable nothingness along with +Meringe and the Solomons, to love just as absolutely this six-quart +steward with the understanding ways and the fascinating lip-caress. +Kwaque, no; for Kwaque was black. Kwaque he merely accepted, as an +appurtenance, as a part of the human landscape, as a chattel of Dag +Daughtry. + +But he did not know this new god as Dag Daughtry. Kwaque called him +"marster"; but Michael heard other white men so addressed by the blacks. +Many blacks had he heard call Captain Kellar "marster." It was Captain +Duncan who called the steward "Steward." Michael came to hear him, and +his officers, and all the passengers, so call him; and thus, to Michael, +his god's name was Steward, and for ever after he was to know him and +think of him as Steward. + +There was the question of his own name. The next evening after he came +on board, Dag Daughtry talked it over with him. Michael sat on his +haunches, the length of his lower jaw resting on Daughtry's knee, the +while his eyes dilated, contracted and glowed, his ears ever pricking and +repricking to listen, his stump tail thumping ecstatically on the floor. + +"It's this way, son," the steward told him. "Your father and mother were +Irish. Now don't be denying it, you rascal--" + +This, as Michael, encouraged by the unmistakable geniality and kindness +in the voice, wriggled his whole body and thumped double knocks of +delight with his tail. Not that he understood a word of it, but that he +did understand the something behind the speech that informed the string +of sounds with all the mysterious likeableness that white gods possessed. + +"Never be ashamed of your ancestry. An' remember, God loves the +Irish--Kwaque! Go fetch 'm two bottle beer fella stop 'm along +icey-chestis!--Why, the very mug of you, my lad, sticks out Irish all +over it." (Michael's tail beat a tattoo.) "Now don't be blarneyin' me. +'Tis well I'm wise to your insidyous, snugglin', heart-stealin' ways. +I'll have ye know my heart's impervious. 'Tis soaked too long this many +a day in beer. I stole you to sell you, not to be lovin' you. I +could've loved you once; but that was before me and beer was introduced. +I'd sell you for twenty quid right now, coin down, if the chance offered. +An' I ain't goin' to love you, so you can put that in your pipe 'n' smoke +it." + +"But as I was about to say when so rudely interrupted by your 'fectionate +ways--" + +Here he broke off to tilt to his mouth the opened bottle Kwaque handed +him. He sighed, wiped his lips with the back of his hand, and proceeded. + +"'Tis a strange thing, son, this silly matter of beer. Kwaque, the +Methusalem-faced ape grinnin' there, belongs to me. But by my faith do I +belong to beer, bottles 'n' bottles of it 'n' mountains of bottles of it +enough to sink the ship. Dog, truly I envy you, settin' there +comfortable-like inside your body that's untainted of alcohol. I may own +you, and the man that gives me twenty quid will own you, but never will a +mountain of bottles own you. You're a freer man than I am, Mister Dog, +though I don't know your name. Which reminds me--" + +He drained the bottle, tossed it to Kwaque, and made signs for him to +open the remaining one. + +"The namin' of you, son, is not lightly to be considered. Irish, of +course, but what shall it be? Paddy? Well may you shake your head. +There's no smack of distinction to it. Who'd mistake you for a +hod-carrier? Ballymena might do, but it sounds much like a lady, my boy. +Ay, boy you are. 'Tis an idea. Boy! Let's see. Banshee Boy? Rotten. +Lad of Erin!" + +He nodded approbation and reached for the second bottle. He drank and +meditated, and drank again. + +"I've got you," he announced solemnly. "Killeny is a lovely name, and +it's Killeny Boy for you. How's that strike your honourableness?--high- +soundin', dignified as a earl or . . . or a retired brewer. Many's the +one of that gentry I've helped to retire in my day." + +He finished his bottle, caught Michael suddenly by both jowls, and, +leaning forward, rubbed noses with him. As suddenly released, with +thumping tail and dancing eyes, Michael gazed up into the god's face. A +definite soul, or entity, or spirit-thing glimmered behind his dog's +eyes, already fond with affection for this hair-grizzled god who talked +with him he knew not what, but whose very talking carried delicious and +unguessable messages to his heart. + +"Hey! Kwaque, you!" + +Kwaque, squatted on the floor, his hams on his heels, paused from the +rough-polishing of a shell comb designed and cut out by his master, and +looked up, eager to receive command and serve. + +"Kwaque, you fella this time now savvee name stop along this fella dog. +His name belong 'm him, Killeny Boy. You make 'm name stop 'm inside +head belong you. All the time you speak 'm this fella dog, you speak 'm +Killeny Boy. Savvee? Suppose 'm you no savvee, I knock 'm block off +belong you. Killeny Boy, savvee! Killeny Boy. Killeny Boy." + +As Kwaque removed his shoes and helped him undress, Daughtry regarded +Michael with sleepy eyes. + +"I've got you, laddy," he announced, as he stood up and swayed toward +bed. "I've got your name, an' here's your number--I got that, too: _high- +strung but reasonable_. It fits you like the paper on the wall. + +"High-strung but reasonable, that's what you are, Killeny Boy, +high-strung but reasonable," he continued to mumble as Kwaque helped to +roll him into his bunk. + +Kwaque returned to his polishing. His lips stammered and halted in the +making of noiseless whispers, as, with corrugated brows of puzzlement, he +addressed the steward: + +"Marster, what name stop 'm along that fella dog?" + +"Killeny Boy, you kinky-head man-eater, Killeny Boy, Killeny Boy," Dag +Daughtry murmured drowsily. "Kwaque, you black blood-drinker, run n' +fetch 'm one fella bottle stop 'm along icey-chestis." + +"No stop 'm, marster," the black quavered, with eyes alert for something +to be thrown at him. "Six fella bottle he finish altogether." + +The steward's sole reply was a snore. + +The black, with the twisted hand of leprosy and with a barely perceptible +infiltration of the same disease thickening the skin of the forehead +between the eyes, bent over his polishing, and ever his lips moved, +repeating over and over, "Killeny Boy." + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +For a number of days Michael saw only Steward and Kwaque. This was +because he was confined to the steward's stateroom. Nobody else knew +that he was on board, and Dag Daughtry, thoroughly aware that he had +stolen a white man's dog, hoped to keep his presence secret and smuggle +him ashore when the _Makambo_ docked in Sydney. + +Quickly the steward learned Michael's pre-eminent teachableness. In the +course of his careful feeding of him, he gave him an occasional chicken +bone. Two lessons, which would scarcely be called lessons, since both of +them occurred within five minutes and each was not over half a minute in +duration, sufficed to teach Michael that only on the floor of the room in +the corner nearest the door could he chew chicken bones. Thereafter, +without prompting, as a matter of course when handed a bone, he carried +it to the corner. + +And why not? He had the wit to grasp what Steward desired of him; he had +the heart that made it a happiness for him to serve. Steward was a god +who was kind, who loved him with voice and lip, who loved him with touch +of hand, rub of nose, or enfolding arm. As all service flourishes in the +soil of love, so with Michael. Had Steward commanded him to forego the +chicken bone after it was in the corner, he would have served him by +foregoing. Which is the way of the dog, the only animal that will +cheerfully and gladly, with leaping body of joy, leave its food uneaten +in order to accompany or to serve its human master. + +Practically all his waking time off duty, Dag Daughtry spent with the +imprisoned Michael, who, at command, had quickly learned to refrain from +whining and barking. And during these hours of companionship Michael +learned many things. Daughtry found that he already understood and +obeyed simple things such as "no," "yes," "get up," and "lie down," and +he improved on them, teaching him, "Go into the bunk and lie down," "Go +under the bunk," "Bring one shoe," "Bring two shoes." And almost without +any work at all, he taught him to roll over, to say his prayers, to play +dead, to sit up and smoke a pipe with a hat on his head, and not merely +to stand up on his hind legs but to walk on them. + +Then, too, was the trick of "no can and can do." Placing a savoury, nose- +tantalising bit of meat or cheese on the edge of the bunk on a level with +Michael's nose, Daughtry would simply say, "No can." Nor would Michael +touch the food till he received the welcome, "Can do." Daughtry, with +the "no can" still in force, would leave the stateroom, and, though he +remained away half an hour or half a dozen hours, on his return he would +find the food untouched and Michael, perhaps, asleep in the corner at the +head of the bunk which had been allotted him for a bed. Early in this +trick once when the steward had left the room and Michael's eager nose +was within an inch of the prohibited morsel, Kwaque, playfully inclined, +reached for the morsel himself and received a lacerated hand from the +quick flash and clip of Michael's jaws. + +None of the tricks that he was ever eager to do for Steward, would +Michael do for Kwaque, despite the fact that Kwaque had no touch of +meanness or viciousness in him. The point was that Michael had been +trained, from his first dawn of consciousness, to differentiate between +black men and white men. Black men were always the servants of white +men--or such had been his experience; and always they were objects of +suspicion, ever bent on wreaking mischief and requiring careful watching. +The cardinal duty of a dog was to serve his white god by keeping a +vigilant eye on all blacks that came about. + +Yet Michael permitted Kwaque to serve him in matters of food, water, and +other offices, at first in the absence of Steward attending to his ship +duties, and, later, at any time. For he realized, without thinking about +it at all, that whatever Kwaque did for him, whatever food Kwaque spread +for him, really proceeded, not from Kwaque, but from Kwaque's master who +was also his master. Yet Kwaque bore no grudge against Michael, and was +himself so interested in his lord's welfare and comfort--this lord who +had saved his life that terrible day on King William Island from the two +grief-stricken pig-owners--that he cherished Michael for his lord's sake. +Seeing the dog growing into his master's affection, Kwaque himself +developed a genuine affection for Michael--much in the same way that he +worshipped anything of the steward's, whether the shoes he polished for +him, the clothes he brushed and cleaned for him, or the six bottles of +beer he put into the ice-chest each day for him. + +In truth, there was nothing of the master-quality in Kwaque, while +Michael was a natural aristocrat. Michael, out of love, would serve +Steward, but Michael lorded it over the kinky-head. Kwaque possessed +overwhelmingly the slave-nature, while in Michael there was little more +of the slave-nature than was found in the North American Indians when the +vain attempt was made to make them into slaves on the plantations of +Cuba. All of which was no personal vice of Kwaque or virtue of Michael. +Michael's heredity, rigidly selected for ages by man, was chiefly +composed of fierceness and faithfulness. And fierceness and +faithfulness, together, invariably produce pride. And pride cannot exist +without honour, nor can honour without poise. + +Michael's crowning achievement, under Daughtry's tutelage, in the first +days in the stateroom, was to learn to count up to five. Many hours of +work were required, however, in spite of his unusual high endowment of +intelligence. For he had to learn, first, the spoken numerals; second, +to see with his eyes and in his brain differentiate between one object, +and all other groups of objects up to and including the group of five; +and, third, in his mind, to relate an object, or any group of objects, +with its numerical name as uttered by Steward. + +In the training Dag Daughtry used balls of paper tied about with twine. +He would toss the five balls under the bunk and tell Michael to fetch +three, and neither two, nor four, but three would Michael bring forth and +deliver into his hand. When Daughtry threw three under the bunk and +demanded four, Michael would deliver the three, search about vainly for +the fourth, then dance pleadingly with bobs of tail and half-leaps about +Steward, and finally leap into the bed and secure the fourth from under +the pillow or among the blankets. + +It was the same with other known objects. Up to five, whether shoes or +shirts or pillow-slips, Michael would fetch the number requested. And +between the mathematical mind of Michael, who counted to five, and the +mind of the ancient black at Tulagi, who counted sticks of tobacco in +units of five, was a distance shorter than that between Michael and Dag +Daughtry who could do multiplication and long division. In the same +manner, up the same ladder of mathematical ability, a still greater +distance separated Dag Daughtry from Captain Duncan, who by mathematics +navigated the _Makambo_. Greatest mathematical distance of all was that +between Captain Duncan's mind and the mind of an astronomer who charted +the heavens and navigated a thousand million miles away among the stars +and who tossed, a mere morsel of his mathematical knowledge, the few +shreds of information to Captain Duncan that enabled him to know from day +to day the place of the _Makambo_ on the sea. + +In one thing only could Kwaque rule Michael. Kwaque possessed a jews' +harp, and, whenever the world of the _Makambo_ and the servitude to the +steward grew wearisome, he could transport himself to King William Island +by thrusting the primitive instrument between his jaws and fanning weird +rhythms from it with his hand, and when he thus crossed space and time, +Michael sang--or howled, rather, though his howl possessed the same soft +mellowness as Jerry's. Michael did not want to howl, but the chemistry +of his being was such that he reacted to music as compulsively as +elements react on one another in the laboratory. + +While he lay perdu in Steward's stateroom, his voice was the one thing +that was not to be heard, so Kwaque was forced to seek the solace of his +jews' harp in the sweltering heat of the gratings over the fire-room. But +this did not continue long, for, either according to blind chance, or to +the lines of fate written in the book of life ere ever the foundations of +the world were laid, Michael was scheduled for an adventure that was +profoundly to affect, not alone his own destiny, but the destinies of +Kwaque and Dag Daughtry and determine the very place of their death and +burial. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +The adventure that was so to alter the future occurred when Michael, in +no uncertain manner, announced to all and sundry his presence on the +_Makambo_. It was due to Kwaque's carelessness, to commence with, for +Kwaque left the stateroom without tight-closing the door. As the +_Makambo_ rolled on an easy sea the door swung back and forth, remaining +wide open for intervals and banging shut but not banging hard enough to +latch itself. + +Michael crossed the high threshold with the innocent intention of +exploring no farther than the immediate vicinity. But scarcely was he +through, when a heavier roll slammed the door and latched it. And +immediately Michael wanted to get back. Obedience was strong in him, for +it was his heart's desire to serve his lord's will, and from the few +days' confinement he sensed, or guessed, or divined, without thinking +about it, that it was Steward's will for him to stay in the stateroom. + +For a long time he sat down before the closed door, regarding it +wistfully but being too wise to bark or speak to such inanimate object. +It had been part of his early puppyhood education to learn that only live +things could be moved by plea or threat, and that while things not alive +did move, as the door had moved, they never moved of themselves, and were +deaf to anything life might have to say to them. Occasionally he trotted +down the short cross-hall upon which the stateroom opened, and gazed up +and down the long hall that ran fore and aft. + +For the better part of an hour he did this, returning always to the door +that would not open. Then he achieved a definite idea. Since the door +would not open, and since Steward and Kwaque did not return, he would go +in search of them. Once with this concept of action clear in his brain, +without timidities of hesitation and irresolution, he trotted aft down +the long hall. Going around the right angle in which it ended, he +encountered a narrow flight of steps. Among many scents, he recognized +those of Kwaque and Steward and knew they had passed that way. + +Up the stairs and on the main deck, he began to meet passengers. Being +white gods, he did not resent their addresses to him, though he did not +linger and went out on the open deck where more of the favoured gods +reclined in steamer-chairs. Still no Kwaque or Steward. Another flight +of narrow, steep stairs invited, and he came out on the boat-deck. Here, +under the wide awnings, were many more of the gods--many times more than +he had that far seen in his life. + +The for'ard end of the boat-deck terminated in the bridge, which, instead +of being raised above it, was part of it. Trotting around the +wheel-house to the shady lee-side of it, he came upon his fate; for be it +known that Captain Duncan possessed on board in addition to two +fox-terriers, a big Persian cat, and that cat possessed a litter of +kittens. Her chosen nursery was the wheel-house, and Captain Duncan had +humoured her, giving her a box for her kittens and threatening the +quartermasters with all manner of dire fates did they so much as step on +one of the kittens. + +But Michael knew nothing of this. And the big Persian knew of his +existence before he did of hers. In fact, the first he knew was when she +launched herself upon him out of the open wheel-house doorway. Even as +he glimpsed this abrupt danger, and before he could know what it was, he +leaped sideways and saved himself. From his point of view, the assault +was unprovoked. He was staring at her with bristling hair, recognizing +her for what she was, a cat, when she sprang again, her tail the size of +a large man's arm, all claws and spitting fury and vindictiveness. + +This was too much for a self-respecting Irish terrier. His wrath was +immediate with her second leap, and he sprang to the side to avoid her +claws, and in from the side to meet her, his jaws clamping together on +her spinal column with a jerk while she was still in mid-air. The next +moment she lay sprawling and struggling on the deck with a broken back. + +But for Michael this was only the beginning. A shrill yelling, rather +than yelping, of more enemies made him whirl half about, but not quick +enough. Struck in flank by two full-grown fox-terriers, he was slashed +and rolled on the deck. The two, by the way, had long before made their +first appearance on the _Makambo_ as little puppies in Dag Daughtry's +coat pockets--Daughtry, in his usual fashion, having appropriated them +ashore in Sydney and sold them to Captain Duncan for a guinea apiece. + +By this time, scrambling to his feet, Michael was really angry. In +truth, it was raining cats and dogs, such belligerent shower all +unprovoked by him who had picked no quarrels nor even been aware of his +enemies until they assailed him. Brave the fox-terriers were, despite +the hysterical rage they were in, and they were upon him as he got his +legs under him. The fangs of one clashed with his, cutting the lips of +both of them, and the lighter dog recoiled from the impact. The other +succeeded in taking Michael in flank, fetching blood and hurt with his +teeth. With an instant curve, that was almost spasmodic, of his body, +Michael flung his flank clear, leaving the other's mouth full of his +hair, and at the same moment drove his teeth through an ear till they +met. The fox-terrier, with a shrill yelp of pain, sprang back so +impetuously as to ribbon its ear as Michael's teeth combed through it. + +The first terrier was back upon him, and he was whirling to meet it, when +a new and equally unprovoked assault was made upon him. This time it was +Captain Duncan, in a rage at sight of his slain cat. The instep of his +foot caught Michael squarely under the chest, half knocking the breath +out of him and wholly lifting him into the air, so that he fell heavily +on his side. The two terriers were upon him, filling their mouths with +his straight, wiry hair as they sank their teeth in. Still on his side, +as he was beginning to struggle to his feet, he clipped his jaws together +on a leg of one, who screamed with pain and retreated on three legs, +holding up the fourth, a fore leg, the bone of which Michael's teeth had +all but crushed. + +Twice Michael slashed the other four-footed foe and then pursued him in a +circle with Captain Duncan pursuing him in turn. Shortening the distance +by leaping across a chord of the arc of the other's flight, Michael +closed his jaws on the back and side of the neck. Such abrupt arrest in +mid-flight by the heavier dog brought the fox-terrier down on deck with, +a heavy thump. Simultaneous with this, Captain Duncan's second kick +landed, communicating such propulsion to Michael as to tear his clenched +teeth through the flesh and out of the flesh of the fox-terrier. + +And Michael turned on the Captain. What if he were a white god? In his +rage at so many assaults of so many enemies, Michael, who had been +peacefully looking for Kwaque and Steward, did not stop to reckon. +Besides, it was a strange white god upon whom he had never before laid +eyes. + +At the beginning he had snarled and growled. But it was a more serious +affair to attack a god, and no sound came from him as he leaped to meet +the leg flying toward him in another kick. As with the cat, he did not +leap straight at it. To the side to avoid, and in with a curve of body +as it passed, was his way. He had learned the trick with many blacks at +Meringe and on board the _Eugenie_, so that as often he succeeded as +failed at it. His teeth came together in the slack of the white duck +trousers. The consequent jerk on Captain Duncan's leg made that +infuriated mariner lose his balance. Almost he fell forward on his face, +part recovered himself with a violent effort, stumbled over Michael who +was in for another bite, tottered wildly around, and sat down on the +deck. + +How long he might have sat there to recover his breath is problematical, +for he rose as rapidly as his stoutness would permit, spurred on by +Michael's teeth already sunk into the fleshy part of his shoulder. +Michael missed his calf as he uprose, but tore the other leg of the +trousers to shreds and received a kick that lifted him a yard above the +deck in a half-somersault and landed him on his back on deck. + +Up to this time the Captain had been on the ferocious offensive, and he +was in the act of following up the kick when Michael regained his feet +and soared up in the air, not for leg or thigh, but for the throat. Too +high it was for him to reach it, but his teeth closed on the flowing +black scarf and tore it to tatters as his weight drew him back to deck. + +It was not this so much that turned Captain Duncan to the pure defensive +and started him retreating backward, as it was the silence of Michael. +Ominous as death it was. There were no snarls nor throat-threats. With +eyes straight-looking and unblinking, he sprang and sprang again. Neither +did he growl when he attacked nor yelp when he was kicked. Fear of the +blow was not in him. As Tom Haggin had so often bragged of Biddy and +Terrence, they bred true in Jerry and Michael in the matter of not +wincing at a blow. Always--they were so made--they sprang to meet the +blow and to encounter the creature who delivered the blow. With a +silence that was invested with the seriousness of death, they were wont +to attack and to continue to attack. + +And so Michael. As the Captain retreated kicking, he attacked, leaping +and slashing. What saved Captain Duncan was a sailor with a deck mop on +the end of a stick. Intervening, he managed to thrust it into Michael's +mouth and shove him away. This first time his teeth closed automatically +upon it. But, spitting it out, he declined thereafter to bite it, +knowing it for what it was, an inanimate thing upon which his teeth could +inflict no hurt. + +Nor, beyond trying to avoid him, was he interested in the sailor. It was +Captain Duncan, leaning his back against the rail, breathing heavily, and +wiping the streaming sweat from his face, who was Michael's meat. Long +as it has taken to tell the battle, beginning with the slaying of the +Persian cat to the thrusting of the mop into Michael's jaws, so swift had +been the rush of events that the passengers, springing from their deck- +chairs and hurrying to the scene, were just arriving when Michael eluded +the mop of the sailor by a successful dodge and plunged in on Captain +Duncan, this time sinking his teeth so savagely into a rotund calf as to +cause its owner to splutter an incoherent curse and howl of wrathful +surprise. + +A fortunate kick hurled Michael away and enabled the sailor to intervene +once again with the mop. And upon the scene came Dag Daughtry, to behold +his captain, frayed and bleeding and breathing apoplectically, Michael +raging in ghastly silence at the end of a mop, and a large Persian mother- +cat writhing with a broken back. + +"Killeny Boy!" the steward cried imperatively. + +Through no matter what indignation and rage that possessed him, his +lord's voice penetrated his consciousness, so that, cooling almost +instantly, Michael's ears flattened, his bristling hair lay down, and his +lips covered his fangs as he turned his head to look acknowledgment. + +"Come here, Killeny!" + +Michael obeyed--not crouching cringingly, but trotting eagerly, gladly, +to Steward's feet. + +"Lie down, Boy." + +He turned half around as he flumped himself down with a sigh of relief, +and, with a red flash of tongue, kissed Steward's foot. + +"Your dog, Steward?" Captain Duncan demanded in a smothered voice wherein +struggled anger and shortness of breath. + +"Yes, sir. My dog. What's he been up to, sir?" + +The totality of what Michael had been up to choked the Captain +completely. He could only gesture around from the dying cat to his torn +clothes and bleeding wounds and the fox-terriers licking their injuries +and whimpering at his feet. + +"It's too bad, sir . . . " Daughtry began. + +"Too bad, hell!" the captain shut him off. "Bo's'n! Throw that dog +overboard." + +"Throw the dog overboard, sir, yes, sir," the boatswain repeated, but +hesitated. + +Dag Daughtry's face hardened unconsciously with the stiffening of his +will to dogged opposition, which, in its own slow quiet way, would go to +any length to have its way. But he answered respectfully enough, his +features, by a shrewd effort, relaxing into a seeming of his customary +good-nature. + +"He's a good dog, sir, and an unoffending dog. I can't imagine what +could a-made 'm break loose this way. He must a-had cause, sir--" + +"He had," one of the passengers, a coconut planter from the Shortlands, +interjected. + +The steward threw him a grateful glance and continued. + +"He's a good dog, sir, a most obedient dog, sir--look at the way he +minded me right in the thick of the scrap an' come 'n' lay down. He's +smart as chain-lightnin', sir; do anything I tell him. I'll make him +make friends. See. . . " + +Stepping over to the two hysterical terriers, Daughtry called Michael to +him. + +"He's all right, savvee, Killeny, he all right," he crooned, at the same +time resting one hand on a terrier and the other on Michael. + +The terrier whimpered and backed solidly against Captain Duncan's legs, +but Michael, with a slow bob of tail and unbelligerent ears, advanced to +him, looked up to Steward to make sure, then sniffed his late antagonist, +and even ran out his tongue in a caress to the side of the other's ear. + +"See, sir, no bad feelings," Daughtry exulted. "He plays the game, sir. +He's a proper dog, he's a man-dog.--Here, Killeny! The other one. He +all right. Kiss and make up. That's the stuff." + +The other fox-terrier, the one with the injured foreleg, endured +Michael's sniff with no more than hysterical growls deep in the throat; +but the flipping out of Michael's tongue was too much. The wounded +terrier exploded in a futile snap at Michael's tongue and nose. + +"He all right, Killeny, he all right, sure," Steward warned quickly. + +With a bob of his tail in token of understanding, without a shade of +resentment, Michael lifted a paw and with a playful casual stroke, dab- +like, brought its weight on the other's neck and rolled him, +head-downward, over on the deck. Though he snarled wrathily, Michael +turned away composedly and looked up into Steward's face for approval. + +A roar of laughter from the passengers greeted the capsizing of the fox- +terrier and the good-natured gravity of Michael. But not alone at this +did they laugh, for at the moment of the snap and the turning over, +Captain Duncan's unstrung nerves had exploded, causing him to jump as he +tensed his whole body. + +"Why, sir," the steward went on with growing confidence, "I bet I can +make him friends with you, too, by this time to-morrow . . . " + +"By this time five minutes he'll be overboard," the captain answered. +"Bo's'n! Over with him!" + +The boatswain advanced a tentative step, while murmurs of protest arose +from the passengers. + +"Look at my cat, and look at me," Captain Duncan defended his action. + +The boatswain made another step, and Dag Daughtry glared a threat at him. + +"Go on!" the Captain commanded. + +"Hold on!" spoke up the Shortlands planter. "Give the dog a square deal. +I saw the whole thing. He wasn't looking for trouble. First the cat +jumped him. She had to jump twice before he turned loose. She'd have +scratched his eyes out. Then the two dogs jumped him. He hadn't +bothered them. Then you jumped him. He hadn't bothered you. And then +came that sailor with the mop. And now you want the bo's'n to jump him +and throw him overboard. Give him a square deal. He's only been +defending himself. What do you expect any dog that is a dog to do?--lie +down and be walked over by every strange dog and cat that comes along? +Play the game, Skipper. You gave him some mighty hard kicks. He only +defended himself." + +"He's some defender," Captain Duncan grinned, with a hint of the return +of his ordinary geniality, at the same time tenderly pressing his +bleeding shoulder and looking woefully down at his tattered duck +trousers. "All right, Steward. If you can make him friends with me in +five minutes, he stays on board. But you'll have to make it up to me +with a new pair of trousers." + +"And gladly, sir, thank you, sir," Daughtry cried. "And I'll make it up +with a new cat as well, sir--Come on, Killeny Boy. This big fella +marster he all right, you bet." + +And Michael listened. Not with the smouldering, smothering, choking +hysteria that still worked in the fox-terriers did he listen, nor with +quivering of muscles and jumps of over-wrought nerves, but coolly, +composedly, as if no battle royal had just taken place and no rips of +teeth and kicks of feet still burned and ached his body. + +He could not help bristling, however, when first he sniffed a trousers' +leg into which his teeth had so recently torn. + +"Put your hand down on him, sir," Daughtry begged. + +And Captain Duncan, his own good self once more, bent and rested a firm, +unhesitating hand on Michael's head. Nay, more; he even caressed the +ears and rubbed about the roots of them. And Michael the merry-hearted, +who fought like a lion and forgave and forgot like a man, laid his neck +hair smoothly down, wagged his stump tail, smiled with his eyes and ears +and mouth, and kissed with his tongue the hand with which a short time +before he had been at war. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +For the rest of the voyage Michael had the run of the ship. Friendly to +all, he reserved his love for Steward alone, though he was not above many +an undignified romp with the fox-terriers. + +"The most playful-minded dog, without being silly, I ever saw," was Dag +Daughtry's verdict to the Shortlands planter, to whom he had just sold +one of his turtle-shell combs. "You see, some dogs never get over the +play-idea, an' they're never good for anything else. But not Killeny +Boy. He can come down to seriousness in a second. I'll show you, and +I'll show you he's got a brain that counts to five an' knows wireless +telegraphy. You just watch." + +At the moment the steward made his faint lip-noise--so faint that he +could not hear it himself and was almost for wondering whether or not he +had made it; so faint that the Shortlands planter did not dream that he +was making it. At that moment Michael was lying squirming on his back a +dozen feet away, his legs straight up in the air, both fox-terriers +worrying with well-stimulated ferociousness. With a quick out-thrust of +his four legs, he rolled over on his side and with questioning eyes and +pricked ears looked and listened. Again Daughtry made the lip-noise; +again the Shortlands planter did not hear nor guess; and Michael bounded +to his feet and to his lord's side. + +"Some dog, eh?" the steward boasted. + +"But how did he know you wanted him?" the planter queried. "You never +called him." + +"Mental telepathy, the affinity of souls pitched in the same whatever-you- +call-it harmony," the steward mystified. "You see, Killeny an' me are +made of the same kind of stuff, only run into different moulds. He might +a-been my full brother, or me his, only for some mistake in the creation +factory somewhere. Now I'll show you he knows his bit of arithmetic." + +And, drawing the paper balls from his pocket, Dag Daughtry demonstrated +to the amazement and satisfaction of the ring of passengers Michael's +ability to count to five. + +"Why, sir," Daughtry concluded the performance, "if I was to order four +glasses of beer in a public-house ashore, an' if I was absent-minded an' +didn't notice the waiter 'd only brought three, Killeny Boy there 'd +raise a row instanter." + +Kwaque was no longer compelled to enjoy his jews' harp on the gratings +over the fire-room, now that Michael's presence on the _Makambo_ was +known, and, in the stateroom, on stolen occasions, he made experiments of +his own with Michael. Once the jews' harp began emitting its barbaric +rhythms, Michael was helpless. He needs must open his mouth and pour +forth an unwilling, gushing howl. But, as with Jerry, it was not mere +howl. It was more akin to a mellow singing; and it was not long before +Kwaque could lead his voice up and down, in rough time and tune, within a +definite register. + +Michael never liked these lessons, for, looking down upon Kwaque, he +hated in any way to be under the black's compulsion. But all this was +changed when Dag Daughtry surprised them at a singing lesson. He +resurrected the harmonica with which it was his wont, ashore in public- +houses, to while away the time between bottles. The quickest way to +start Michael singing, he discovered, was with minors; and, once started, +he would sing on and on for as long as the music played. Also, in the +absence of an instrument, Michael would sing to the prompting and +accompaniment of Steward's voice, who would begin by wailing "kow-kow" +long and sadly, and then branch out on some old song or ballad. Michael +had hated to sing with Kwaque, but he loved to do it with Steward, even +when Steward brought him on deck to perform before the laughter-shrieking +passengers. + +Two serious conversations were held by the steward toward the close of +the voyage: one with Captain Duncan and one with Michael. + +"It's this way, Killeny," Daughtry began, one evening, Michael's head +resting on his lord's knees as he gazed adoringly up into his lord's +face, understanding no whit of what was spoken but loving the intimacy +the sounds betokened. "I stole you for beer money, an' when I saw you +there on the beach that night I knew you'd bring ten quid anywheres. Ten +quid's a horrible lot of money. Fifty dollars in the way the Yankees +reckon it, an' a hundred Mex in China fashion. + +"Now, fifty dollars gold 'd buy beer to beat the band--enough to drown me +if I fell in head first. Yet I want to ask you one question. Can you +see me takin' ten quid for you? . . . Go on. Speak up. Can you?" + +And Michael, with thumps of tail to the floor and a high sharp bark, +showed that he was in entire agreement with whatever had been propounded. + +"Or say twenty quid, now. That's a fair offer. Would I? Eh! Would I? +Not on your life. What d'ye say to fifty quid? That might begin to +interest me, but a hundred quid would interest me more. Why, a hundred +quid all in beer 'd come pretty close to floatin' this old hooker. But +who in Sam Hill'd offer a hundred quid? I'd like to clap eyes on him +once, that's all, just once. D'ye want to know what for? All right. +I'll whisper it. So as I could tell him to go to hell. Sure, Killeny +Boy, just like that--oh, most polite, of course, just a kindly directin' +of his steps where he'd never suffer from frigid extremities." + +Michael's love for Steward was so profound as almost to be a mad but +enduring infatuation. What the steward's regard for Michael was coming +to be was best evidenced by his conversation with Captain Duncan. + +"Sure, sir, he must 've followed me on board," Daughtry finished his +unveracious recital. "An' I never knew it. Last I seen of 'm was on the +beach. Next I seen of 'm there, he was fast asleep in my bunk. Now +how'd he get there, sir? How'd he pick out my room? I leave it to you, +sir. I call it marvellous, just plain marvellous." + +"With a quartermaster at the head of the gangway!" Captain Duncan +snorted. "As if I didn't know your tricks, Steward. There's nothing +marvellous about it. Just a plain case of steal. Followed you on board? +That dog never came over the side. He came through a port-hole, and he +never came through by himself. That nigger of yours, I'll wager, had a +hand in the helping. But let's have done with beating about the bush. +Give me the dog, and I'll say no more about the cat." + +"Seein' you believe what you believe, then you'd be for compoundin' the +felony," Daughtry retorted, the habitual obstinate tightening of his +brows showing which way his will set. "Me, sir, I'm only a ship's +steward, an' it wouldn't mean nothin' at all bein' arrested for +dog-stealin'; but you, sir, a captain of a fine steamer, how'd it sound +for you, sir? No, sir; it'd be much wiser for me to keep the dog that +followed me aboard." + +"I'll give ten pounds in the bargain," the captain proffered. + +"No, it wouldn't do, it wouldn't do at all, sir, an' you a captain," the +steward continued to reiterate, rolling his head sombrely. "Besides, I +know where's a peach of an Angora in Sydney. The owner is gone to the +country an' has no further use of it, an' it'd be a kindness to the cat, +air to give it a good regular home like the _Makambo_." + + + + +CHAPTER VIIII + + +Another trick Dag Daughtry succeeded in teaching Michael so enhanced him +in Captain Duncan's eyes as to impel him to offer fifty pounds, "and +never mind the cat." At first, Daughtry practised the trick in private +with the chief engineer and the Shortlands planter. Not until thoroughly +satisfied did he make a public performance of it. + +"Now just suppose you're policemen, or detectives," Daughtry told the +first and third officers, "an' suppose I'm guilty of some horrible crime. +An' suppose Killeny is the only clue, an' you've got Killeny. When he +recognizes his master--me, of course--you've got your man. You go down +the deck with him, leadin' by the rope. Then you come back this way with +him, makin' believe this is the street, an' when he recognizes me you +arrest me. But if he don't realize me, you can't arrest me. See?" + +The two officers led Michael away, and after several minutes returned +along the deck, Michael stretched out ahead on the taut rope seeking +Steward. + +"What'll you take for the dog?" Daughtry demanded, as they drew near--this +the cue he had trained Michael to know. + +And Michael, straining at the rope, went by, without so much as a wag of +tail to Steward or a glance of eye. The officers stopped before Daughtry +and drew Michael back into the group. + +"He's a lost dog," said the first officer. + +"We're trying to find his owner," supplemented the third. + +"Some dog that--what'll you take for 'm?" Daughtry asked, studying +Michael with critical eyes of interest. "What kind of a temper's he +got?" + +"Try him," was the answer. + +The steward put out his hand to pat him on the head, but withdrew it +hastily as Michael, with bristle and growl, viciously bared his teeth. + +"Go on, go on, he won't hurt you," the delighted passengers urged. + +This time the steward's hand was barely missed by a snap, and he leaped +back as Michael ferociously sprang the length of the rope at him. + +"Take 'm away!" Dag Daughtry roared angrily. "The treacherous beast! I +wouldn't take 'm for gift!" + +And as they obeyed, Michael strained backward in a paroxysm of rage, +making fierce short jumps to the end of the tether as he snarled and +growled with utmost fierceness at the steward. + +"Eh? Who'd say he ever seen me in his life?" Daughtry demanded +triumphantly. "It's a trick I never seen played myself, but I've heard +tell about it. The old-time poachers in England used to do it with their +lurcher dogs. If they did get the dog of a strange poacher, no +gamekeeper or constable could identify 'm by the dog--mum was the word." + +"Tell you what, he knows things, that Killeny. He knows English. Right +now, in my room, with the door open, an' so as he can find 'm, is shoes, +slippers, cap, towel, hair-brush, an' tobacco pouch. What'll it be? Name +it an' he'll fetch it." + +So immediately and variously did the passengers respond that every +article was called for. + +"Just one of you choose," the steward advised. "The rest of you pick 'm +out." + +"Slipper," said Captain Duncan, selected by acclamation. + +"One or both?" Daughtry asked. + +"Both." + +"Come here, Killeny," Daughtry began, bending toward him but leaping back +from the snap of jaws that clipped together close to his nose. + +"My mistake," he apologized. "I ain't told him the other game was over. +Now just listen an, watch. 'n' see if you can catch on to the tip I'm +goin' to give 'm." + +No one saw anything, heard anything, yet Michael, with a whine of +eagerness and joy, with laughing mouth and wriggling body, was upon the +steward, licking his hands madly, squirming and twisting in the embrace +of the loved hands he had so recently threatened, making attempts at +short upward leaps as he flashed his tongue upward toward his lord's +face. For hard it was on Michael, a nerve and mental strain of the +severest for him so to control himself as to play-act anger and threat of +hurt to his beloved Steward. + +"Takes him a little time to get over a thing like that," Daughtry +explained, as he soothed Michael down. + +"Now, Killeny! Go fetch 'm slipper! Wait! Fetch 'm _one_ slipper. +Fetch 'm _two_ slipper." + +Michael looked up with pricked ears, and with eyes filled with query as +all his intelligent consciousness suffused them. + +"_Two_ slipper! Fetch 'm quick!" + +He was off and away in a scurry of speed that seemed to flatten him close +to the deck, and that, as he turned the corner of the deck-house to the +stairs, made his hind feet slip and slide across the smooth planks. + +Almost in a trice he was back, both slippers in his mouth, which he +deposited at the steward's feet. + +"The more I know dogs the more amazin' marvellous they are to me," Dag +Daughtry, after he had compassed his fourth bottle, confided in monologue +to the Shortlands planter that night just before bedtime. "Take Killeny +Boy. He don't do things for me mechanically, just because he's learned +to do 'm. There's more to it. He does 'm because he likes me. I can't +give you the hang of it, but I feel it, I _know_ it. + +"Maybe, this is what I'm drivin' at. Killeny can't talk, as you 'n' me +talk, I mean; so he can't tell me how he loves me, an' he's all love, +every last hair of 'm. An' actions speakin' louder 'n' words, he tells +me how he loves me by doin' these things for me. Tricks? Sure. But +they make human speeches of eloquence cheaper 'n dirt. Sure it's speech. +Dog-talk that's tongue-tied. Don't I know? Sure as I'm a livin' man +born to trouble as the sparks fly upward, just as sure am I that it makes +'m happy to do tricks for me . . . just as it makes a man happy to lend a +hand to a pal in a ticklish place, or a lover happy to put his coat +around the girl he loves to keep her warm. I tell you . . . " + +Here, Dag Daughtry broke down from inability to express the concepts +fluttering in his beer-excited, beer-sodden brain, and, with a stutter or +two, made a fresh start. + +"You know, it's all in the matter of talkin', an' Killeny can't talk. +He's got thoughts inside that head of his--you can see 'm shinin' in his +lovely brown eyes--but he can't get 'em across to me. Why, I see 'm +tryin' to tell me sometimes so hard that he almost busts. There's a big +hole between him an' me, an' language is about the only bridge, and he +can't get over the hole, though he's got all kinds of ideas an' feelings +just like mine. + +"But, say! The time we get closest together is when I play the harmonica +an' he yow-yows. Music comes closest to makin' the bridge. It's a +regular song without words. And . . . I can't explain how . . . but just +the same, when we've finished our song, I know we've passed a lot over to +each other that don't need words for the passin'." + +"Why, d'ye know, when I'm playin' an' he's singin', it's a regular duet +of what the sky-pilots 'd call religion an' knowin' God. Sure, when we +sing together I'm absorbin' religion an' gettin' pretty close up to God. +An' it's big, I tell you. Big as the earth an' ocean an' sky an' all the +stars. I just seem to get hold of a sense that we're all the same stuff +after all--you, me, Killeny Boy, mountains, sand, salt water, worms, +mosquitoes, suns, an' shootin' stars an' blazin comets . . . " + +Day Daughtry left his flight as beyond his own grasp of speech, and +concluded, his half embarrassment masked by braggadocio over Michael: + +"Oh, believe me, they don't make dogs like him every day in the week. +Sure, I stole 'm. He looked good to me. An' if I had it over, knowin' +as I do known 'm now, I'd steal 'm again if I lost a leg doin' it. That's +the kind of a dog _he_ is." + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +The morning the _Makambo_ entered Sydney harbour, Captain Duncan had +another try for Michael. The port doctor's launch was coming alongside, +when he nodded up to Daughtry, who was passing along the deck: + +"Steward, I'll give you twenty pounds." + +"No, sir, thank you, sir," was Dag Daughtry's answer. "I couldn't bear +to part with him." + +"Twenty-five pounds, then. I can't go beyond that. Besides, there are +plenty more Irish terriers in the world." + +"That's what I'm thinkin', sir. An' I'll get one for you. Right here in +Sydney. An' it won't cost you a penny, sir." + +"But I want Killeny Boy," the captain persisted. + +"An' so do I, which is the worst of it, sir. Besides, I got him first." + +"Twenty-five sovereigns is a lot of money . . . for a dog," Captain +Duncan said. + +"An' Killeny Boy's a lot of dog . . . for the money," the steward +retorted. "Why, sir, cuttin' out all sentiment, his tricks is worth more +'n that. Him not recognizing me when I don't want 'm to is worth fifty +pounds of itself. An' there's his countin' an' his singin', an' all the +rest of his tricks. Now, no matter how I got him, he didn't have them +tricks. Them tricks are mine. I taught him them. He ain't the dog he +was when he come on board. He's a whole lot of me now, an' sellin' him +would be like sellin' a piece of myself." + +"Thirty pounds," said the captain with finality. + +"No, sir, thankin' you just the same, sir," was Daughtry's refusal. + +And Captain Duncan was forced to turn away in order to greet the port +doctor coming over the side. + +Scarcely had the _Makambo_ passed quarantine, and while on her way up +harbour to dock, when a trim man-of-war launch darted in to her side and +a trim lieutenant mounted the _Makambo's_ boarding-ladder. His mission +was quickly explained. The _Albatross_, British cruiser of the second +class, of which he was fourth lieutenant, had called in at Tulagi with +dispatches from the High Commissioner of the English South Seas. A scant +twelve hours having intervened between her arrival and the _Makambo's_ +departure, the Commissioner of the Solomons and Captain Kellar had been +of the opinion that the missing dog had been carried away on the steamer. +Knowing that the _Albatross_ would beat her to Sydney, the captain of the +_Albatross_ had undertaken to look up the dog. Was the dog, an Irish +terrier answering to the name of Michael, on board? + +Captain Duncan truthfully admitted that it was, though he most +unveraciously shielded Dag Daughtry by repeating his yarn of the dog +coming on board of itself. How to return the dog to Captain Kellar?--was +the next question; for the _Albatross_ was bound on to New Zealand. +Captain Duncan settled the matter. + +"The _Makambo_ will be back in Tulagi in eight weeks," he told the +lieutenant, "and I'll undertake personally to deliver the dog to its +owner. In the meantime we'll take good care of it. Our steward has sort +of adopted it, so it will be in good hands." + +* * * * * + +"Seems we don't either of us get the dog," Daughtry commented resignedly, +when Captain Duncan had explained the situation. + +But when Daughtry turned his back and started off along the deck, his +constitutional obstinacy tightened his brows so that the Shortlands +planter, observing it, wondered what the captain had been rowing him +about. + +* * * * * + +Despite his six quarts a day and all his easy-goingness of disposition, +Dag Daughtry possessed certain integrities. Though he could steal a dog, +or a cat, without a twinge of conscience, he could not but be faithful to +his salt, being so made. He could not draw wages for being a ship +steward without faithfully performing the functions of ship steward. +Though his mind was firmly made up, during the several days of the +_Makambo_ in Sydney, lying alongside the Burns Philp Dock, he saw to +every detail of the cleaning up after the last crowd of outgoing +passengers, and to every detail of preparation for the next crowd of +incoming passengers who had tickets bought for the passage far away to +the coral seas and the cannibal isles. + +In the midst of this devotion to his duty, he took a night off and part +of two afternoons. The night off was devoted to the public-houses which +sailors frequent, and where can be learned the latest gossip and news of +ships and of men who sail upon the sea. Such information did he gather, +over many bottles of beer, that the next afternoon, hiring a small launch +at a cost of ten shillings, he journeyed up the harbour to Jackson Bay, +where lay the lofty-poled, sweet-lined, three-topmast American schooner, +the _Mary Turner_. + +Once on board, explaining his errand, he was taken below into the main +cabin, where he interviewed, and was interviewed by, a quartette of men +whom Daughtry qualified to himself as "a rum bunch." + +It was because he had talked long with the steward who had left the ship, +that Dag Daughtry recognized and identified each of the four men. That, +surely, was the "Ancient Mariner," sitting back and apart with washed +eyes of such palest blue that they seemed a faded white. Long thin wisps +of silvery, unkempt hair framed his face like an aureole. He was slender +to emaciation, cavernously checked, roll after roll of skin, no longer +encasing flesh or muscle, hanging grotesquely down his neck and swathing +the Adam's apple so that only occasionally, with queer swallowing +motions, did it peep out of the mummy-wrappings of skin and sink back +again from view. + +A proper ancient mariner, thought Daughtry. Might be seventy-five, might +just as well be a hundred and five, or a hundred and seventy-five. + +Beginning at the right temple, a ghastly scar split the cheek-bone, sank +into the depths of the hollow cheek, notched across the lower jaw, and +plunged to disappearance among the prodigious skin-folds of the neck. The +withered lobes of both ears were perforated by tiny gypsy-like circles of +gold. On the skeleton fingers of his right hand were no less than five +rings--not men's rings, nor women's, but foppish rings--"that would fetch +a price," Daughtry adjudged. On the left hand were no rings, for there +were no fingers to wear them. Only was there a thumb; and, for that +matter, most of the hand was missing as well, as if it had been cut off +by the same slicing edge that had cleaved him from temple to jaw and +heaven alone knew how far down that skin-draped neck. + +The Ancient Mariner's washed eyes seemed to bore right through Daughtry +(or at least so Daughtry felt), and rendered him so uncomfortable as to +make him casually step to the side for the matter of a yard. This was +possible, because, a servant seeking a servant's billet, he was expected +to stand and face the four seated ones as if they were judges on the +bench and he the felon in the dock. Nevertheless, the gaze of the +ancient one pursued him, until, studying it more closely, he decided that +it did not reach to him at all. He got the impression that those washed +pale eyes were filmed with dreams, and that the intelligence, the +_thing_, that dwelt within the skull, fluttered and beat against the +dream-films and no farther. + +"How much would you expect?" the captain was asking,--a most unsealike +captain, in Daughtry's opinion; rather, a spick-and-span, brisk little +business-man or floor-walker just out of a bandbox. + +"He shall not share," spoke up another of the four, huge, raw-boned, +middle-aged, whom Daughtry identified by his ham-like hands as the +California wheat-farmer described by the departed steward. + +"Plenty for all," the Ancient Mariner startled Daughtry by cackling +shrilly. "Oodles and oodles of it, my gentlemen, in cask and chest, in +cask and chest, a fathom under the sand." + +"Share--_what_, sir?" Daughtry queried, though well he knew, the other +steward having cursed to him the day he sailed from San Francisco on a +blind lay instead of straight wages. "Not that it matters, sir," he +hastened to add. "I spent a whalin' voyage once, three years of it, an' +paid off with a dollar. Wages for mine, an' sixty gold a month, seein' +there's only four of you." + +"And a mate," the captain added. + +"And a mate," Daughtry repeated. "Very good, sir. An' no share." + +"But yourself?" spoke up the fourth man, a huge-bulking, colossal-bodied, +greasy-seeming grossness of flesh--the Armenian Jew and San Francisco +pawnbroker the previous steward had warned Daughtry about. "Have you +papers--letters of recommendation, the documents you receive when you are +paid off before the shipping commissioners?" + +"I might ask, sir," Dag Daughtry brazened it, "for your own papers. This +ain't no regular cargo-carrier or passenger-carrier, no more than you +gentlemen are a regular company of ship-owners, with regular offices, +doin' business in a regular way. How do I know if you own the ship even, +or that the charter ain't busted long ago, or that you're being libelled +ashore right now, or that you won't dump me on any old beach anywheres +without a soo-markee of what's comin' to me? Howsoever"--he anticipated +by a bluff of his own the show of wrath from the Jew that he knew would +be wind and bluff--"howsoever, here's my papers . . . " + +With a swift dip of his hand into his inside coat-pocket he scattered out +in a wealth of profusion on the cabin table all the papers, sealed and +stamped, that he had collected in forty-five years of voyaging, the +latest date of which was five years back. + +"I don't ask your papers," he went on. "What I ask is, cash payment in +full the first of each month, sixty dollars a month gold--" + +"Oodles and oodles of it, gold and gold and better than gold, in cask and +chest, in cask and chest, a fathom under the sand," the Ancient Mariner +assured him in beneficent cackles. "Kings, principalities and +powers!--all of us, the least of us. And plenty more, my gentlemen, +plenty more. The latitude and longitude are mine, and the bearings from +the oak ribs on the shoal to Lion's Head, and the cross-bearings from the +points unnamable, I only know. I only still live of all that brave, mad, +scallywag ship's company . . . " + +"Will you sign the articles to that?" the Jew demanded, cutting in on the +ancient's maunderings. + +"What port do you wind up the cruise in?" Daughtry asked. + +"San Francisco." + +"I'll sign the articles that I'm to sign off in San Francisco then." + +The Jew, the captain, and the farmer nodded. + +"But there's several other things to be agreed upon," Daughtry continued. +"In the first place, I want my six quarts a day. I'm used to it, and I'm +too old a stager to change my habits." + +"Of spirits, I suppose?" the Jew asked sarcastically. + +"No; of beer, good English beer. It must be understood beforehand, no +matter what long stretches we may be at sea, that a sufficient supply is +taken along." + +"Anything else?" the captain queried. + +"Yes, sir," Daughtry answered. "I got a dog that must come along." + +"Anything else?--a wife or family maybe?" the farmer asked. + +"No wife or family, sir. But I got a nigger, a perfectly good nigger, +that's got to come along. He can sign on for ten dollars a month if he +works for the ship all his time. But if he works for me all the time, +I'll let him sign on for two an' a half a month." + +"Eighteen days in the longboat," the Ancient Mariner shrilled, to +Daughtry's startlement. "Eighteen days in the longboat, eighteen days of +scorching hell." + +"My word," quoth Daughtry, "the old gentleman'd give one the jumps. +There'll sure have to be plenty of beer." + +"Sea stewards put on some style, I must say," commented the wheat-farmer, +oblivious to the Ancient Mariner, who still declaimed of the heat of the +longboat. + +"Suppose we don't see our way to signing on a steward who travels in such +style?" the Jew asked, mopping the inside of his collar-band with a +coloured silk handkerchief. + +"Then you'll never know what a good steward you've missed, sir," Daughtry +responded airily. + +"I guess there's plenty more stewards on Sydney beach," the captain said +briskly. "And I guess I haven't forgotten old days, when I hired them +like so much dirt, yes, by Jinks, so much dirt, there were so many of +them." + +"Thank you, Mr. Steward, for looking us up," the Jew took up the idea +with insulting oiliness. "We very much regret our inability to meet your +wishes in the matter--" + +"And I saw it go under the sand, a fathom under the sand, on +cross-bearings unnamable, where the mangroves fade away, and the coconuts +grow, and the rise of land lifts from the beach to the Lion's Head." + +"Hold your horses," the wheat-farmer said, with a flare of irritation, +directed, not at the Ancient Mariner, but at the captain and the Jew. +"Who's putting up for this expedition? Don't I get no say so? Ain't my +opinion ever to be asked? I like this steward. Strikes me he's the real +goods. I notice he's as polite as all get-out, and I can see he can take +an order without arguing. And he ain't no fool by a long shot." + +"That's the very point, Grimshaw," the Jew answered soothingly. +"Considering the unusualness of our . . . of the expedition, we'd be +better served by a steward who is more of a fool. Another point, which +I'd esteem a real favour from you, is not to forget that you haven't put +a red copper more into this trip than I have--" + +"And where'd either of you be, if it wasn't for me with my knowledge of +the sea?" the captain demanded aggrievedly. "To say nothing of the +mortgage on my house and on the nicest little best paying flat building +in San Francisco since the earthquake." + +"But who's still putting up?--all of you, I ask you." The wheat-farmer +leaned forward, resting the heels of his hands on his knees so that the +fingers hung down his long shins, in Daughtry's appraisal, half-way to +his feet. "You, Captain Doane, can't raise another penny on your +properties. My land still grows the wheat that brings the ready. You, +Simon Nishikanta, won't put up another penny--yet your loan-shark offices +are doing business at the same old stands at God knows what per cent. to +drunken sailors. And you hang the expedition up here in this hole-in-the- +wall waiting for my agent to cable more wheat-money. Well, I guess we'll +just sign on this steward at sixty a month and all he asks, or I'll just +naturally quit you cold on the next fast steamer to San Francisco." + +He stood up abruptly, towering to such height that Daughtry looked to see +the crown of his head collide with the deck above. + +"I'm sick and tired of you all, yes, I am," he continued. "Get busy! +Well, let's get busy. My money's coming. It'll be here by to-morrow. +Let's be ready to start by hiring a steward that is a steward. I don't +care if he brings two families along." + +"I guess you're right, Grimshaw," Simon Nishikanta said appeasingly. "The +trip is beginning to get on all our nerves. Forget it if I fly off the +handle. Of course we'll take this steward if you want him. I thought he +was too stylish for you." + +He turned to Daughtry. + +"Naturally, the least said ashore about us the better." + +"That's all right, sir. I can keep my mouth shut, though I might as well +tell you there's some pretty tales about you drifting around the beach +right now." + +"The object of our expedition?" the Jew queried quickly. + +Daughtry nodded. + +"Is that why you want to come?" was demanded equally quickly. + +Daughtry shook his head. + +"As long as you give me my beer each day, sir, I ain't goin' to be +interested in your treasure-huntin'. It ain't no new tale to me. The +South Seas is populous with treasure-hunters--" Almost could Daughtry +have sworn that he had seen a flash of anxiety break through the dream- +films that bleared the Ancient Mariner's eyes. "And I must say, sir," he +went on easily, though saying what he would not have said had it not been +for what he was almost certain he sensed of the ancient's anxiousness, +"that the South Seas is just naturally lousy with buried treasure. +There's Keeling-Cocos, millions 'n' millions of it, pounds sterling, I +mean, waiting for the lucky one with the right steer." + +This time Daughtry could have sworn to having sensed a change toward +relief in the Ancient Mariner, whose eyes were again filmy with dreams. + +"But I ain't interested in treasure, sir," Daughtry concluded. "It's +beer I'm interested in. You can chase your treasure, an' I don't care +how long, just as long as I've got six quarts to open each day. But I +give you fair warning, sir, before I sign on: if the beer dries up, I'm +goin' to get interested in what you're after. Fair play is my motto." + +"Do you expect us to pay for your beer in addition?" Simon Nishikanta +demanded. + +To Daughtry it was too good to be true. Here, with the Jew healing the +breach with the wheat-farmer whose agents still cabled money, was the +time to take advantage. + +"Sure, it's one of our agreements, sir. What time would it suit you, +sir, to-morrow afternoon, for me to sign on at the shipping +commissioner's?" + +"Casks and chests of it, casks and chests of it, oodles and oodles, a +fathom under the sand," chattered the Ancient Mariner. + +"You're all touched up under the roof," Daughtry grinned. "Which ain't +got nothing to do with me as long as you furnish the beer, pay me due an' +proper what's comin' to me the first of each an' every month, an' pay me +off final in San Francisco. As long as you keep up your end, I'll sail +with you to the Pit 'n' back an' watch you sweatin' the casks 'n' chests +out of the sand. What I want is to sail with you if you want me to sail +with you enough to satisfy me." + +Simon Nishikanta glanced about. Grimshaw and Captain Doane nodded. + +"At three o'clock to-morrow afternoon, at the shipping commissioner's," +the Jew agreed. "When will you report for duty?" + +"When will you sail, sir?" Daughtry countered. + +"Bright and early next morning." + +"Then I'll be on board and on duty some time to-morrow night, sir." + +And as he went up the cabin companion, he could hear the Ancient Mariner +maundering: "Eighteen days in the longboat, eighteen days of scorching +hell . . . " + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +Michael left the _Makambo_ as he had come on board, through a port-hole. +Likewise, the affair occurred at night, and it was Kwaque's hands that +received him. It had been quick work, and daring, in the dark of early +evening. From the boat-deck, with a bowline under Kwaque's arms and a +turn of the rope around a pin, Dag Daughtry had lowered his leprous +servitor into the waiting launch. + +On his way below, he encountered Captain Duncan, who saw fit to warn him: + +"No shannigan with Killeny Boy, Steward. He must go back to Tulagi with +us." + +"Yes, sir," the steward agreed. "An' I'm keepin' him tight in my room to +make safe. Want to see him, sir?" + +The very frankness of the invitation made the captain suspicious, and the +thought flashed through his mind that perhaps Killeny Boy was already +hidden ashore somewhere by the dog-stealing steward. + +"Yes, indeed I'd like to say how-do-you-do to him," Captain Duncan +answered. + +And his was genuine surprise, on entering the steward's room, to behold +Michael just rousing from his curled-up sleep on the floor. But when he +left, his surprise would have been shocking could he have seen through +the closed door what immediately began to take place. Out through the +open port-hole, in a steady stream, Daughtry was passing the contents of +the room. Everything went that belonged to him, including the turtle- +shell and the photographs and calendars on the wall. Michael, with the +command of silence laid upon him, went last. Remained only a sea-chest +and two suit-cases, themselves too large for the port-hole but bare of +contents. + +When Daughtry sauntered along the main deck a few minutes later and +paused for a gossip with the customs officer and a quartermaster at the +head of the gang-plank, Captain Duncan little dreamed that his casual +glance was resting on his steward for the last time. He watched him go +down the gang-plank empty-handed, with no dog at his heels, and stroll +off along the wharf under the electric lights. + +Ten minutes after Captain Duncan saw the last of his broad back, +Daughtry, in the launch with his belongings and heading for Jackson Bay, +was hunched over Michael and caressing him, while Kwaque, crooning with +joy under his breath that he was with all that was precious to him in the +world, felt once again in the side-pocket of his flimsy coat to make sure +that his beloved jews' harp had not been left behind. + +Dag Daughtry was paying for Michael, and paying well. Among other +things, he had not cared to arouse suspicion by drawing his wages from +Burns Philp. The twenty pounds due him he had abandoned, and this was +the very sum, that night on the beach at Tulagi, he had decided he could +realize from the sale of Michael. He had stolen him to sell. He was +paying for him the sales price that had tempted him. + +For, as one has well said: the horse abases the base, ennobles the noble. +Likewise the dog. The theft of a dog to sell for a price had been the +abasement worked by Michael on Dag Daughtry. To pay the price out of +sheer heart-love that could recognize no price too great to pay, had been +the ennoblement of Dag Daughtry which Michael had worked. And as the +launch chug-chugged across the quiet harbour under the southern stars, +Dag Daughtry would have risked and tossed his life into the bargain in a +battle to continue to have and to hold the dog he had originally +conceived of as being interchangeable for so many dozens of beer. + +* * * * * + +The _Mary Turner_, towed out by a tug, sailed shortly after daybreak, and +Daughtry, Kwaque, and Michael looked their last for ever on Sydney +Harbour. + +"Once again these old eyes have seen this fair haven," the Ancient +Mariner, beside them gazing, babbled; and Daughtry could not help but +notice the way the wheat-farmer and the pawnbroker pricked their ears to +listen and glanced each to the other with scant eyes. "It was in '52, in +1852, on such a day as this, all drinking and singing along the decks, we +cleared from Sydney in the _Wide Awake_. A pretty craft, oh sirs, a most +clever and pretty craft. A crew, a brave crew, all youngsters, all of +us, fore and aft, no man was forty, a mad, gay crew. The captain was an +elderly gentleman of twenty-eight, the third officer another of eighteen, +the down, untouched of steel, like so much young velvet on his cheek. He, +too, died in the longboat. And the captain gasped out his last under the +palm trees of the isle unnamable while the brown maidens wept about him +and fanned the air to his parching lungs." + +Dag Daughtry heard no more, for he turned below to take up his new +routine of duty. But while he made up bunks with fresh linen and +directed Kwaque's efforts to cleaning long-neglected floors, he shook his +head to himself and muttered, "He's a keen 'un. He's a keen 'un. All +ain't fools that look it." + +The fine lines of the _Mary Turner_ were explained by the fact that she +had been built for seal-hunting; and for the same reason on board of her +was room and to spare. The forecastle with bunk-space for twelve, bedded +but eight Scandinavian seamen. The five staterooms of the cabin +accommodated the three treasure-hunters, the Ancient Mariner, and the +mate--the latter a large-bodied, gentle-souled Russian-Finn, known as Mr. +Jackson through inability of his shipmates to pronounce the name he had +signed on the ship's articles. + +Remained the steerage, just for'ard of the cabin, separated from it by a +stout bulkhead and entered by a companionway on the main deck. On this +deck, between the break of the poop and the steerage companion, stood the +galley. In the steerage itself, which possessed a far larger +living-space than the cabin, were six capacious bunks, each double the +width of the forecastle bunks, and each curtained and with no bunk above +it. + +"Some fella glory-hole, eh, Kwaque?" Daughtry told his seventeen-years- +old brown-skinned Papuan with the withered ancient face of a centenarian, +the legs of a living skeleton, and the huge-stomached torso of an elderly +Japanese wrestler. "Eh, Kwaque! What you fella think?" + +And Kwaque, too awed by the spaciousness to speak, eloquently rolled his +eyes in agreement. + +"You likee this piecee bunk?" the cook, a little old Chinaman, asked the +steward with eager humility, inviting the white man's acceptance of his +own bunk with a wave of arm. + +Daughtry shook his head. He had early learned that it was wise to get +along well with sea-cooks, since sea-cocks were notoriously given to +going suddenly lunatic and slicing and hacking up their shipmates with +butcher knives and meat cleavers on the slightest remembered provocation. +Besides, there was an equally good bunk all the way across the width of +the steerage from the Chinaman's. The bunk next on the port side to the +cook's and abaft of it Daughtry allotted to Kwaque. Thus he retained for +himself and Michael the entire starboard side with its three bunks. The +next one abaft of his own he named "Killeny Boy's," and called on Kwaque +and the cook to take notice. Daughtry had a sense that the cook, whose +name had been quickly volunteered as Ah Moy, was not entirely satisfied +with the arrangement; but it affected him no more than a momentary +curiosity about a Chinaman who drew the line at a dog taking a bunk in +the same apartment with him. + +Half an hour later, returning, from setting the cabin aright, to the +steerage for Kwaque to serve him with a bottle of beer, Daughtry observed +that Ah Moy had moved his entire bunk belongings across the steerage to +the third bunk on the starboard side. This had put him with Daughtry and +Michael and left Kwaque with half the steerage to himself. Daughtry's +curiosity recrudesced. + +"What name along that fella Chink?" he demanded of Kwaque. "He no like +'m you fella boy stop 'm along same fella side along him. What for? My +word! What name? That fella Chink make 'm me cross along him too much!" + +"Suppose 'm that fella Chink maybe he think 'm me kai-kai along him," +Kwaque grinned in one of his rare jokes. + +"All right," the steward concluded. "We find out. You move 'm along my +bunk, I move 'm along that fella Chink's bunk." + +This accomplished, so that Kwaque, Michael, and Ah Moy occupied the +starboard side and Daughtry alone bunked on the port side, he went on +deck and aft to his duties. On his next return he found Ah Moy had +transferred back to the port side, but this time into the last bunk aft. + +"Seems the beggar's taken a fancy to me," the steward smiled to himself. + +Nor was he capable of guessing Ah Moy's reason for bunking always on the +opposite side from Kwaque. + +"I changee," the little old cook explained, with anxious eyes to please +and placate, in response to Daughtry's direct question. "All the time +like that, changee, plentee changee. You savvee?" + +Daughtry did not savvee, and shook his head, while Ah Moy's slant eyes +betrayed none of the anxiety and fear with which he privily gazed on +Kwaque's two permanently bent fingers of the left hand and on Kwaque's +forehead, between the eyes, where the skin appeared a shade darker, a +trifle thicker, and was marked by the first beginning of three short +vertical lines or creases that were already giving him the lion-like +appearance, the leonine face so named by the experts and technicians of +the fell disease. + +As the days passed, the steward took facetious occasions, when he had +drunk five quarts of his daily allowance, to shift his and Kwaque's bunks +about. And invariably Ah Moy shifted, though Daughtry failed to notice +that he never shifted into a bunk which Kwaque had occupied. Nor did he +notice that it was when the time came that Kwaque had variously occupied +all the six bunks that Ah Moy made himself a canvas hammock, suspended it +from the deck beams above and thereafter swung clear in space and +unmolested. + +Daughtry dismissed the matter from his thoughts as no more than a thing +in keeping with the general inscrutability of the Chinese mind. He did +notice, however, that Kwaque was never permitted to enter the galley. +Another thing he noticed, which, expressed in his own words, was: "That's +the all-dangdest cleanest Chink I've ever clapped my lamps on. Clean in +galley, clean in steerage, clean in everything. He's always washing the +dishes in boiling water, when he isn't washing himself or his clothes or +bedding. My word, he actually boils his blankets once a week!" + +For there were other things to occupy the steward's mind. Getting +acquainted with the five men aft in the cabin, and lining up the whole +situation and the relations of each of the five to that situation and to +one another, consumed much time. Then there was the path of the _Mary +Turner_ across the sea. No old sailor breathes who does not desire to +know the casual course of his ship and the next port-of-call. + +"We ought to be moving along a line that'll cross somewhere northard of +New Zealand," Daughtry guessed to himself, after a hundred stolen glances +into the binnacle. But that was all the information concerning the +ship's navigation he could steal; for Captain Doane took the observations +and worked them out, to the exclusion of the mate, and Captain Doane +always methodically locked up his chart and log. That there were heated +discussions in the cabin, in which terms of latitude and longitude were +bandied back and forth, Daughtry did know; but more than that he could +not know, because it was early impressed upon him that the one place for +him never to be, at such times of council, was the cabin. Also, he could +not but conclude that these councils were real battles wherein Messrs. +Doane, Nishikanta, and Grimahaw screamed at each other and pounded the +table at each other, when they were not patiently and most politely +interrogating the Ancient Mariner. + +"He's got their goat," the steward early concluded to himself; but, +thereafter, try as he would, he failed to get the Ancient Mariner's goat. + +Charles Stough Greenleaf was the Ancient Mariner's name. This, Daughtry +got from him, and nothing else did he get save maunderings and ravings +about the heat of the longboat and the treasure a fathom deep under the +sand. + +"There's some of us plays games, an' some of us as looks on an' admires +the games they see," the steward made his bid one day. "And I'm sure +these days lookin' on at a pretty game. The more I see it the more I got +to admire." + +The Ancient Mariner dreamed back into the steward's eyes with a blank, +unseeing gaze. + +"On the _Wide Awake_ all the stewards were young, mere boys," he +murmured. + +"Yes, sir," Daughtry agreed pleasantly. "From all you say, the _Wide +Awake_, with all its youngsters, was sure some craft. Not like the crowd +of old 'uns on this here hooker. But I doubt, sir, that them youngsters +ever played as clever games as is being played aboard us right now. I +just got to admire the fine way it's being done, sir." + +"I'll tell you something," the Ancient Mariner replied, with such +confidential air that almost Daughtry leaned to hear. "No steward on the +_Wide Awake_ could mix a highball in just the way I like, as well as you. +We didn't know cocktails in those days, but we had sherry and bitters. A +good appetizer, too, a most excellent appetizer." + +"I'll tell you something more," he continued, just as it seemed he had +finished, and just in time to interrupt Daughtry away from his third +attempt to ferret out the true inwardness of the situation on the _Mary +Turner_ and of the Ancient Mariner's part in it. "It is mighty nigh five +bells, and I should be very pleased to have one of your delicious +cocktails ere I go down to dine." + +More suspicious than ever of him was Daughtry after this episode. But, +as the days went by, he came more and more to the conclusion that Charles +Stough Greenleaf was a senile old man who sincerely believed in the +abiding of a buried treasure somewhere in the South Seas. + +Once, polishing the brass-work on the hand-rails of the cabin +companionway, Daughtry overheard the ancient one explaining his terrible +scar and missing fingers to Grimshaw and the Armenian Jew. The pair of +them had plied him with extra drinks in the hope of getting more out of +him by way of his loosened tongue. + +"It was in the longboat," the aged voice cackled up the companion. "On +the eleventh day it was that the mutiny broke. We in the sternsheets +stood together against them. It was all a madness. We were starved +sore, but we were mad for water. It was over the water it began. For, +see you, it was our custom to lick the dew from the oar-blades, the +gunwales, the thwarts, and the inside planking. And each man of us had +developed property in the dew-collecting surfaces. Thus, the tiller and +the rudder-head and half of the plank of the starboard stern-sheet had +become the property of the second officer. No one of us lacked the +honour to respect his property. The third officer was a lad, only +eighteen, a brave and charming boy. He shared with the second officer +the starboard stern-sheet plank. They drew a line to mark the division, +and neither, lapping up what scant moisture fell during the night-hours, +ever dreamed of trespassing across the line. They were too honourable. + +"But the sailors--no. They squabbled amongst themselves over the dew- +surfaces, and only the night before one of them was knifed because he so +stole. But on this night, waiting for the dew, a little of it, to become +more, on the surfaces that were mine, I heard the noises of a dew-lapper +moving aft along the port-gunwale--which was my property aft of the +stroke-thwart clear to the stern. I emerged from a nightmare dream of +crystal springs and swollen rivers to listen to this night-drinker that I +feared might encroach upon what was mine. + +"Nearer he came to the line of my property, and I could hear him making +little moaning, whimpering noises as he licked the damp wood. It was +like listening to an animal grazing pasture-grass at night and ever +grazing nearer. + +"It chanced I was holding a boat-stretcher in my hand--to catch what +little dew might fall upon it. I did not know who it was, but when he +lapped across the line and moaned and whimpered as he licked up my +precious drops of dew, I struck out. The boat-stretcher caught him +fairly on the nose--it was the bo's'n--and the mutiny began. It was the +bo's'n's knife that sliced down my face and sliced away my fingers. The +third officer, the eighteen-year-old lad, fought well beside me, and +saved me, so that, just before I fainted, he and I, between us, hove the +bo's'n's carcass overside." + +A shifting of feet and changing of positions of those in the cabin +plunged Daughtry back into his polishing, which he had for the time +forgotten. And, as he rubbed the brass-work, he told himself under his +breath: "The old party's sure been through the mill. Such things just +got to happen." + +"No," the Ancient Mariner was continuing, in his thin falsetto, in reply +to a query. "It wasn't the wounds that made me faint. It was the +exertion I made in the struggle. I was too weak. No; so little moisture +was there in my system that I didn't bleed much. And the amazing thing, +under the circumstances, was the quickness with which I healed. The +second officer sewed me up next day with a needle he'd made out of an +ivory toothpick and with twine he twisted out of the threads from a +frayed tarpaulin." + +"Might I ask, Mr. Greenleaf, if there were rings at the time on the +fingers that were cut off?" Daughtry heard Simon Nishikanta ask. + +"Yes, and one beauty. I found it afterward in the boat bottom and +presented it to the sandalwood trader who rescued me. It was a large +diamond. I paid one hundred and eighty guineas for it to an English +sailor in the Barbadoes. He'd stolen it, and of course it was worth +more. It was a beautiful gem. The sandalwood man did not merely save my +life for it. In addition, he spent fully a hundred pounds in outfitting +me and buying me a passage from Thursday Island to Shanghai." + +* * * * * + +"There's no getting away from them rings he wears," Daughtry overheard +Simon Nishikanta that evening telling Grimshaw in the dark on the weather +poop. "You don't see that kind nowadays. They're old, real old. They're +not men's rings so much as what you'd call, in the old-fashioned days, +gentlemen's rings. Real gentlemen, I mean, grand gentlemen, wore rings +like them. I wish collateral like them came into my loan offices these +days. They're worth big money." + +* * * * * + +"I just want to tell you, Killeny Boy, that maybe I'll be wishin' before +the voyage is over that I'd gone on a lay of the treasure instead of +straight wages," Dag Daughtry confided to Michael that night at turning- +in time as Kwaque removed his shoes and as he paused midway in the +draining of his sixth bottle. "Take it from me, Killeny, that old +gentleman knows what he's talkin' about, an' has been some hummer in his +days. Men don't lose the fingers off their hands and get their faces +chopped open just for nothing--nor sport rings that makes a Jew +pawnbroker's mouth water." + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +Before the voyage of the _Mary Turner_ came to an end, Dag Daughtry, +sitting down between the rows of water-casks in the main-hold, with a +great laugh rechristened the schooner "the Ship of Fools." But that was +some weeks after. In the meantime he so fulfilled his duties that not +even Captain Doane could conjure a shadow of complaint. + +Especially did the steward attend upon the Ancient Mariner, for whom he +had come to conceive a strong admiration, if not affection. The old +fellow was different from his cabin-mates. They were money-lovers; +everything in them had narrowed down to the pursuit of dollars. Daughtry, +himself moulded on generously careless lines, could not but appreciate +the spaciousness of the Ancient Mariner, who had evidently lived +spaciously and who was ever for sharing the treasure they sought. + +"You'll get your whack, steward, if it comes out of my share," he +frequently assured Daughtry at times of special kindness on the latter's +part. "There's oodles of it, and oodles of it, and, without kith or kin, +I have so little time longer to live that I shall not need it much or +much of it." + +And so the Ship of Fools sailed on, all aft fooling and befouling, from +the guileless-eyed, gentle-souled Finnish mate, who, with the scent of +treasure pungent in his nostrils, with a duplicate key stole the ship's +daily position from Captain Doane's locked desk, to Ah Moy, the cook, who +kept Kwaque at a distance and never whispered warning to the others of +the risk they ran from continual contact with the carrier of the terrible +disease. + +Kwaque himself had neither thought nor worry of the matter. He knew the +thing as a thing that occasionally happened to human creatures. It +bothered him, from the pain standpoint, scarcely at all, and it never +entered his kinky head that his master did not know about it. For the +same reason he never suspected why Ah Moy kept him so at a distance. Nor +had Kwaque other worries. His god, over all gods of sea and jungle, he +worshipped, and, himself ever intimately allowed in the presence, +paradise was wherever he and his god, the steward, might be. + +And so Michael. Much in the same way that Kwaque loved and worshipped +did he love and worship the six-quart man. To Michael and Kwaque, the +daily, even hourly, recognition and consideration of Dag Daughtry was +tantamount to resting continuously in the bosom of Abraham. The god of +Messrs. Doane, Nishikanta, and Grimshaw was a graven god whose name was +Gold. The god of Kwaque and Michael was a living god, whose voice could +be always heard, whose arms could be always warm, the pulse of whose +heart could be always felt throbbing in a myriad acts and touches. + +No greater joy was Michael's than to sit by the hour with Steward and +sing with him all songs and tunes he sang or hummed. With a quantity or +pitch even more of genius or unusualness in him than in Jerry, Michael +learned more quickly, and since the way of his education was singing, he +came to sing far beyond the best Villa Kennan ever taught Jerry. + +Michael could howl, or sing, rather (because his howling was so mellow +and so controlled), any air that was not beyond his register that Steward +elected to sing with him. In addition, he could sing by himself, and +unmistakably, such simple airs as "Home, Sweet Home," "God save the +King," and "The Sweet By and By." Even alone, prompted by Steward a +score of feet away from him, could he lift up his muzzle and sing +"Shenandoah" and "Roll me down to Rio." + +Kwaque, on stolen occasions when Steward was not around, would get out +his Jews' harp and by the sheer compellingness of the primitive +instrument make Michael sing with him the barbaric and devil-devil +rhythms of King William Island. Another master of song, but one in whom +Michael delighted, came to rule over him. This master's name was Cocky. +He so introduced himself to Michael at their first meeting. + +"Cocky," he said bravely, without a quiver of fear or flight, when +Michael had charged upon him at sight to destroy him. And the human +voice, the voice of a god, issuing from the throat of the tiny, +snow-white bird, had made Michael go back on his haunches, while, with +eyes and nostrils, he quested the steerage for the human who had spoken. +And there was no human . . . only a small cockatoo that twisted his head +impudently and sidewise at him and repeated, "Cocky." + +The taboo of the chicken Michael had been well taught in his earliest +days at Meringe. Chickens, esteemed by _Mister_ Haggin and his white-god +fellows, were things that dogs must even defend instead of ever attack. +But this thing, itself no chicken, with the seeming of a wild feathered +thing of the jungle that was fair game for any dog, talked to him with +the voice of a god. + +"Get off your foot," it commanded so peremptorily, so humanly, as again +to startle Michael and made him quest about the steerage for the +god-throat that had uttered it. + +"Get off your foot, or I'll throw the leg of Moses at you," was the next +command from the tiny feathered thing. + +After that came a farrago of Chinese, so like the voice of Ah Moy, that +again, though for the last time, Michael sought about the steerage for +the utterer. + +At this Cocky burst into such wild and fantastic shrieks of laughter that +Michael, ears pricked, head cocked to one side, identified in the fibres +of the laughter the fibres of the various voices he had just previously +heard. + +And Cocky, only a few ounces in weight, less than half a pound, a tiny +framework of fragile bone covered with a handful of feathers and incasing +a heart that was as big in pluck as any heart on the _Mary Turner_, +became almost immediately Michael's friend and comrade, as well as ruler. +Minute morsel of daring and courage that Cocky was, he commanded +Michael's respect from the first. And Michael, who with a single +careless paw-stroke could have broken Cocky's slender neck and put out +for ever the brave brightness of Cocky's eyes, was careful of him from +the first. And he permitted him a myriad liberties that he would never +have permitted Kwaque. + +Ingrained in Michael's heredity, from the very beginning of four-legged +dogs on earth, was the _defence of the meat_. He never reasoned it. +Automatic and involuntary as his heart-beating and air-breathing, was his +defence of his meat once he had his paw on it, his teeth in it. Only to +Steward, by an extreme effort of will and control, could he accord the +right to touch his meat once he had himself touched it. Even Kwaque, who +most usually fed him under Steward's instructions, knew that the safety +of fingers and flesh resided in having nothing further whatever to do +with anything of food once in Michael's possession. But Cocky, a bit of +feathery down, a morsel-flash of light and life with the throat of a god, +violated with sheer impudence and daring Michael's taboo, the defence of +the meat. + +Perched on the rim of Michael's pannikin, this inconsiderable adventurer +from out of the dark into the sun of life, a mere spark and mote between +the darks, by a ruffing of his salmon-pink crest, a swift and enormous +dilation of his bead-black pupils, and a raucous imperative cry, as of +all the gods, in his throat, could make Michael give back and permit the +fastidious selection of the choicest tidbits of his dish. + +For Cocky had a way with him, and ways and ways. He, who was sheer +bladed steel in the imperious flashing of his will, could swashbuckle and +bully like any over-seas roisterer, or wheedle as wickedly winningly as +the first woman out of Eden or the last woman of that descent. When +Cocky, balanced on one leg, the other leg in the air as the foot of it +held the scruff of Michael's neck, leaned to Michael's ear and wheedled, +Michael could only lay down silkily the bristly hair-waves of his neck, +and with silly half-idiotic eyes of bliss agree to whatever was Cocky's +will or whimsey so delivered. + +Cocky became more intimately Michael's because, very early, Ah Moy washed +his hands of the bird. Ah Moy had bought him in Sydney from a sailor for +eighteen shillings and chaffered an hour over the bargain. And when he +saw Cocky, one day, perched and voluble, on the twisted fingers of +Kwaque's left hand, Ah Moy discovered such instant distaste for the bird +that not even eighteen shillings, coupled with possession of Cocky and +possible contact, had any value to him. + +"You likee him? You wanchee?" he proffered. + +"Changee for changee!" Kwaque queried back, taking for granted that it +was an offer to exchange and wondering whether the little old cook had +become enamoured of his precious jews' harp. + +"No changee for changee," Ah Moy answered. "You wanchee him, all right, +can do." + +"How fashion can do?" Kwaque demanded, who to his beche-de-mer English +was already adding pidgin English. "Suppose 'm me fella no got 'm what +you fella likee?" + +"No fashion changee," Ah Moy reiterated. "You wanchee, you likee he stop +along you fella all right, my word." + +And so did pass the brave bit of feathered life with the heart of pluck, +called of men, and of himself, "Cocky," who had been birthed in the +jungle roof of the island of Santo, in the New Hebrides, who had been +netted by a two-legged black man-eater and sold for six sticks of tobacco +and a shingle hatchet to a Scotch trader dying of malaria, and in turn +had been traded from hand to hand, for four shillings to a blackbirder, +for a turtle-shell comb made by an English coal-passer after an old +Spanish design, for the appraised value of six shillings and sixpence in +a poker game in the firemen's forecastle, for a second-hand accordion +worth at least twenty shillings, and on for eighteen shillings cash to a +little old withered Chinaman--so did pass Cocky, as mortal or as immortal +as any brave sparkle of life on the planet, from the possession of one, +Ah Moy, a sea-cock who, forty years before, had slain his young wife in +Macao for cause and fled away to sea, to Kwaque, a leprous Black Papuan +who was slave to one, Dag Daughtry, himself a servant of other men to +whom he humbly admitted "Yes, sir," and "No, sir," and "Thank you, sir." + +One other comrade Michael found, although Cocky was no party to the +friendship. This was Scraps, the awkward young Newfoundland puppy, who +was the property of no one, unless of the schooner _Mary Turner_ herself, +for no man, fore or aft, claimed ownership, while every man disclaimed +having brought him on board. So he was called Scraps, and, since he was +nobody's dog, was everybody's dog--so much so, that Mr. Jackson promised +to knock Ah Moy's block off if he did not feed the puppy well, while +Sigurd Halvorsen, in the forecastle, did his best to knock off Henrik +Gjertsen's block when the latter was guilty of kicking Scraps out of his +way. Yea, even more. When Simon Nishikanta, huge and gross as in the +flesh he was and for ever painting delicate, insipid, feministic water- +colours, when he threw his deck-chair at Scraps for clumsily knocking +over his easel, he found the ham-like hand of Grimshaw so instant and +heavy on his shoulder as to whirl him half about, almost fling him to the +deck, and leave him lame-muscled and black-and-blued for days. + +Michael, full grown, mature, was so merry-hearted an individual that he +found all delight in interminable romps with Scraps. So strong was the +play-instinct in him, as well as was his constitution strong, that he +continually outplayed Scraps to abject weariness, so that he could only +lie on the deck and pant and laugh through air-draughty lips and dab +futilely in the air with weak forepaws at Michael's continued ferocious- +acted onslaughts. And this, despite the fact that Scraps out-bullied him +and out-scaled him at least three times, and was as careless and +unwitting of the weight of his legs or shoulders as a baby elephant on a +lawn of daisies. Given his breath back again, Scraps was as ripe as ever +for another frolic, and Michael was just as ripe to meet him. All of +which was splendid training for Michael, keeping him in the tiptop of +physical condition and mental wholesomeness. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +So sailed the Ship of Fools--Michael playing with Scraps, respecting +Cocky and by Cocky being bullied and wheedled, singing with Steward and +worshipping him; Daughtry drinking his six quarts of beer each day, +collecting his wages the first of each month, and admiring Charles Stough +Greenleaf as the finest man on board; Kwaque serving and loving his +master and thickening and darkening and creasing his brow with the +growing leprous infiltration; Ah Moy avoiding the Black Papuan as the +very plague, washing himself continuously and boiling his blankets once a +week; Captain Doane doing the navigating and worrying about his +flat-building in San Francisco; Grimshaw resting his ham-hands on his +colossal knees and girding at the pawnbroker to contribute as much to the +adventure as he was contributing from his wheat-ranches; Simon Nishikanta +wiping his sweaty neck with the greasy silk handkerchief and painting +endless water-colours; the mate patiently stealing the ship's latitude +and longitude with his duplicate key; and the Ancient Mariner, solacing +himself with Scotch highballs, smoking fragrant three-for-a-dollar +Havanas that were charged to the adventure, and for ever maundering about +the hell of the longboat, the cross-bearings unnamable, and the treasure +a fathom under the sand. + +Came a stretch of ocean that to Daughtry was like all other stretches of +ocean and unidentifiable from them. No land broke the sea-rim. The ship +the centre, the horizon was the invariable and eternal circle of the +world. The magnetic needle in the binnacle was the point on which the +_Mary Turner_ ever pivoted. The sun rose in the undoubted east and set +in the undoubted west, corrected and proved, of course, by declination, +deviation, and variation; and the nightly march of the stars and +constellations proceeded across the sky. + +And in this stretch of ocean, lookouts were mastheaded at day-dawn and +kept mastheaded until twilight of evening, when the _Mary Turner_ was +hove-to, to hold her position through the night. As time went by, and +the scent, according to the Ancient Mariner, grow hotter, all three of +the investors in the adventure came to going aloft. Grimshaw contented +himself with standing on the main crosstrees. Captain Doane climbed even +higher, seating himself on the stump of the foremast with legs a-straddle +of the butt of the fore-topmast. And Simon Nishikanta tore himself away +from his everlasting painting of all colour-delicacies of sea and sky +such as are painted by seminary maidens, to be helped and hoisted up the +ratlines of the mizzen rigging, the huge bulk of him, by two grinning, +slim-waisted sailors, until they lashed him squarely on the crosstrees +and left him to stare with eyes of golden desire, across the sun-washed +sea through the finest pair of unredeemed binoculars that had ever been +pledged in his pawnshops. + +"Strange," the Ancient Mariner would mutter, "strange, and most strange. +This is the very place. There can be no mistake. I'd have trusted that +youngster of a third officer anywhere. He was only eighteen, but he +could navigate better than the captain. Didn't he fetch the atoll after +eighteen days in the longboat? No standard compasses, and you know what +a small-boat horizon is, with a big sea, for a sextant. He died, but the +dying course he gave me held good, so that I fetched the atoll the very +next day after I hove his body overboard." + +Captain Doane would shrug his shoulders and defiantly meet the +mistrustful eyes of the Armenian Jew. + +"It cannot have sunk, surely," the Ancient Mariner would tactfully carry +across the forbidding pause. "The island was no mere shoal or reef. The +Lion's Head was thirty-eight hundred and thirty-five feet. I saw the +captain and the third officer triangulate it." + +"I've raked and combed the sea," Captain Doane would then break out, "and +the teeth of my comb are not so wide apart as to let slip through a four- +thousand-foot peak." + +"Strange, strange," the Ancient Mariner would next mutter, half to his +cogitating soul, half aloud to the treasure-seekers. Then, with a sudden +brightening, he would add: + +"But, of course, the variation has changed, Captain Doane. Have you +allowed for the change in variation for half a century! That should make +a grave difference. Why, as I understand it, who am no navigator, the +variation was not so definitely and accurately known in those days as +now." + +"Latitude was latitude, and longitude was longitude," would be the +captain's retort. "Variation and deviation are used in setting courses +and estimating dead reckoning." + +All of which was Greek to Simon Nishikanta, who would promptly take the +Ancient Mariner's side of the discussion. + +But the Ancient Mariner was fair-minded. What advantage he gave the Jew +one moment, he balanced the next moment with an advantage to the skipper. + +"It's a pity," he would suggest to Captain Doane, "that you have only one +chronometer. The entire fault may be with the chronometer. Why did you +sail with only one chronometer?" + +"But I _was_ willing for two," the Jew would defend. "You know that, +Grimshaw?" + +The wheat-farmer would nod reluctantly and Captain would snap: + +"But not for three chronometers." + +"But if two was no better than one, as you said so yourself and as +Grimshaw will bear witness, then three was no better than two except for +an expense." + +"But if you only have two chronometers, how can you tell which has gone +wrong?" Captain Doane would demand. + +"Search me," would come the pawnbroker's retort, accompanied by an +incredulous shrug of the shoulders. "If you can't tell which is wrong of +two, then how much harder must it be to tell which is wrong of two dozen? +With only two, it's a fifty-fifty split that one or the other is wrong." + +"But don't you realize--" + +"I realize that it's all a great foolishness, all this highbrow stuff +about navigation. I've got clerks fourteen years old in my offices that +can figure circles all around you and your navigation. Ask them that if +two chronometers ain't better than one, then how can two thousand be +better than one? And they'd answer quick, snap, like that, that if two +dollars ain't any better than one dollar, then two thousand dollars ain't +any better than one dollar. That's common sense." + +"Just the same, you're wrong on general principle," Grimshaw would oar +in. "I said at the time that the only reason we took Captain Doane in +with us on the deal was because we needed a navigator and because you and +me didn't know the first thing about it. You said, 'Yes, sure'; and +right away knew more about it than him when you wouldn't stand for buying +three chronometers. What was the matter with you was that the expense +hurt you. That's about as big an idea as your mind ever had room for. +You go around looking for to dig out ten million dollars with a second- +hand spade you call buy for sixty-eight cents." + +Dag Daughtry could not fail to overhear some of these conversations, +which were altercations rather than councils. The invariable ending, for +Simon Nishikanta, would be what sailors name "the sea-grouch." For hours +afterward the sulky Jew would speak to no one nor acknowledge speech from +any one. Vainly striving to paint, he would suddenly burst into violent +rage, tear up his attempt, stamp it into the deck, then get out his large- +calibred automatic rifle, perch himself on the forecastle-head, and try +to shoot any stray porpoise, albacore, or dolphin. It seemed to give him +great relief to send a bullet home into the body of some surging, +gorgeous-hued fish, arrest its glorious flashing motion for ever, and +turn it on its side slowly to sink down into the death and depth of the +sea. + +On occasion, when a school of blackfish disported by, each one of them a +whale of respectable size, Nishikanta would be beside himself in the +ecstasy of inflicting pain. Out of the school perhaps he would reach a +score of the leviathans, his bullets biting into them like whip-lashes, +so that each, like a colt surprised by the stock-whip, would leap in the +air, or with a flirt of tail dive under the surface, and then charge +madly across the ocean and away from sight in a foam-churn of speed. + +The Ancient Mariner would shake his head sadly; and Daughtry, who +likewise was hurt by the infliction of hurt on unoffending animals, would +sympathize with him and fetch him unbidden another of the expensive three- +for-a-dollar cigars so that his feelings might be soothed. Grimshaw +would curl his lip in a sneer and mutter: "The cheap skate. The skunk. +No man with half the backbone of a man would take it out of the harmless +creatures. He's that kind that if he didn't like you, or if you +criticised his grammar or arithmetic, he'd kick your dog to get even . . . +or poison it. In the good old days up in Colusa we used to hang men +like him just to keep the air we breathed clean and wholesome." + +But it was Captain Doane who protested outright. + +"Look at here, Nishikanta," he would say, his face white and his lips +trembling with anger. "That's rough stuff, and all you can get back for +it is rough stuff. I know what I'm talking about. You've got no right +to risk our lives that way. Wasn't the pilot boat _Annie Mine_ sunk by a +whale right in the Golden Gate? Didn't I sail in as a youngster, second +mate on the brig _Berncastle_, into Hakodate, pumping double watches to +keep afloat just because a whale took a smash at us? Didn't the full- +rigged ship, the whaler _Essex_, sink off the west coast of South +America, twelve hundred miles from the nearest land for the small boats +to cover, and all because of a big cow whale that butted her into +kindling-wood?" + +And Simon Nishikanta, in his grouch, disdaining to reply, would continue +to pepper the last whale into flight beyond the circle of the sea their +vision commanded. + +"I remember the whaleship _Essex_," the Ancient Mariner told Dag +Daughtry. "It was a cow with a calf that did for her. Her barrels were +two-thirds full, too. She went down in less than an hour. One of the +boats never was heard of." + +"And didn't another one of her boats get to Hawaii, sir?" Daughtry +queried with all due humility of respect. "Leastwise, thirty years ago, +when I was in Honolulu, I met a man, an old geezer, who claimed he'd been +a harpooner on a whaleship sunk by a whale off the coast of South +America. That was the first and last I heard of it, until right now you +speaking of it, sir. It must a-been the same ship, sir, don't you +think?" + +"Unless two different ships were whale-sunk off the west coast," the +Ancient Mariner replied. "And of the one ship, the _Essex_, there is no +discussion. It is historical. The chance is likely, steward, that the +man you mentioned was from the _Essex_." + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +Captain Doane worked hard, pursuing the sun in its daily course through +the sky, by the equation of time correcting its aberrations due to the +earth's swinging around the great circle of its orbit, and charting +Sumner lines innumerable, working assumed latitudes for position until +his head grew dizzy. + +Simon Nishikanta sneered openly at what he considered the captain's +inefficient navigation, and continued to paint water-colours when he was +serene, and to shoot at whales, sea-birds, and all things hurtable when +he was downhearted and sea-sore with disappointment at not sighting the +Lion's Head peak of the Ancient Mariner's treasure island. + +"I'll show I ain't a pincher," Nishikanta announced one day, after having +broiled at the mast-head for five hours of sea-searching. "Captain +Doane, how much could we have bought extra chronometers for in San +Francisco--good second-hand ones, I mean?" + +"Say a hundred dollars," the captain answered. + +"Very well. And this ain't a piker's proposition. The cost of such a +chronometer would have been divided between the three of us. I stand for +its total cost. You just tell the sailors that I, Simon Nishikanta, will +pay one hundred dollars gold money for the first one that sights land on +Mr. Greenleaf's latitude and longitude." + +But the sailors who swarmed the mast-heads were doomed to disappointment, +in that for only two days did they have opportunity to stare the ocean +surface for the reward. Nor was this due entirely to Dag Daughtry, +despite the fact that his own intention and act would have been +sufficient to spoil their chance for longer staring. + +Down in the lazarette, under the main-cabin floor, it chanced that he +took toll of the cases of beer which had been shipped for his especial +benefit. He counted the cases, doubted the verdict of his senses, +lighted more matches, counted again, then vainly searched the entire +lazarette in the hope of finding more cases of beer stored elsewhere. + +He sat down under the trap door of the main-cabin floor and thought for a +solid hour. It was the Jew again, he concluded--the Jew who had been +willing to equip the _Mary Turner_ with two chronometers, but not with +three; the Jew who had ratified the agreement of a sufficient supply to +permit Daughtry his daily six quarts. Once again the steward counted the +cases to make sure. There were three. And since each case contained two +dozen quarts, and since his whack each day was half a dozen quarts, it +was patent that, the supply that stared him in the face would last him +only twelve days. And twelve days were none too long to sail from this +unidentifiable naked sea-stretch to the nearest possible port where beer +could be purchased. + +The steward, once his mind was made up, wasted no time. The clock marked +a quarter before twelve when he climbed up out of the lazarette, replaced +the trapdoor, and hurried to set the table. He served the company +through the noon meal, although it was all he could do to refrain from +capsizing the big tureen of split-pea soup over the head of Simon +Nishikanta. What did effectually withstrain him was the knowledge of the +act which in the lazarette he had already determined to perform that +afternoon down in the main hold where the water-casks were stored. + +At three o'clock, while the Ancient Mariner supposedly drowned in his +room, and while Captain Doane, Grimshaw, and half the watch on deck +clustered at the mast-heads to try to raise the Lion's Head from out the +sapphire sea, Dag Daughtry dropped down the ladder of the open hatchway +into the main hold. Here, in long tiers, with alleyways between, the +water-casks were chocked safely on their sides. + +From inside his shirt the steward drew a brace, and to it fitted a half- +inch bit from his hip-pocket. On his knees, he bored through the head of +the first cask until the water rushed out upon the deck and flowed down +into the bilge. He worked quickly, boring cask after cask down the +alleyway that led to deeper twilight. When he had reached the end of the +first row of casks he paused a moment to listen to the gurglings of the +many half-inch streams running to waste. His quick ears caught a similar +gurgling from the right in the direction of the next alleyway. Listening +closely, he could have sworn he heard the sounds of a bit biting into +hard wood. + +A minute later, his own brace and bit carefully secreted, his hand was +descending on the shoulder of a man he could not recognize in the gloom, +but who, on his knees and wheezing, was steadily boring into the head of +a cask. The culprit made no effort to escape, and when Daughtry struck a +match he gazed down into the upturned face of the Ancient Mariner. + +"My word!" the steward muttered his amazement softly. "What in hell are +you running water out for?" + +He could feel the old man's form trembling with violent nervousness, and +his own heart smote him for gentleness. + +"It's all right," he whispered. "Don't mind me. How many have you +bored?" + +"All in this tier," came the whispered answer. "You will not inform on +me to the . . . the others?" + +"Inform?" Daughtry laughed softly. "I don't mind telling you that we're +playing the same game, though I don't know why you should play it. I've +just finished boring all of the starboard row. Now I tell you, sir, you +skin out right now, quietly, while the goin' is good. Everybody's aloft, +and you won't be noticed. I'll go ahead and finish this job . . . all +but enough water to last us say a dozen days." + +"I should like to talk with you . . . to explain matters," the Ancient +Mariner whispered. + +"Sure, sir, an' I don't mind sayin', sir, that I'm just plain mad curious +to hear. I'll join you down in the cabin, say in ten minutes, and we can +have a real gam. But anyway, whatever your game is, I'm with you. +Because it happens to be my game to get quick into port, and because, +sir, I have a great liking and respect for you. Now shoot along. I'll +be with you inside ten minutes." + +"I like you, steward, very much," the old man quavered. + +"And I like you, sir--and a damn sight more than them money-sharks aft. +But we'll just postpone this. You beat it out of here, while I finish +scuppering the rest of the water." + +A quarter of an hour later, with the three money-sharks still at the mast- +heads, Charles Stough Greenleaf was seated in the cabin and sipping a +highball, and Dag Daughtry was standing across the table from him, +drinking directly from a quart bottle of beer. + +"Maybe you haven't guessed it," the Ancient Mariner said; "but this is my +fourth voyage after this treasure." + +"You mean . . . ?" Daughtry asked. + +"Just that. There isn't any treasure. There never was one--any more +than the Lion's Head, the longboat, or the bearings unnamable."' + +Daughtry rumpled his grizzled thatch of hair in his perplexity, as he +admitted: + +"Well, you got me, sir. You sure got me to believin' in that treasure." + +"And I acknowledge, steward, that I am pleased to hear it. It shows that +I have not lost my cunning when I can deceive a man like you. It is easy +to deceive men whose souls know only money. But you are different. You +don't live and breathe for money. I've watched you with your dog. I've +watched you with your nigger boy. I've watched you with your beer. And +just because your heart isn't set on a great buried treasure of gold, you +are harder to deceive. Those whose hearts are set, are most +astonishingly easy to fool. They are of cheap kidney. Offer them a +proposition of one hundred dollars for one, and they are like hungry pike +snapping at the bait. Offer a thousand dollars for one, or ten thousand +for one, and they become sheer lunatic. I am an old man, a very old man. +I like to live until I die--I mean, to live decently, comfortably, +respectably." + +"And you like the voyages long? I begin to see, sir. Just as they're +getting near to where the treasure ain't, a little accident like the loss +of their water-supply sends them into port and out again to start hunting +all over." + +The Ancient Mariner nodded, and his sun-washed eyes twinkled. + +"There was the _Emma Louisa_. I kept her on the long voyage over +eighteen months with water accidents and similar accidents. And, +besides, they kept me in one of the best hotels in New Orleans for over +four months before the voyage began, and advanced to me handsomely, yes, +bravely, handsomely." + +"But tell me more, sir; I am most interested," Dag Daughtry concluded his +simple matter of the beer. "It's a good game. I might learn it for my +old age, though I give you my word, sir, I won't butt in on your game. I +wouldn't tackle it until you are gone, sir, good game that it is." + +"First of all, you must pick out men with money--with plenty of money, so +that any loss will not hurt them. Also, they are easier to interest--" + +"Because they are more hoggish," the steward interrupted. "The more +money they've got the more they want." + +"Precisely," the Ancient Mariner continued. "And, at least, they are +repaid. Such sea-voyages are excellent for their health. After all, I +do them neither hurt nor harm, but only good, and add to their health." + +"But them scars--that gouge out of your face--all them fingers missing on +your hand? You never got them in the fight in the longboat when the +bo's'n carved you up. Then where in Sam Hill did you get the them? Wait +a minute, sir. Let me fill your glass first." And with a fresh-brimmed +glass, Charles Stough Greanleaf narrated the history of his scars. + +"First, you must know, steward, that I am--well, a gentleman. My name +has its place in the pages of the history of the United States, even back +before the time when they were the United States. I graduated second in +my class in a university that it is not necessary to name. For that +matter, the name I am known by is not my name. I carefully compounded it +out of names of other families. I have had misfortunes. I trod the +quarter-deck when I was a young man, though never the deck of the _Wide +Awake_, which is the ship of my fancy--and of my livelihood in these +latter days. + +"The scars you asked about, and the missing fingers? Thus it chanced. It +was the morning, at late getting-up times in a Pullman, when the accident +happened. The car being crowded, I had been forced to accept an upper +berth. It was only the other day. A few years ago. I was an old man +then. We were coming up from Florida. It was a collision on a high +trestle. The train crumpled up, and some of the cars fell over sideways +and fell off, ninety feet into the bottom of a dry creek. It was dry, +though there was a pool of water just ten feet in diameter and eighteen +inches deep. All the rest was dry boulders, and I bull's-eyed that pool. + +"This is the way it was. I had just got on my shoes and pants and shirt, +and had started to get out of the bunk. There I was, sitting on the edge +of the bunk, my legs dangling down, when the locomotives came together. +The berths, upper and lower, on the opposite side had already been made +up by the porter. + +"And there I was, sitting, legs dangling, not knowing where I was, on a +trestle or a flat, when the thing happened. I just naturally left that +upper berth, soared like a bird across the aisle, went through the glass +of the window on the opposite side clean head-first, turned over and over +through the ninety feet of fall more times than I like to remember, and +by some sort of miracle was mostly flat-out in the air when I bull's-eyed +that pool of water. It was only eighteen inches deep. But I hit it +flat, and I hit it so hard that it must have cushioned me. I was the +only survivor of my car. It struck forty feet away from me, off to the +side. And they took only the dead out of it. When they took me out of +the pool I wasn't dead by any means. And when the surgeons got done with +me, there were the fingers gone from my hand, that scar down the side of +my face . . . and, though you'd never guess it, I've been three ribs +short of the regular complement ever since. + +"Oh, I had no complaint coming. Think of the others in that car--all +dead. Unfortunately, I was riding on a pass, and so could not sue the +railroad company. But here I am, the only man who ever dived ninety feet +into eighteen inches of water and lived to tell the tale.--Steward, if +you don't mind replenishing my glass . . . " + +Dag Daughtry complied and in his excitement of interest pulled off the +top of another quart of beer for himself. + +"Go on, go on, sir," he murmured huskily, wiping his lips, "and the +treasure-hunting graft. I'm straight dying to hear. Sir, I salute you." + +"I may say, steward," the Ancient Mariner resumed, "that I was born with +a silver spoon that melted in my mouth and left me a proper prodigal son. +Also, that I was born with a backbone of pride that would not melt. Not +for a paltry railroad accident, but for things long before as well as +after, my family let me die, and I . . . I let it live. That is the +story. I let my family live. Furthermore, it was not my family's fault. +I never whimpered. I never let on. I melted the last of my silver +spoon--South Sea cotton, an' it please you, cacao in Tonga, rubber and +mahogany in Yucatan. And do you know, at the end, I slept in Bowery +lodging-houses and ate scrapple in East-Side feeding-dens, and, on more +than one occasion, stood in the bread-line at midnight and pondered +whether or not I should faint before I fed." + +"And you never squealed to your family," Dag Daughtry murmured admiringly +in the pause. + +The Ancient Mariner straightened up his shoulders, threw his head back, +then bowed it and repeated, "No, I never squealed. I went into the poor- +house, or the county poor-farm as they call it. I lived sordidly. I +lived like a beast. For six months I lived like a beast, and then I saw +my way out. I set about building the _Wide Awake_. I built her plank by +plank, and copper-fastened her, selected her masts and every timber of +her, and personally signed on her full ship's complement fore-and-aft, +and outfitted her amongst the Jews, and sailed with her to the South Seas +and the treasure buried a fathom under the sand. + +"You see," he explained, "all this I did in my mind, for all the time I +was a hostage in the poor-farm of broken men." + +The Ancient Mariner's face grew suddenly bleak and fierce, and his right +hand flashed out to Daughtry's wrist, prisoning it in withered fingers of +steel. + +"It was a long, hard way to get out of the poor-farm and finance my +miserable little, pitiful little, adventure of the _Wide Awake_. Do you +know that I worked in the poor-farm laundry for two years, for one dollar +and a half a week, with my one available hand and what little I could do +with the other, sorting dirty clothes and folding sheets and pillow-slips +until I thought a thousand times my poor old back would break in two, and +until I knew a million times the location in my chest of every fraction +of an inch of my missing ribs." + +"You are a young man yet--" + +Daughtry grinned denial as he rubbed his grizzled mat of hair. + +"You are a young man yet, steward," the Ancient Mariner insisted with a +show of irritation. "You have never been shut out from life. In the +poor-farm one is shut out from life. There is no respect--no, not for +age alone, but for human life in the poor-house. How shall I say it? One +is not dead. Nor is one alive. One is what once was alive and is in +process of becoming dead. Lepers are treated that way. So are the +insane. I know it. When I was young and on the sea, a +brother-lieutenant went mad. Sometimes he was violent, and we struggled +with him, twisting his arms, bruising his flesh, tying him helpless while +we sat and panted on him that he might not do harm to us, himself, or the +ship. And he, who still lived, died to us. Don't you understand? He +was no longer of us, like us. He was something other. That is +it--_other_. And so, in the poor-farm, we, who are yet unburied, are +_other_. You have heard me chatter about the hell of the longboat. That +is a pleasant diversion in life compared with the poor-farm. The food, +the filth, the abuse, the bullying, the--the sheer animalness of it! + +"For two years I worked for a dollar and a half a week in the laundry. +And imagine me, who had melted a silver spoon in my mouth--a sizable +silver spoon steward--imagine me, my old sore bones, my old belly +reminiscent of youth's delights, my old palate ticklish yet and not all +withered of the deviltries of taste learned in younger days--as I say, +steward, imagine me, who had ever been free-handed, lavish, saving that +dollar and a half intact like a miser, never spending a penny of it on +tobacco, never mitigating by purchase of any little delicacy the sad +condition of my stomach that protested against the harshness and +indigestibility of our poor fare. I cadged tobacco, poor cheap tobacco, +from poor doddering old chaps trembling on the edge of dissolution. Ay, +and when Samuel Merrivale I found dead in the morning, next cot to mine, +I first rummaged his poor old trousers' pocket for the half-plug of +tobacco I knew was the total estate he left, then announced the news. + +"Oh, steward, I was careful of that dollar and a half. Don't you see?--I +was a prisoner sawing my way out with a tiny steel saw. And I sawed +out!" His voice rose in a shrill cackle of triumph. "Steward, I sawed +out!" + +Dag Daughtry held forth and up his beer-bottle as he said gravely and +sincerely: + +"Sir, I salute you." + +"And I thank you, sir--you understand," the Ancient Mariner replied with +simple dignity to the toast, touching his glass to the bottle and +drinking with the steward eyes to eyes. + +"I should have had one hundred and fifty-six dollars when I left the poor- +farm," the ancient one continued. "But there were the two weeks I lost, +with influenza, and the one week from a confounded pleurisy, so that I +emerged from that place of the living dead with but one hundred and fifty- +one dollars and fifty cents." + +"I see, sir," Daughtry interrupted with honest admiration. "The tiny saw +had become a crowbar, and with it you were going back to break into life +again." + +All the scarred face and washed eyes of Charles Stough Greenleaf beamed +as he held his glass up. + +"Steward, I salute you. You understand. And you have said it well. I +was going back to break into the house of life. It was a crowbar, that +pitiful sum of money accumulated by two years of crucifixion. Think of +it! A sum that in the days ere the silver spoon had melted, I staked in +careless moods of an instant on a turn of the cards. But as you say, a +burglar, I came back to break into life, and I came to Boston. You have +a fine turn for a figure of speech, steward, and I salute you." + +Again bottle and glass tinkled together, and both men drank eyes to eyes +and each was aware that the eyes he gazed into were honest and +understanding. + +"But it was a thin crowbar, steward. I dared not put my weight on it for +a proper pry. I took a room in a small but respectable hotel, European +plan. It was in Boston, I think I said. Oh, how careful I was of my +crowbar! I scarcely ate enough to keep my frame inhabited. But I bought +drinks for others, most carefully selected--bought drinks with an air of +prosperity that was as a credential to my story; and in my cups (my +apparent cups, steward), spun an old man's yarn of the _Wide Awake_, the +longboat, the bearings unnamable, and the treasure under the sand.--A +fathom under the sand; that was literary; it was psychological; it +smacked of the salt sea, and daring rovers, and the loot of the Spanish +Main. + +"You have noticed this nugget I wear on my watch-chain, steward? I could +not afford it at that time, but I talked golden instead, California gold, +nuggets and nuggets, oodles and oodles, from the diggings of forty-nine +and fifty. That was literary. That was colour. Later, after my first +voyage out of Boston I was financially able to buy a nugget. It was so +much bait to which men rose like fishes. And like fishes they nibbled. +These rings, also--bait. You never see such rings now. After I got in +funds, I purchased them, too. Take this nugget: I am talking. I toy +with it absently as I am telling of the great gold treasure we buried +under the sand. Suddenly the nugget flashes fresh recollection into my +mind. I speak of the longboat, of our thirst and hunger, and of the +third officer, the fair lad with cheeks virgin of the razor, and that he +it was who used it as a sinker when we strove to catch fish. + +"But back in Boston. Yarns and yarns, when seemingly I was gone in +drink, I told my apparent cronies--men whom I despised, stupid dolts of +creatures that they were. But the word spread, until one day, a young +man, a reporter, tried to interview me about the treasure and the _Wide +Awake_. I was indignant, angry.--Oh, softly, steward, softly; in my +heart was great joy as I denied that young reporter, knowing that from my +cronies he already had a sufficiency of the details. + +"And the morning paper gave two whole columns and headlines to the tale. +I began to have callers. I studied them out well. Many were for +adventuring after the treasure who themselves had no money. I baffled +and avoided them, and waited on, eating even less as my little capital +dwindled away. + +"And then he came, my gay young doctor--doctor of philosophy he was, for +he was very wealthy. My heart sang when I saw him. But twenty-eight +dollars remained to me--after it was gone, the poor-house, or death. I +had already resolved upon death as my choice rather than go back to be of +that dolorous company, the living dead of the poor-farm. But I did not +go back, nor did I die. The gay young doctor's blood ran warm at thought +of the South Seas, and in his nostrils I distilled all the scents of the +flower-drenched air of that far-off land, and in his eyes I builded him +the fairy visions of the tradewind clouds, the monsoon skies, the palm +isles and the coral seas. + +"He was a gay, mad young dog, grandly careless of his largess, fearless +as a lion's whelp, lithe and beautiful as a leopard, and mad, a trifle +mad of the deviltries and whimsies that tickled in that fine brain of +his. Look you, steward. Before we sailed in the _Gloucester_ fishing- +schooner, purchased by the doctor, and that was like a yacht and showed +her heels to most yachts, he had me to his house to advise about personal +equipment. We were overhauling in a gear-room, when suddenly he spoke: + +"'I wonder how my lady will take my long absence. What say you? Shall +she go along?' + +"And I had not known that he had any wife or lady. And I looked my +surprise and incredulity. + +"'Just that you do not believe I shall take her on the cruise,' he +laughed, wickedly, madly, in my astonished face. 'Come, you shall meet +her.' + +"Straight to his bedroom and his bed he led me, and, turning down the +covers, showed there to me, asleep as she had slept for many a thousand +years, the mummy of a slender Egyptian maid. + +"And she sailed with us on the long vain voyage to the South Seas and +back again, and, steward, on my honour, I grew quite fond of the dear +maid myself." + +The Ancient Mariner gazed dreamily into his glass, and Dag Daughtry took +advantage of the pause to ask: + +"But the young doctor? How did he take the failure to find the +treasure?" + +The Ancient Mariner's face lighted with joy. + +"He called me a delectable old fraud, with his arm on my shoulder while +he did it. Why, steward, I had come to love that young man like a +splendid son. And with his arm on my shoulder, and I know there was more +than mere kindness in it, he told me we had barely reached the River +Plate when he discovered me. With laughter, and with more than one slap +of his hand on my shoulder that was more caress than jollity, he pointed +out the discrepancies in my tale (which I have since amended, steward, +thanks to him, and amended well), and told me that the voyage had been a +grand success, making him eternally my debtor. + +"What could I do? I told him the truth. To him even did I tell my +family name, and the shame I had saved it from by forswearing it. + +"He put his arm on my shoulder, I tell you, and . . . " + +The Ancient Mariner ceased talking because of a huskiness in his throat, +and a moisture from his eyes trickled down both cheeks. + +Dag Daughtry pledged him silently, and in the draught from his glass he +recovered himself. + +"He told me that I should come and live with him, and, to his great +lonely house he took me the very day we landed in Boston. Also, he told +me he would make arrangements with his lawyers--the idea tickled his +fancy--'I shall adopt you,' he said. 'I shall adopt you along with +Isthar'--Isthar was the little maid's name, the little mummy's name. + +"Here was I, back in life, steward, and legally to be adopted. But life +is a fond betrayer. Eighteen hours afterward, in the morning, we found +him dead in his bed, the little mummy maid beside him. Heart-failure, +the burst of some blood-vessel in the brain--I never learned. + +"I prayed and pleaded with them for the pair to be buried together. But +they were a hard, cold, New England lot, his cousins and his aunts, and +they presented Isthar to the museum, and me they gave a week to be quit +of the house. I left in an hour, and they searched my small baggage +before they would let me depart. + +"I went to New York. It was the same game there, only that I had more +money and could play it properly. It was the same in New Orleans, in +Galveston. I came to California. This is my fifth voyage. I had a hard +time getting these three interested, and spent all my little store of +money before they signed the agreement. They were very mean. Advance +any money to me! The very idea of it was preposterous. Though I bided +my time, ran up a comfortable hotel bill, and, at the very last, ordered +my own generous assortment of liquors and cigars and charged the bill to +the schooner. Such a to-do! All three of them raged and all but tore +their hair . . . and mime. They said it could not be. I fell promptly +sick. I told them they got on my nerves and made me sick. The more they +raged, the sicker I got. Then they gave in. As promptly I grew better. +And here we are, out of water and heading soon most likely for the +Marquesas to fill our barrels. Then they will return and try for it +again!" + +"You think so, sir?" + +"I shall remember even more important data, steward," the Ancient Mariner +smiled. "Without doubt they will return. Oh, I know them well. They +are meagre, narrow, grasping fools." + +"Fools! all fools! a ship of fools!" Dag Daughtry exulted; repeating what +he had expressed in the hold, as he bored the last barrel, listened to +the good water gurgling away into the bilge, and chuckled over his +discovery of the Ancient Mariner on the same lay as his own. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +Early next morning, the morning watch of sailors, whose custom was to +fetch the day's supply of water for the galley and cabin, discovered that +the barrels were empty. Mr. Jackson was so alarmed that he immediately +called Captain Doane, and not many minutes elapsed ere Captain Doane had +routed out Grimshaw and Nishikanta to tell them the disaster. + +Breakfast was an excitement shared in peculiarly by the Ancient Mariner +and Dag Daughtry, while the trio of partners raged and bewailed. Captain +Doane particularly wailed. Simon Nishikanta was fiendish in his +descriptions of whatever miscreant had done the deed and of how he should +be made to suffer for it, while Grimshaw clenched and repeatedly clenched +his great hands as if throttling some throat. + +"I remember, it was in forty-seven--nay, forty-six--yes, forty-six," the +Ancient Mariner chattered. "It was a similar and worse predicament. It +was in the longboat, sixteen of us. We ran on Glister Reef. So named it +was after our pretty little craft discovered it one dark night and left +her bones upon it. The reef is on the Admiralty charts. Captain Doane +will verify me . . . " + +No one listened, save Dag Daughtry, serving hot cakes and admiring. But +Simon Nishikanta, becoming suddenly aware that the old man was babbling, +bellowed out ferociously: + +"Oh, shut up! Close your jaw! You make me tired with your everlasting +'I remember.'" + +The Ancient Mariner was guilelessly surprised, as if he had slipped +somewhere in his narrative. + +"No, I assure you," he continued. "It must have been some error of my +poor old tongue. It was not the _Wide Awake_, but the brig _Glister_. +Did I say _Wide Awake_? It was the _Glister_, a smart little brig, +almost a toy brig in fact, copper-bottomed, lines like a dolphin, a sea- +cutter and a wind-eater. Handled like a top. On my honour, gentlemen, +it was lively work for both watches when she went about. I was super- +cargo. We sailed out of New York, ostensibly for the north-west coast, +with sealed orders--" + +"In the name of God, peace, peace! You drive me mad with your drivel!" +So Nishikanta cried out in nervous pain that was real and quivering. "Old +man, have a heart. What do I care to know of your _Glister_ and your +sealed orders!" + +"Ah, sealed orders," the Ancient Mariner went on beamingly. "A magic +phrase, sealed orders." He rolled it off his tongue with unction. "Those +were the days, gentlemen, when ships did sail with sealed orders. And as +super-cargo, with my trifle invested in the adventure and my share in the +gains, I commanded the captain. Not in him, but in me were reposed the +sealed orders. I assure you I did not know myself what they were. Not +until we were around old Cape Stiff, fifty to fifty, and in fifty in the +Pacific, did I break the seal and learn we were bound for Van Dieman's +Land. They called it Van Dieman's Land in those days . . . " + +It was a day of discoveries. Captain Doane caught the mate stealing the +ship's position from his desk with the duplicate key. There was a scene, +but no more, for the Finn was too huge a man to invite personal +encounter, and Captain Dome could only stigmatize his conduct to a +running reiteration of "Yes, sir," and "No, sir," and "Sorry, sir." + +Perhaps the most important discovery, although he did not know it at the +time, was that of Dag Daughtry. It was after the course had been changed +and all sail set, and after the Ancient Mariner had privily informed him +that Taiohae, in the Marquesas, was their objective, that Daughtry gaily +proceeded to shave. But one trouble was on his mind. He was not quite +sure, in such an out-of-the-way place as Taiohae, that good beer could be +procured. + +As he prepared to make the first stroke of the razor, most of his face +white with lather, he noticed a dark patch of skin on his forehead just +between the eyebrows and above. When he had finished shaving he touched +the dark patch, wondering how he had been sunburned in such a spot. But +he did not know he had touched it in so far as there was any response of +sensation. The dark place was numb. + +"Curious," he thought, wiped his face, and forgot all about it. + +No more than he knew what horror that dark spot represented, did he know +that Ah Moy's slant eyes had long since noticed it and were continuing to +notice it, day by day, with secret growing terror. + +Close-hauled on the south-east trades, the _Mary Turner_ began her long +slant toward the Marquesas. For'ard, all were happy. Being only seamen, +on seamen's wages, they hailed with delight the news that they were bound +in for a tropic isle to fill their water-barrels. Aft, the three +partners were in bad temper, and Nishikanta openly sneered at Captain +Doane and doubted his ability to find the Marquesas. In the steerage +everybody was happy--Dag Daughtry because his wages were running on and a +further supply of beer was certain; Kwaque because he was happy whenever +his master was happy; and Ah Moy because he would soon have opportunity +to desert away from the schooner and the two lepers with whom he was +domiciled. + +Michael shared in the general happiness of the steerage, and joined +eagerly with Steward in learning by heart a fifth song. This was "Lead, +kindly Light." In his singing, which was no more than trained howling +after all, Michael sought for something he knew not what. In truth, it +was the _lost pack_, the pack of the primeval world before the dog ever +came in to the fires of men, and, for that matter, before men built fires +and before men were men. + +He had been born only the other day and had lived but two years in the +world, so that, of himself, he had no knowledge of the lost pack. For +many thousands of generations he had been away from it; yet, deep down in +the crypts of being, tied about and wrapped up in every muscle and nerve +of him, was the indelible record of the days in the wild when dim +ancestors had run with the pack and at the same time developed the pack +and themselves. When Michael was asleep, then it was that pack-memories +sometimes arose to the surface of his subconscious mind. These dreams +were real while they lasted, but when he was awake he remembered them +little if at all. But asleep, or singing with Steward, he sensed and +yearned for the lost pack and was impelled to seek the forgotten way to +it. + +Waking, Michael had another and real pack. This was composed of Steward, +Kwaque, Cocky, and Scraps, and he ran with it as ancient forbears had ran +with their own kind in the hunting. The steerage was the lair of this +pack, and, out of the steerage, it ranged the whole world, which was the +_Mary Turner_ ever rocking, heeling, reeling on the surface of the +unstable sea. + +But the steerage and its company meant more to Michael than the mere +pack. It was heaven as well, where dwelt God. Man early invented God, +often of stone, or clod, or fire, and placed him in trees and mountains +and among the stars. This was because man observed that man passed and +was lost out of the tribe, or family, or whatever name he gave to his +group, which was, after all, the human pack. And man did not want to be +lost out of the pack. So, of his imagination, he devised a new pack that +would be eternal and with which he might for ever run. Fearing the dark, +into which he observed all men passed, he built beyond the dark a fairer +region, a happier hunting-ground, a jollier and robuster feasting-hall +and wassailing-place, and called it variously "heaven." + +Like some of the earliest and lowest of primitive men, Michael never +dreamed of throwing the shadow of himself across his mind and worshipping +it as God. He did not worship shadows. He worshipped a real and +indubitable god, not fashioned in his own four-legged, hair-covered +image, but in the flesh-and-blood image, two-legged, hairless, +upstanding, of Steward. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +Had the trade wind not failed on the second day after laying the course +for the Marquesas; had Captain Doane, at the mid-day meal, not grumbled +once again at being equipped with only one chronometer; had Simon +Nishikanta not become viciously angry thereat and gone on deck with his +rifle to find some sea-denizen to kill; and had the sea-denizen that +appeared close alongside been a bonita, a dolphin, a porpoise, an +albacore, or anything else than a great, eighty-foot cow whale +accompanied by her nursing calf--had any link been missing from this +chain of events, the _Mary Turner_ would have undoubtedly reached the +Marquesas, filled her water-barrels, and returned to the +treasure-hunting; and the destinies of Michael, Daughtry, Kwaque, and +Cocky would have been quite different and possibly less terrible. + +But every link was present for the occasion. The schooner, in a dead +calm, was rolling over the huge, smooth seas, her boom sheets and tackles +crashing to the hollow thunder of her great sails, when Simon Nishikanta +put a bullet into the body of the little whale calf. By an almost +miracle of chance, the shot killed the calf. It was equivalent to +killing an elephant with a pea-rifle. Not at once did the calf die. It +merely immediately ceased its gambols and for a while lay quivering on +the surface of the ocean. The mother was beside it the moment after it +was struck, and to those on board, looking almost directly down upon her, +her dismay and alarm were very patent. She would nudge the calf with her +huge shoulder, circle around and around it, then range up alongside and +repeat her nudgings and shoulderings. + +All on the _Mary Turner_, fore and aft, lined the rail and stared down +apprehensively at the leviathan that was as long as the schooner. + +"If she should do to us, sir, what that other one did to the _Essex_," +Dag Daughtry observed to the Ancient Mariner. + +"It would be no more than we deserve," was the response. "It was +uncalled-for--a wanton, cruel act." + +Michael, aware of the excitement overside but unable to see because of +the rail, leaped on top of the cabin and at sight of the monster barked +defiantly. Every eye turned on him in startlement and fear, and Steward +hushed him with a whispered command. + +"This is the last time," Grimshaw muttered in a low voice, tense with +anger, to Nishikanta. "If ever again, on this voyage, you take a shot at +a whale, I'll wring your dirty neck for you. Get me. I mean it. I'll +choke your eye-balls out of you." + +The Jew smiled in a sickly way and whined, "There ain't nothing going to +happen. I don't believe that _Essex_ ever was sunk by a whale." + +Urged on by its mother, the dying calf made spasmodic efforts to swim +that were futile and caused it to veer and wallow from side to side. + +In the course of circling about it, the mother accidentally brushed her +shoulder under the port quarter of the _Mary Turner_, and the _Mary +Turner_ listed to starboard as her stern was lifted a yard or more. Nor +was this unintentional, gentle impact all. The instant after her +shoulder had touched, startled by the contact, she flailed out with her +tail. The blow smote the rail just for'ard of the fore-shrouds, +splintering a gap through it as if it were no more than a cigar-box and +cracking the covering board. + +That was all, and an entire ship's company stared down in silence and +fear at a sea-monster grief-stricken over its dying progeny. + +Several times, in the course of an hour, during which the schooner and +the two whales drifted farther and farther apart, the calf strove vainly +to swim. Then it set up a great quivering, which culminated in a wild +wallowing and lashing about of its tail. + +"It is the death-flurry," said the Ancient Mariner softly. + +"By damn, it's dead," was Captain Doane's comment five minutes later. +"Who'd believe it? A rifle bullet! I wish to heaven we could get half +an hour's breeze of wind to get us out of this neighbourhood." + +"A close squeak," said Grimshaw, + +Captain Doane shook his head, as his anxious eyes cast aloft to the empty +canvas and quested on over the sea in the hope of wind-ruffles on the +water. But all was glassy calm, each great sea, of all the orderly +procession of great seas, heaving up, round-topped and mountainous, like +so much quicksilver. + +"It's all right," Grimahaw encouraged. "There she goes now, beating it +away from us." + +"Of course it's all right, always was all right," Nishikanta bragged, as +he wiped the sweat from his face and neck and looked with the others +after the departing whale. "You're a fine brave lot, you are, losing +your goat to a fish." + +"I noticed your face was less yellow than usual," Grimshaw sneered. "It +must have gone to your heart." + +Captain Doane breathed a great sigh. His relief was too strong to permit +him to join in the squabbling. + +"You're yellow," Grimshaw went on, "yellow clean through." He nodded his +head toward the Ancient Mariner. "Now there's the real thing as a man. +No yellow in him. He never batted an eye, and I reckon he knew more +about the danger than you did. If I was to choose being wrecked on a +desert island with him or you, I'd take him a thousand times first. If--" + +But a cry from the sailors interrupted him. + +"Merciful God!" Captain Doane breathed aloud. + +The great cow whale had turned about, and, on the surface, was charging +straight back at them. Such was her speed that a bore was raised by her +nose like that which a Dreadnought or an Atlantic liner raises on the +sea. + +"Hold fast, all!" Captain Doane roared. + +Every man braced himself for the shock. Henrik Gjertsen, the sailor at +the wheel, spread his legs, crouched down, and stiffened his shoulders +and arms to hand-grips on opposite spokes of the wheel. Several of the +crew fled from the waist to the poop, and others of them sprang into the +main-rigging. Daughtry, one hand on the rail, with his free arm clasped +the Ancient Mariner around the waist. + +All held. The whale struck the _Mary Turner_ just aft of the +fore-shroud. A score of things, which no eye could take in +simultaneously, happened. A sailor, in the main rigging, carried away a +ratline in both hands, fell head-downward, and was clutched by an ankle +and saved head-downward by a comrade, as the schooner cracked and +shuddered, uplifted on the port side, and was flung down on her starboard +side till the ocean poured level over her rail. Michael, on the smooth +roof of the cabin, slithered down the steep slope to starboard and +disappeared, clawing and snarling, into the runway. The port shrouds of +the foremast carried away at the chain-plates, and the fore-topmast +leaned over drunkenly to starboard. + +"My word," quoth the Ancient Mariner. "We certainly felt that." + +"Mr. Jackson," Captain Doane commanded the mate, "will you sound the +well." + +The mate obeyed, although he kept an anxious eye on the whale, which had +gone off at a tangent and was smoking away to the eastward. + +"You see, that's what you get," Grimshaw snarled at Nishikanta. + +Nishikanta nodded, as he wiped the sweat away, and muttered, "And I'm +satisfied. I got all I want. I didn't think a whale had it in it. I'll +never do it again." + +"Maybe you'll never have the chance," the captain retorted. "We're not +done with this one yet. The one that charged the _Essex_ made charge +after charge, and I guess whale nature hasn't changed any in the last few +years." + +"Dry as a bone, sir," Mr. Jackson reported the result of his sounding. + +"There she turns," Daughtry called out. + +Half a mile away, the whale circled about sharply and charged back. + +"Stand from under for'ard there!" Captain Doane shouted to one of the +sailors who had just emerged from the forecastle scuttle, sea-bag in +hand, and over whom the fore-topmast was swaying giddily. + +"He's packed for the get-away," Daughtry murmured to the Ancient Mariner. +"Like a rat leaving a ship." + +"We're all rats," was the reply. "I learned just that when I was a rat +among the mangy rats of the poor-farm." + +By this time, all men on board had communicated to Michael their +contagion of excitement and fear. Back on top of the cabin so that he +might see, he snarled at the cow whale when the men seized fresh grips +against the impending shock and when he saw her close at hand and +oncoming. + +The _Mary Turner_ was struck aft of the mizzen shrouds. As she was +hurled down to starboard, whither Michael was ignominiously flung, the +crack of shattered timbers was plainly heard. Henrik Gjertsen, at the +wheel, clutching the wheel with all his strength, was spun through the +air as the wheel was spun by the fling of the rudder. He fetched up +against Captain Doane, whose grip had been torn loose from the rail. Both +men crumpled down on deck with the wind knocked out of them. Nishikanta +leaned cursing against the side of the cabin, the nails of both hands +torn off at the quick by the breaking of his grip on the rail. + +While Daughtry was passing a turn of rope around the Ancient Mariner and +the mizzen rigging and giving the turn to him to hold, Captain Doane +crawled gasping to the rail and dragged himself erect. + +"That fetched her," he whispered huskily to the mate, hand pressed to his +side to control his pain. "Sound the well again, and keep on sounding." + +More of the sailors took advantage of the interval to rush for'ard under +the toppling fore-topmast, dive into the forecastle, and hastily pack +their sea-bags. As Ah Moy emerged from the steerage with his own rotund +sea-bag, Daughtry dispatched Kwaque to pack the belongings of both of +them. + +"Dry as a bone, sir," came the mate's report. + +"Keep on sounding, Mr. Jackson," the captain ordered, his voice already +stronger as he recovered from the shock of his collision with the +helmsman. "Keep right on sounding. Here she comes again, and the +schooner ain't built that'd stand such hammering." + +By this time Daughtry had Michael tucked under one arm, his free arm +ready to anticipate the next crash by swinging on to the rigging. + +In making its circle to come back, the cow lost her bearings sufficiently +to miss the stern of the _Mary Turner_ by twenty feet. Nevertheless, the +bore of her displacement lifted the schooner's stern gently and made her +dip her bow to the sea in a stately curtsey. + +"If she'd a-hit . . . " Captain Doane murmured and ceased. + +"It'd a-ben good night," Daughtry concluded for him. "She's a-knocked +our stern clean off of us, sir." + +Again wheeling, this time at no more than two hundred yards, the whale +charged back, not completing her semi-circle sufficiently, so that she +bore down upon the schooner's bow from starboard. Her back hit the stem +and seemed just barely to scrape the martingale, yet the _Mary Turner_ +sat down till the sea washed level with her stern-rail. Nor was this +all. Martingale, bob-stays and all parted, as well as all starboard +stays to the bowsprit, so that the bowsprit swung out to port at right +angles and uplifted to the drag of the remaining topmast stays. The +topmast anticked high in the air for a space, then crashed down to deck, +permitting the bowsprit to dip into the sea, go clear with the butt of it +of the forecastle head, and drag alongside. + +"Shut up that dog!" Nishikanta ordered Daughtry savagery. "If you don't +. . . " + +Michael, in Steward's arms, was snarling and growling intimidatingly, not +merely at the cow whale but at all the hostile and menacing universe that +had thrown panic into the two-legged gods of his floating world. + +"Just for that," Daughtry snarled back, "I'll let 'm sing. You made this +mess, and if you lift a hand to my dog you'll miss seeing the end of the +mess you started, you dirty pawnbroker, you." + +"Perfectly right, perfectly right," the Ancient Mariner nodded +approbation. "Do you think, steward, you could get a width of canvas, or +a blanket, or something soft and broad with which to replace this rope? +It cuts me too sharply in the spot where my three ribs are missing." + +Daughtry thrust Michael into the old man's arm. + +"Hold him, sir," the steward said. "If that pawnbroker makes a move +against Killeny Boy, spit in his face, bite him, anything. I'll be back +in a jiffy, sir, before he can hurt you and before the whale can hit us +again. And let Killeny Boy make all the noise he wants. One hair of +him's worth more than a world-full of skunks of money-lenders." + +Daughtry dashed into the cabin, came back with a pillow and three sheets, +and, using the first as a pad and knotting the last together in swift +weaver's knots, he left the Ancient Mariner safe and soft and took +Michael back into his own arms. + +"She's making water, sir," the mate called. "Six inches--no, seven +inches, sir." + +There was a rush of sailors across the wreckage of the fore-topmast to +the forecastle to pack their bags. + +"Swing out that starboard boat, Mr. Jackson," the captain commanded, +staring after the foaming course of the cow as she surged away for a +fresh onslaught. "But don't lower it. Hold it overside in the falls, or +that damned fish'll smash it. Just swing it out, ready and waiting, let +the men get their bags, then stow food and water aboard of her." + +Lashings were cast off the boat and the falls attached, when the men fled +to holding-vantage just ere the whale arrived. She struck the _Mary +Turner_ squarely amidships on the port beam, so that, from the poop, one +saw, as well as heard, her long side bend and spring back like a limber +fabric. The starboard rail buried under the sea as the schooner heeled +to the blow, and, as she righted with a violent lurch, the water swashed +across the deck to the knees of the sailors about the boat and spouted +out of the port scuppers. + +"Heave away!" Captain Doane ordered from the poop. "Up with her! Swing +her out! Hold your turns! Make fast!" + +The boat was outboard, its gunwale resting against the _Mary Turner's_ +rail. + +"Ten inches, sir, and making fast," was the mate's information, as he +gauged the sounding-rod. + +"I'm going after my tools," Captain Doane announced, as he started for +the cabin. Half into the scuttle, he paused to add with a sneer for +Nishikanta's benefit, "And for my one chronometer." + +"A foot and a half, and making," the mate shouted aft to him. + +"We'd better do some packing ourselves," Grimshaw, following on the +captain, said to Nishikanta. + +"Steward," Nishikanta said, "go below and pack my bedding. I'll take +care of the rest." + +"Mr. Nishikanta, you can go to hell, sir, and all the rest as well," was +Daughtry's quiet response, although in the same breath he was saying, +respectfully and assuringly, to the Ancient Mariner: "You hold Killeny, +sir. I'll take care of your dunnage. Is there anything special you want +to save, sir?" + +Jackson joined the four men below, and as the five of them, in haste and +trepidation, packed articles of worth and comfort, the _Mary Turner_ was +struck again. Caught below without warning, all were flung fiercely to +port and from Simon Nishikanta's room came wailing curses of announcement +of the hurt to his ribs against his bunk-rail. But this was drowned by a +prodigious smashing and crashing on deck. + +"Kindling wood--there won't be anything else left of her," Captain Doane +commented in the ensuing calm, as he crept gingerly up the companionway +with his chronometer cuddled on an even keel to his breast. + +Placing it in the custody of a sailor, he returned below and was helped +up with his sea-chest by the steward. In turn, he helped the steward up +with the Ancient Mariner's sea-chest. Next, aided by anxious sailors, he +and Daughtry dropped into the lazarette through the cabin floor, and +began breaking out and passing up a stream of supplies--cases of salmon +and beef, of marmalade and biscuit, of butter and preserved milk, and of +all sorts of the tinned, desiccated, evaporated, and condensed stuff that +of modern times goes down to the sea in ships for the nourishment of men. + +Daughtry and the captain emerged last from the cabin, and both stared +upward for a moment at the gaps in the slender, sky-scraping top-hamper, +where, only minutes before, the main- and mizzen-topmasts had been. A +second moment they devoted to the wreckage of the same on deck--the +mizzen-topmast, thrust through the spanker and supported vertically by +the stout canvas, thrashing back and forth with each thrash of the sail, +the main-topmast squarely across the ruined companionway to the steerage. + +While the mother-whale expressing her bereavement in terms of violence +and destruction, was withdrawing the necessary distance for another +charge, all hands of the _Mary Turner_ gathered about the starboard boat +swung outboard ready for lowering. A respectable hill of case goods, +water-kegs, and personal dunnage was piled on the deck alongside. A +glance at this, and at the many men of fore and aft, demonstrated that it +was to be a perilously overloaded boat. + +"We want the sailors with us, at any rate--they can row," said Simon +Nishikanta. + +"But do we want you?" Grimshaw queried gloomily. "You take up too much +room, for your size, and you're a beast anyway." + +"I guess I'll be wanted," the pawnbroker observed, as he jerked open his +shirt, tearing out the four buttons in his impetuousness and showing a +Colt's .44 automatic, strapped in its holster against the bare skin of +his side under his left arm, the butt of the weapon most readily +accessible to any hasty dip of his right hand. "I guess I'll be wanted. +But just the same we can dispense with the undesirables." + +"If you will have your will," the wheat-farmer conceded sardonically, +although his big hand clenched involuntarily as if throttling a throat. +"Besides, if we should run short of food you will prove desirable--for +the quantity of you, I mean, and not otherwise. Now just who would you +consider undesirable?--the black nigger? He ain't got a gun." + +But his pleasantries were cut short by the whale's next attack--another +smash at the stern that carried away the rudder and destroyed the +steering gear. + +"How much water?" Captain Doane queried of the mate. + +"Three feet, sir--I just sounded," came the answer. "I think, sir, it +would be advisable to part-load the boat; then, right after the next time +the whale hits us, lower away on the run, chuck the rest of the dunnage +in, and ourselves, and get clear." + +Captain Doane nodded. + +"It will be lively work," he said. "Stand ready, all of you. Steward, +you jump aboard first and I'll pass the chronometer to you." + +Nishikanta bellicosely shouldered his vast bulk up to the captain, opened +his shirt, and exposed his revolver. + +"There's too many for the boat," he said, "and the steward's one of 'em +that don't go along. Get that. Hold it in your head. The steward's one +of 'em that don't go along." + +Captain Doane coolly surveyed the big automatic, while at the fore of his +consciousness burned a vision of his flat buildings in San Francisco. + +He shrugged his shoulders. "The boat would be overloaded, with all this +truck, anyway. Go ahead, if you want to make it your party, but just +bear in mind that I'm the navigator, and that, if you ever want to lay +eyes on your string of pawnshops, you'd better see that gentle care is +taken of me.--Steward!" + +Daughtry stepped close. + +"There won't be room for you . . . and for one or two others, I'm sorry +to say." + +"Glory be!" said Daughtry. "I was just fearin' you'd be wantin' me +along, sir.--Kwaque, you take 'm my fella dunnage belong me, put 'm in +other fella boat along other side." + +While Kwaque obeyed, the mate sounded the well for the last time, +reporting three feet and a half, and the lighter freightage of the +starboard boat was tossed in by the sailors. + +A rangy, gangly, Scandinavian youth of a sailor, droop-shouldered, six +feet six and slender as a lath, with pallid eyes of palest blue and skin +and hair attuned to the same colour scheme, joined Kwaque in his work. + +"Here, you Big John," the mate interfered. "This is your boat. You work +here." + +The lanky one smiled in embarrassment as he haltingly explained: "I tank +I lak go along cooky." + +"Sure, let him go, the more the easier," Nishikanta took charge of the +situation. "Anybody else?" + +"Sure," Dag Daughtry sneered to his face. "I reckon what's left of the +beer goes with my boat . . . unless you want to argue the matter." + +"For two cents--" Nishikanta spluttered in affected rage. + +"Not for two billion cents would you risk a scrap with me, you +money-sweater, you," was Daughtry's retort. "You've got their goats, but +I've got your number. Not for two billion billion cents would you excite +me into callin' it right now.--Big John! Just carry that case of beer +across, an' that half case, and store in my boat.--Nishikanta, just start +something, if you've got the nerve." + +Simon Nishikanta did not dare, nor did he know what to do; but he was +saved from his perplexity by the shout: + +"Here she comes!" + +All rushed to holding-ground, and held, while the whale broke more +timbers and the _Mary Turner_ rolled sluggishly down and back again. + +"Lower away! On the run! Lively!" + +Captain Doane's orders were swiftly obeyed. The starboard boat, fended +off by sailors, rose and fell in the water alongside while the remainder +of the dunnage and provisions showered into her. + +"Might as well lend a hand, sir, seein' you're bent on leaving in such a +hurry," said Daughtry, taking the chronometer from Captain Doane's hand +and standing ready to pass it down to him as soon as he was in the boat. + +"Come on, Greenleaf," Grimshaw called up to the Ancient Mariner. + +"No, thanking you very kindly, sir," came the reply. "I think there'll +be more room in the other boat." + +"We want the cook!" Nishikanta cried out from the stern sheets. "Come +on, you yellow monkey! Jump in!" + +Little old shrivelled Ah Moy debated. He visibly thought, although none +knew the intrinsicness of his thinking as he stared at the gun of the fat +pawnbroker and at the leprosy of Kwaque and Daughtry, and weighed the one +against the other and tossed the light and heavy loads of the two boats +into the balance. + +"Me go other boat," said Ah Moy, starting to drag his bag away across the +deck. + +"Cast off," Captain Doane commanded. + +Scraps, the big Newfoundland puppy, who had played and pranced about +through all the excitement, seeing so many of the _Mary Turner's_ humans +in the boat alongside, sprang over the rail, low and close to the water, +and landed sprawling on the mass of sea-bags and goods cases. + +The boot rocked, and Nishikanta, his automatic in his hand, cried out: + +"Back with him! Throw him on board!" + +The sailors obeyed, and the astounded Scraps, after a brief flight +through the air, found himself arriving on his back on the _Mary +Turner's_ deck. At any rate, he took it for no more than a rough joke, +and rolled about ecstatically, squirming vermicularly, in anticipation of +what new delights of play were to be visited upon him. He reached out, +with an enticing growl of good fellowship, for Michael, who was now free +on deck, and received in return a forbidding and crusty snarl. + +"Guess we'll have to add him to our collection, eh, sir?" Daughtry +observed, sparing a moment to pat reassurance on the big puppy's head and +being rewarded with a caressing lick on his hand from the puppy's +blissful tongue. + +No first-class ship's steward can exist without possessing a more than +average measure of executive ability. Dag Daughtry was a first-class +ship's steward. Placing the Ancient Mariner in a nook of safety, and +setting Big John to unlashing the remaining boat and hooking on the +falls, he sent Kwaque into the hold to fill kegs of water from the scant +remnant of supply, and Ah Moy to clear out the food in the galley. + +The starboard boat, cluttered with men, provisions, and property and +being rapidly rowed away from the danger centre, which was the _Mary +Turner_, was scarcely a hundred yards away, when the whale, missing the +schooner clean, turned at full speed and close range, churning the water, +and all but collided with the boat. So near did she come that the rowers +on the side next to her pulled in their oars. The surge she raised, +heeled the loaded boat gunwale under, so that a degree of water was +shipped ere it righted. Nishikanta, automatic still in hand, standing up +in the sternsheets by the comfortable seat he had selected for himself, +was staggered by the lurch of the boat. In his instinctive, spasmodic +effort to maintain balance, he relaxed his clutch on the pistol, which +fell into the sea. + +"_Ha-ah_!" Daughtry girded. "What price Nishikanta? I got his number, +and he's lost you fellows' goats. He's your meat now. Easy meat? I +should say! And when it comes to the eating, eat him first. Sure, he's +a skunk, and will taste like one, but many's the honest man that's eaten +skunk and pulled through a tight place. But you'd better soak 'im all +night in salt water, first." + +Grimshaw, whose seat in the sternsheets was none of the best, grasped the +situation simultaneously with Daughtry, and, with a quick upstanding, and +hooking out-reach of hand, caught the fat pawnbroker around the back of +the neck, and with anything but gentle suasion jerked him half into the +air and flung him face downward on the bottom boards. + +"Ha-ah!" said Daughtry across the hundred yards of ocean. + +Next, and without hurry, Grimshaw took the more comfortable seat for +himself. + +"Want to come along?" he called to Daughtry. + +"No, thank you, sir," was the latter's reply. "There's too many of us, +an' we'll make out better in the other boat." + +With some bailing, and with others bending to the oars, the boat rowed +frantically away, while Daughtry took Ah Moy with him down into the +lazarette beneath the cabin floor and broke out and passed up more +provisions. + +It was when he was thus below that the cow grazed the schooner just +for'ard of amidships on the port side, lashed out with her mighty tail as +she sounded, and ripped clean away the chain plates and rail of the +mizzen-shrouds. In the next roll of the huge, glassy sea, the mizzen- +mast fell overside. + +"My word, some whale," Daughtry said to Ah Moy, as they emerged from the +cabin companionway and gazed at this latest wreckage. + +Ah Moy found need to get more food from the galley, when Daughtry, +Kwaque, and Big John swung their weight on the falls, one at a time, and +hoisted the port boat, one end at a time, over the rail and swung her +out. + +"We'll wait till the next smash, then lower away, throw everything in, +an' get outa this," the steward told the Ancient Mariner. "Lots of time. +The schooner'll sink no faster when she's awash than she's sinkin' now." + +Even as he spoke, the scuppers were nearly level with the ocean, and her +rolling in the big sea was sluggish. + +"Hey!" he called with sudden forethought across the widening stretch of +sea to Captain Doane. "What's the course to the Marquesas? Right now? +And how far away, sir?" + +"Nor'-nor'-east-quarter-east!" came the faint reply. "Will fetch Nuka- +Hiva! About two hundred miles! Haul on the south-east trade with a good +full and you'll make it!" + +"Thank you, sir," was the steward's acknowledgment, ere he ran aft, +disrupted the binnacle, and carried the steering compass back to the +boat. + +Almost, from the whale's delay in renewing her charging, did they think +she had given over. And while they waited and watched her rolling on the +sea an eighth of a mile away, the _Mary Turner_ steadily sank. + +"We might almost chance it," Daughtry was debating aloud to Big John, +when a new voice entered the discussion. + +"Cocky!--Cocky!" came plaintive tones from below out of the steerage +companion. + +"Devil be damned!" was the next, uttered in irritation and anger. "Devil +be damned! Devil be damned!" + +"Of course not," was Daughtry's judgment, as he dashed across the deck, +crawled through the confusion of the main-topmast and its many stays that +blocked the way, and found the tiny, white morsel of life perched on a +bunk-edge, ruffling its feathers, erecting and flattening its rosy crest, +and cursing in honest human speech the waywardness of the world and of +ships and humans upon the sea. + +The cockatoo stepped upon Daughtry's inviting index finger, swiftly +ascended his shirt sleeve, and, on his shoulder, claws sunk into the +flimsy shirt fabric till they hurt the flesh beneath, leaned head to ear +and uttered in gratitude and relief, and in self-identification: "Cocky. +Cocky." + +"You son of a gun," Daughtry crooned. + +"Glory be!" Cooky replied, in tones so like Daughtry's as to startle him. + +"You son of a gun," Daughtry repeated, cuddling his cheek and ear against +the cockatoo's feathered and crested head. "And some folks thinks it's +only folks that count in this world." + +Still the whale delayed, and, with the ocean washing their toes on the +level deck, Daughtry ordered the boat lowered away. Ah Moy was eager in +his haste to leap into the bow. Nor was Daughtry's judgment correct that +the little Chinaman's haste was due to fear of the sinking ship. What Ah +Moy sought was the place in the boat remotest from Kwaque and the +steward. + +Shoving clear, they roughly stored the supplies and dunnage out of the +way of the thwarts and took their places, Ah Moy pulling bow-oar, next in +order Big John and Kwaque, with Daughtry (Cocky still perched on his +shoulder) at stroke. On top of the dunnage, in the sternsheets, Michael +gazed wistfully at the _Mary Turner_ and continued to snarl crustily at +Scraps who idiotically wanted to start a romp. The Ancient Mariner stood +up at the steering sweep and gave the order, when all was ready, for the +first dip of the oars. + +A growl and a bristle from Michael warned them that the whale was not +only coming but was close upon them. But it was not charging. Instead, +it circled slowly about the schooner as if examining its antagonist. + +"I'll bet it's head's sore from all that banging, an' it's beginnin' to +feel it," Daughtry grinned, chiefly for the purpose of keeping his +comrades unafraid. + +Barely had they rowed a dozen strokes, when an exclamation from Big John +led them to follow his gaze to the schooners forecastle-head, where the +forecastle cat flashed across in pursuit of a big rat. Other rats they +saw, evidently driven out of their lairs by the rising water. + +"We just can't leave that cat behind," Daughtry soliloquized in +suggestive tones. + +"Certainly not," the Ancient Mariner responded swinging his weight on the +steering-sweep and heading the boat back. + +Twice the whale gently rolled them in the course of its leisurely +circling, ere they bent to their oars again and pulled away. Of them the +whale seemed to take no notice. It was from the huge thing, the +schooner, that death had been wreaked upon her calf; and it was upon the +schooner that she vented the wrath of her grief. + +Even as they pulled away, the whale turned and headed across the ocean. +At a half-mile distance she curved about and charged back. + +"With all that water in her, the schooner'll have a real kick-back in her +when she's hit," Daughtry said. "Lordy me, rest on your oars an' watch." + +Delivered squarely amidships, it was the hardest blow the _Mary Turner_ +had received. Stays and splinters of rail flew in the air as she rolled +so far over as to expose half her copper wet-glistening in the sun. As +she righted sluggishly, the mainmast swayed drunkenly in the air but did +not fall. + +"A knock-out!" Daughtry cried, at sight of the whale flurrying the water +with aimless, gigantic splashings. "It must a-smashed both of 'em." + +"Schooner he finish close up altogether," Kwaque observed, as the _Mary +Turner's_ rail disappeared. + +Swiftly she sank, and no more than a matter of moments was it when the +stump of her mainmast was gone. Remained only the whale, floating and +floundering, on the surface of the sea. + +"It's nothing to brag about," Daughtry delivered himself of the _Mary +Turner's_ epitaph. "Nobody'd believe us. A stout little craft like that +sunk, deliberately sunk, by an old cow-whale! No, sir. I never believed +that old moss-back in Honolulu, when he claimed he was a survivor of the +sinkin' of the _Essex_, an' no more will anybody believe me." + +"The pretty schooner, the pretty clever craft," mourned the Ancient +Mariner. "Never were there more dainty and lovable topmasts on a three- +masted schooner, and never was there a three-masted schooner that worked +like the witch she was to windward." + +Dag Daughtry, who had kept always footloose and never married, surveyed +the boat-load of his responsibilities to which he was anchored--Kwaque, +the Black Papuan monstrosity whom he had saved from the bellies of his +fellows; Ah Moy, the little old sea-cook whose age was problematical only +by decades; the Ancient Mariner, the dignified, the beloved, and the +respected; gangly Big John, the youthful Scandinavian with the inches of +a giant and the mind of a child; Killeny Boy, the wonder of dogs; Scraps, +the outrageously silly and fat-rolling puppy; Cocky, the white-feathered +mite of life, imperious as a steel-blade and wheedlingly seductive as a +charming child; and even the forecastle cat, the lithe and tawny slayer +of rats, sheltering between the legs of Ah Moy. And the Marquesas were +two hundred miles distant full-hauled on the tradewind which had ceased +but which was as sure to live again as the morning sun in the sky. + +The steward heaved a sigh, and whimsically shot into his mind the memory- +picture in his nursery-book of the old woman who lived in a shoe. He +wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand, and was +dimly aware of the area of the numbness that bordered the centre that was +sensationless between his eyebrows, as he said: + +"Well, children, rowing won't fetch us to the Marquesas. We'll need a +stretch of wind for that. But it's up to us, right now, to put a mile or +so between us an' that peevish old cow. Maybe she'll revive, and maybe +she won't, but just the same I can't help feelin' leary about her." + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +Two days later, as the steamer _Mariposa_ plied her customary route +between Tahiti and San Francisco, the passengers ceased playing deck +quoits, abandoned their card games in the smoker, their novels and deck +chairs, and crowded the rail to stare at the small boat that skimmed to +them across the sea before a light following breeze. When Big John, +aided by Ah Moy and Kwaque, lowered the sail and unstepped the mast, +titters and laughter arose from the passengers. It was contrary to all +their preconceptions of mid-ocean rescue of ship-wrecked mariners from +the open boat. + +It caught their fancy that this boat was the Ark, what of its freightage +of bedding, dry goods boxes, beer-cases, a cat, two dogs, a white +cockatoo, a Chinaman, a kinky-headed black, a gangly pallid-haired giant, +a grizzled Dag Daughtry, and an Ancient Mariner who looked every inch the +part. Him a facetious, vacationing architect's clerk dubbed Noah, and so +greeted him. + +"I say, Noah," he called. "Some flood, eh? Located Ararat yet?" + +"Catch any fish?" bawled another youngster down over the rail. + +"Gracious! Look at the beer! Good English beer! Put me down for a +case!" + +Never was a more popular wrecked crew more merrily rescued at sea. The +young blades would have it that none other than old Noah himself had come +on board with the remnants of the Lost Tribes, and to elderly female +passengers spun hair-raising accounts of the sinking of an entire tropic +island by volcanic and earthquake action. + +"I'm a steward," Dag Daughtry told the _Mariposa's_ captain, "and I'll be +glad and grateful to berth along with your stewards in the glory-hole. +Big John there's a sailorman, an' the fo'c's'le 'll do him. The Chink is +a ship's cook, and the nigger belongs to me. But Mr. Greenleaf, sir, is +a gentleman, and the best of cabin fare and staterooms'll be none too +good for him, sir." + +And when the news went around that these were part of the survivors of +the three-masted schooner, _Mary Turner_, smashed into kindling wood and +sunk by a whale, the elderly females no more believed than had they the +yarn of the sunken island. + +"Captain Hayward," one of them demanded of the steamer's skipper, "could +a whale sink the _Mariposa_?" + +"She has never been so sunk," was his reply. + +"I knew it!" she declared emphatically. "It's not the way of ships to go +around being sunk by whales, is it, captain?" + +"No, madam, I assure you it is not," was his response. "Nevertheless, +all the five men insist upon it." + +"Sailors are notorious for their unveracity, are they not?" the lady +voiced her flat conclusion in the form of a tentative query. + +"Worst liars I ever saw, madam. Do you know, after forty years at sea, I +couldn't believe myself under oath." + +* * * * * + +Nine days later the _Mariposa_ threaded the Golden Gate and docked at San +Francisco. Humorous half-columns in the local papers, written in the +customary silly way by unlicked cub reporters just out of grammar school, +tickled the fancy of San Francisco for a fleeting moment in that the +steamship _Mariposa_ had rescued some sea-waifs possessed of a cock-and- +bull story that not even the reporters believed. Thus, silly reportorial +unveracity usually proves extraordinary truth a liar. It is the way of +cub reporters, city newspapers, and flat-floor populations which get +their thrills from moving pictures and for which the real world and all +its spaciousness does not exist. + +"Sunk by a whale!" demanded the average flat-floor person. "Nonsense, +that's all. Just plain rotten nonsense. Now, in the 'Adventures of +Eleanor,' which is some film, believe me, I'll tell you what I saw happen +. . . " + +So Daughtry and his crew went ashore into 'Frisco Town uheralded and +unsung, the second following morning's lucubrations of the sea reporters +being varied disportations upon the attack on an Italian crab fisherman +by an enormous jellyfish. Big John promptly sank out of sight in a +sailors' boarding-house, and, within the week, joined the Sailors' Union +and shipped on a steam schooner to load redwood ties at Bandon, Oregon. +Ah Moy got no farther ashore than the detention sheds of the Federal +Immigration Board, whence he was deported to China on the next Pacific +Mail steamer. The _Mary Turner's_ cat was adopted by the sailors' +forecastle of the _Mariposa_, and on the _Mariposa_ sailed away on the +back trip to Tahiti. Scraps was taken ashore by a quartermaster and left +in the bosom of his family. + +And ashore went Dag Daughtry, with his small savings, to rent two cheap +rooms for himself and his remaining responsibilities, namely, Charles +Stough Greenleaf, Kwaque, Michael, and, not least, Cocky. But not for +long did he permit the Ancient Mariner to live with him. + +"It's not playing the game, sir," he told him. "What we need is capital. +We've got to interest capital, and you've got to do the interesting. Now +this very day you've got to buy a couple of suit-cases, hire a taxicab, +go sailing up to the front door of the Bronx Hotel like good pay and be +damned. She's a real stylish hotel, but reasonable if you want to make +it so. A little room, an inside room, European plan, of course, and then +you can economise by eatin' out." + +"But, steward, I have no money," the Ancient Mariner protested. + +"That's all right, sir; I'll back you for all I can." + +"But, my dear man, you know I'm an old impostor. I can't stick you up +like the others. You . . . why . . . why, you're a friend, don't you +see?" + +"Sure I do, and I thank you for sayin' it, sir. And that's why I'm with +you. And when you've nailed another crowd of treasure-hunters and got +the ship ready, you'll just ship me along as steward, with Kwaque, and +Killeny Boy, and the rest of our family. You've adopted me, now, an' I'm +your grown-up son, an' you've got to listen to me. The Bronx is the +hotel for you--fine-soundin' name, ain't it? That's atmosphere. Folk'll +listen half to you an' more to your hotel. I tell you, you leaning back +in a big leather chair talkin' treasure with a two-bit cigar in your +mouth an' a twenty-cent drink beside you, why that's like treasure. They +just got to believe. An' if you'll come along now, sir, we'll trot out +an' buy them suit-cases." + +Right bravely the Ancient Mariner drove to the Bronx in a taxi, +registered his "Charles Stough Greenleaf" in an old-fashioned hand, and +took up anew the activities which for years had kept him free of the poor- +farm. No less bravely did Dag Daughtry set out to seek work. This was +most necessary, because he was a man of expensive luxuries. His family +of Kwaque, Michael, and Cocky required food and shelter; more costly than +that was maintenance of the Ancient Mariner in the high-class hotel; and, +in addition, was his six-quart thirst. + +But it was a time of industrial depression. The unemployed problem was +bulking bigger than usual to the citizens of San Francisco. And, as +regarded steamships and sailing vessels, there were three stewards for +every Steward's position. Nothing steady could Daughtry procure, while +his occasional odd jobs did not balance his various running expenses. +Even did he do pick-and-shovel work, for the municipality, for three +days, when he had to give way, according to the impartial procedure, to +another needy one whom three days' work would keep afloat a little +longer. + +Daughtry would have put Kwaque to work, except that Kwaque was +impossible. The black, who had only seen Sydney from steamers' decks, +had never been in a city in his life. All he knew of the world was +steamers, far-outlying south-sea isles, and his own island of King +William in Melanesia. So Kwaque remained in the two rooms, cooking and +housekeeping for his master and caring for Michael and Cocky. All of +which was prison for Michael, who had been used to the run of ships, of +coral beaches and plantations. + +But in the evenings, sometimes accompanied a few steps in the rear by +Kwaque, Michael strolled out with Steward. The multiplicity of man-gods +on the teeming sidewalks became a real bore to Michael, so that man-gods, +in general, underwent a sharp depreciation. But Steward, the particular +god of his fealty and worship, appreciated. Amongst so many gods Michael +felt bewildered, while Steward's Abrahamic bosom became more than ever +the one sure haven where harshness and danger never troubled. + +"Mind your step," is the last word and warning of twentieth-century city +life. Michael was not slow to learn it, as he conserved his own feet +among the countless thousands of leather-shod feet of men, ever hurrying, +always unregarding of the existence and right of way of a lowly, four- +legged Irish terrier. + +The evening outings with Steward invariably led from saloon to saloon, +where, at long bars, standing on sawdust floors, or seated at tables, men +drank and talked. Much of both did men do, and also did Steward do, ere, +his daily six-quart stint accomplished, he turned homeward for bed. Many +were the acquaintances he made, and Michael with him. Coasting seamen +and bay sailors they mostly were, although there were many 'longshoremen +and waterfront workmen among them. + +From one of these, a scow-schooner captain who plied up and down the bay +and the San Joaquin and Sacramento rivers, Daughtry had the promise of +being engaged as cook and sailor on the schooner _Howard_. Eighty tons +of freight, including deckload, she carried, and in all democracy Captain +Jorgensen, the cook, and the two other sailors, loaded and unloaded her +at all hours, and sailed her night and day on all times and tides, one +man steering while three slept and recuperated. It was time, and double- +time, and over-time beyond that, but the feeding was generous and the +wages ran from forty-five to sixty dollars a month. + +"Sure, you bet," said Captain Jorgensen. "This cook-feller, Hanson, +pretty quick I smash him up an' fire him, then you can come along . . . +and the bow-wow, too." Here he dropped a hearty, wholesome hand of toil +down to a caress of Michael's head. "That's one fine bow-wow. A bow-wow +is good on a scow when all hands sleep alongside the dock or in an anchor +watch." + +"Fire Hanson now," Dag Daughtry urged. + +But Captain Jorgensen shook his slow head slowly. "First I smash him +up." + +"Then smash him now and fire him," Daughtry persisted. "There he is +right now at the corner of the bar." + +"No. He must give me reason. I got plenty of reason. But I want reason +all hands can see. I want him make me smash him, so that all hands say, +'Hurrah, Captain, you done right.' Then you get the job, Daughtry." + +Had Captain Jorgensen not been dilatory in his contemplated smashing, and +had not Hanson delayed in giving sufficient provocation for a smashing, +Michael would have accompanied Steward upon the schooner, _Howard_, and +all Michael's subsequent experiences would have been totally different +from what they were destined to be. But destined they were, by chance +and by combinations of chance events over which Michael had no control +and of which he had no more awareness than had Steward himself. At that +period, the subsequent stage career and nightmare of cruelty for Michael +was beyond any wildest forecast or apprehension. And as to forecasting +Dag Daughtry's fate, along with Kwaque, no maddest drug-dream could have +approximated it. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +One night Dag Daughtry sat at a table in the saloon called the +Pile-drivers' Home. He was in a parlous predicament. Harder than ever +had it been to secure odd jobs, and he had reached the end of his +savings. Earlier in the evening he had had a telephone conference with +the Ancient Mariner, who had reported only progress with an exceptionally +strong nibble that very day from a retired quack doctor. + +"Let me pawn my rings," the Ancient Mariner had urged, not for the first +time, over the telephone. + +"No, sir," had been Daughtry's reply. "We need them in the business. +They're stock in trade. They're atmosphere. They're what you call a +figure of speech. I'll do some thinking to-night an' see you in the +morning, sir. Hold on to them rings an' don't be no more than casual in +playin' that doctor. Make 'm come to you. It's the only way. Now +you're all right, an' everything's hunkydory an' the goose hangs high. +Don't you worry, sir. Dag Daughtry never fell down yet." + +But, as he sat in the Pile-drivers' Home, it looked as if his fall-down +was very near. In his pocket was precisely the room-rent for the +following week, the advance payment of which was already three days +overdue and clamorously demanded by the hard-faced landlady. In the +rooms, with care, was enough food with which to pinch through for another +day. The Ancient Mariner's modest hotel bill had not been paid for two +weeks--a prodigious sum under the circumstances, being a first-class +hotel; while the Ancient Mariner had no more than a couple of dollars in +his pocket with which to make a sound like prosperity in the ears of the +retired doctor who wanted to go a-treasuring. + +Most catastrophic of all, however, was the fact that Dag Daughtry was +three quarts short of his daily allowance and did not dare break into the +rent money which was all that stood between him and his family and the +street. This was why he sat at the beer table with Captain Jorgensen, +who was just returned with a schooner-load of hay from the Petaluma +Flats. He had already bought beer twice, and evinced no further show of +thirst. Instead, he was yawning from long hours of work and waking and +looking at his watch. And Daughtry was three quarts short! Besides, +Hanson had not yet been smashed, so that the cook-job on the schooner +still lay ahead an unknown distance in the future. + +In his desperation, Daughtry hit upon an idea with which to get another +schooner of steam beer. He did not like steam beer, but it was cheaper +than lager. + +"Look here, Captain," he said. "You don't know how smart that Killeny +Boy is. Why, he can count just like you and me." + +"Hoh!" rumbled Captain Jorgensen. "I seen 'em do it in side shows. It's +all tricks. Dogs an' horses can't count." + +"This dog can," Daughtry continued quietly. "You can't fool 'm. I bet +you, right now, I can order two beers, loud so he can hear and notice, +and then whisper to the waiter to bring one, an', when the one comes, +Killeny Boy'll raise a roar with the waiter." + +"Hoh! Hoh! How much will you bet?" + +The steward fingered a dime in his pocket. If Killeny failed him it +meant that the rent-money would be broken in upon. But Killeny couldn't +and wouldn't fail him, he reasoned, as he answered: + +"I'll bet you the price of two beers." + +The waiter was summoned, and, when he had received his secret +instructions, Michael was called over from where he lay at Kwaque's feet +in a corner. When Steward placed a chair for him at the table and +invited him into it, he began to key up. Steward expected something of +him, wanted him to show off. And it was not because of the showing off +that he was eager, but because of his love for Steward. Love and service +were one in the simple processes of Michael's mind. Just as he would +have leaped into fire for Steward's sake, so would he now serve Steward +in any way Steward desired. That was what love meant to him. It was all +love meant to him--service. + +"Waiter!" Steward called; and, when the waiter stood close at hand: "Two +beers.--Did you get that, Killeny? _Two_ beers." + +Michael squirmed in his chair, placed an impulsive paw on the table, and +impulsively flashed out his ribbon of tongue to Steward's close-bending +face. + +"He will remember," Daughtry told the scow-schooner captain. + +"Not if we talk," was the reply. "Now we will fool your bow-wow. I will +say that the job is yours when I smash Hanson. And you will say it is +for me to smash Hanson now. And I will say Hanson must give me reason +first to smash him. And then we will argue like two fools with mouths +full of much noise. Are you ready?" + +Daughtry nodded, and thereupon ensued a loud-voiced discussion that drew +Michael's earnest attention from one talker to the other. + +"I got you," Captain Jorgensen announced, as he saw the waiter +approaching with but a single schooner of beer. "The bow-wow has forgot, +if he ever remembered. He thinks you an' me is fighting. The place in +his mind for _one_ beer, and _two_, is wiped out, like a wave on the +beach wipes out the writing in the sand." + +"I guess he ain't goin' to forget arithmetic no matter how much noise you +shouts," Daughtry argued aloud against his sinking spirits. "An' I ain't +goin' to butt in," he added hopefully. "You just watch 'm for himself." + +The tall, schooner-glass of beer was placed before the captain, who laid +a swift, containing hand around it. And Michael, strung as a taut +string, knowing that something was expected of him, on his toes to serve, +remembered his ancient lessons on the _Makambo_, vainly looked into the +impassive face of Steward for a sign, then looked about and saw, not +_two_ glasses, but _one_ glass. So well had he learned the difference +between one and two that it came to him--how the profoundest psychologist +can no more state than can he state what thought is in itself--that there +was one glass only when two glasses had been commanded. With an abrupt +upspring, his throat half harsh with anger, he placed both forepaws on +the table and barked at the waiter. + +Captain Jorgensen crashed his fist down. + +"You win!" he roared. "I pay for the beer! Waiter, bring one more." + +Michael looked to Steward for verification, and Steward's hand on his +head gave adequate reply. + +"We try again," said the captain, very much awake and interested, with +the back of his hand wiping the beer-foam from his moustache. "Maybe he +knows one an' two. How about three? And four?" + +"Just the same, Skipper. He counts up to five, and knows more than five +when it is more than five, though he don't know the figures by name after +five." + +"Oh, Hanson!" Captain Jorgensen bellowed across the bar-room to the cook +of the _Howard_. "Hey, you square-head! Come and have a drink!" + +Hanson came over and pulled up a chair. + +"I pay for the drinks," said the captain; "but you order, Daughtry. See, +now, Hanson, this is a trick bow-wow. He can count better than you. We +are three. Daughtry is ordering three beers. The bow-wow hears three. I +hold up two fingers like this to the waiter. He brings two. The bow-wow +raises hell with the waiter. You see." + +All of which came to pass, Michael blissfully unappeasable until the +order was filled properly. + +"He can't count," was Hanson's conclusion. "He sees one man without +beer. That's all. He knows every man should ought to have a glass. +That's why he barks." + +"Better than that," Daughtry boasted. "There are three of us. We will +order four. Then each man will have his glass, but Killeny will talk to +the waiter just the same." + +True enough, now thoroughly aware of the game, Michael made outcry to the +waiter till the fourth glass was brought. By this time many men were +about the table, all wanting to buy beer and test Michael. + +"Glory be," Dag Daughtry solloquized. "A funny world. Thirsty one +moment. The next moment they'd fair drown you in beer." + +Several even wanted to buy Michael, offering ridiculous sums like fifteen +and twenty dollars. + +"I tell you what," Captain Jorgensen muttered to Daughtry, whom he had +drawn away into a corner. "You give me that bow-wow, and I'll smash +Hanson right now, and you got the job right away--come to work in the +morning." + +Into another corner the proprietor of the Pile-drivers' Home drew +Daughtry to whisper to him: + +"You stick around here every night with that dog of yourn. It makes +trade. I'll give you free beer any time and fifty cents cash money a +night." + +It was this proposition that started the big idea in Daughtry's mind. As +he told Michael, back in the room, while Kwaque was unlacing his shoes: + +"It's this way Killeny. If you're worth fifty cents a night and free +beer to that saloon keeper, then you're worth that to me . . . and more, +my son, more. 'Cause he's lookin' for a profit. That's why he sells +beer instead of buyin' it. An', Killeny, you won't mind workin' for me, +I know. We need the money. There's Kwaque, an' Mr. Greenleaf, an' +Cocky, not even mentioning you an' me, an' we eat an awful lot. An' room- +rent's hard to get, an' jobs is harder. What d'ye say, son, to-morrow +night you an' me hustle around an' see how much coin we can gather?" + +And Michael, seated on Steward's knees, eyes to eyes and nose to nose, +his jowls held in Steward's hand's wriggled and squirmed with delight, +flipping out his tongue and bobbing his tail in the air. Whatever it +was, it was good, for it was Steward who spoke. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +The grizzled ship's steward and the rough-coated Irish terrier quickly +became conspicuous figures in the night life of the Barbary Coast of San +Francisco. Daughtry elaborated on the counting trick by bringing Cocky +along. Thus, when a waiter did not fetch the right number of glasses, +Michael would remain quite still, until Cocky, at a privy signal from +Steward, standing on one leg, with the free claw would clutch Michael's +neck and apparently talk into Michael's ear. Whereupon Michael would +look about the glasses on the table and begin his usual expostulation +with the waiter. + +But it was when Daughtry and Michael first sang "Roll me Down to Rio" +together, that the ten-strike was made. It occurred in a sailors' dance- +hall on Pacific Street, and all dancing stopped while the sailors +clamoured for more of the singing dog. Nor did the place lose money, for +no one left, and the crowd increased to standing room as Michael went +through his repertoire of "God Save the King," "Sweet Bye and Bye," +"Lead, Kindly Light," "Home, Sweet Home," and "Shenandoah." + +It meant more than free beer to Daughtry, for, when he started to leave, +the proprietor of the place thrust three silver dollars into his hand and +begged him to come around with the dog next night. + +"For that?" Daughtry demanded, looking at the money as if it were +contemptible. + +Hastily the proprietor added two more dollars, and Daughtry promised. + +"Just the same, Killeny, my son," he told Michael as they went to bed, "I +think you an' me are worth more than five dollars a turn. Why, the like +of you has never been seen before. A real singing dog that can carry +'most any air with me, and that can carry half a dozen by himself. An' +they say Caruso gets a thousand a night. Well, you ain't Caruso, but +you're the dog-Caruso of the entire world. Son, I'm goin' to be your +business manager. If we can't make a twenty-dollar gold-piece a +night--say, son, we're goin' to move into better quarters. An' the old +gent up at the Hotel de Bronx is goin' to move into an outside room. An' +Kwaque's goin' to get a real outfit of clothes. Killeny, my boy, we're +goin' to get so rich that if he can't snare a sucker we'll put up the +cash ourselves 'n' buy a schooner for 'm, 'n' send him out a-treasure- +huntin' on his own. We'll be the suckers, eh, just you an' me, an' love +to." + +* * * * * + +The Barbary Coast of San Francisco, once the old-time sailor-town in the +days when San Francisco was reckoned the toughest port of the Seven Seas, +had evolved with the city until it depended for at least half of its +earnings on the slumming parties that visited it and spent liberally. It +was quite the custom, after dinner, for many of the better classes of +society, especially when entertaining curious Easterners, to spend an +hour or several in motoring from dance-hall to dance-hall and cheap +cabaret to cheap cabaret. In short, the "Coast" was as much a +sight-seeing place as was Chinatown and the Cliff House. + +It was not long before Dag Daughtry was getting his twenty dollars a +night for two twenty-minute turns, and was declining more beer than a +dozen men with thirsts equal to his could have accommodated. Never had +he been so prosperous; nor can it be denied that Michael enjoyed it. +Enjoy it he did, but principally for Steward's sake. He was serving +Steward, and so to serve was his highest heart's desire. + +In truth, Michael was the bread-winner for quite a family, each member of +which fared well. Kwaque blossomed out resplendent in russet-brown +shoes, a derby hat, and a gray suit with trousers immaculately creased. +Also, he became a devotee of the moving-picture shows, spending as much +as twenty and thirty cents a day and resolutely sitting out every +repetition of programme. Little time was required of him in caring for +Daughtry, for they had come to eating in restaurants. Not only had the +Ancient Mariner moved into a more expensive outside room at the Bronx; +but Daughtry insisted on thrusting upon him more spending money, so that, +on occasion, he could invite a likely acquaintance to the theatre or a +concert and bring him home in a taxi. + +"We won't keep this up for ever, Killeny," Steward told Michael. "For +just as long as it takes the old gent to land another bunch of +gold-pouched, retriever-snouted treasure-hunters, and no longer. Then +it's hey for the ocean blue, my son, an' the roll of a good craft under +our feet, an' smash of wet on the deck, an' a spout now an' again of the +scuppers. + +"We got to go rollin' down to Rio as well as sing about it to a lot of +cheap skates. They can take their rotten cities. The sea's the life for +us--you an' me, Killeny, son, an' the old gent an' Kwaque, an' Cocky, +too. We ain't made for city ways. It ain't healthy. Why, son, though +you maybe won't believe it, I'm losin' my spring. The rubber's goin' +outa me. I'm kind o' languid, with all night in an' nothin' to do but +sit around. It makes me fair sick at the thought of hearin' the old gent +say once again, 'I think, steward, one of those prime cocktails would be +just the thing before dinner.' We'll take a little ice-machine along +next voyage, an' give 'm the best. + +"An' look at Kwaque, Killeny, my boy. This ain't his climate. He's +positively ailin'. If he sits around them picture-shows much more he'll +develop the T.B. For the good of his health, an' mine an' yours, an' all +of us, we got to get up anchor pretty soon an' hit out for the home of +the trade winds that kiss you through an' through with the salt an' the +life of the sea." + +* * * * * + +In truth, Kwaque, who never complained, was ailing fast. A swelling, +slow and sensationless at first, under his right arm-pit, had become a +mild and unceasing pain. No longer could he sleep a night through. +Although he lay on his left side, never less than twice, and often three +and four times, the hurt of the swelling woke him. Ah Moy, had he not +long since been delivered back to China by the immigration authorities, +could have told him the meaning of that swelling, just as he could have +told Dag Daughtry the meaning of the increasing area of numbness between +his eyes where the tiny, vertical, lion-lines were cutting more +conspicuously. Also, could he have told him what was wrong with the +little finger on his left hand. Daughtry had first diagnosed it as a +sprain of a tendon. Later, he had decided it was chronic rheumatism +brought on by the damp and foggy Sun Francisco climate. It was one of +his reasons for desiring to get away again to sea where the tropic sun +would warm the rheumatism out of him. + +As a steward, Daughtry had been accustomed to contact with men and women +of the upper world. But for the first time in his life, here in the +underworld of San Francisco, in all equality he met such persons from +above. Nay, more, they were eager to meet him. They sought him. They +fawned upon him for an invitation to sit at his table and buy beer for +him in whatever garish cabaret Michael was performing. They would have +bought wine for him, at enormous expense, had he not stubbornly stuck to +his beer. They were, some of them, for inviting him to their homes--"An' +bring the wonderful dog along for a sing-song"; but Daughtry, proud of +Michael for being the cause of such invitations, explained that the +professional life was too arduous to permit of such diversions. To +Michael he explained that when they proffered a fee of fifty dollars, the +pair of them would "come a-runnin'." + +Among the host of acquaintances made in their cabaret-life, two were +destined, very immediately, to play important parts in the lives of +Daughtry and Michael. The first, a politician and a doctor, by name +Emory--Walter Merritt Emory--was several times at Daughtry's table, where +Michael sat with them on a chair according to custom. Among other +things, in gratitude for such kindnesses from Daughtry, Doctor Emory gave +his office card and begged for the privilege of treating, free of charge, +either master or dog should they ever become sick. In Daughtry's +opinion, Dr. Walter Merritt Emory was a keen, clever man, undoubtedly +able in his profession, but passionately selfish as a hungry tiger. As +he told him, in the brutal candour he could afford under such changed +conditions: "Doc, you're a wonder. Anybody can see it with half an eye. +What you want you just go and get. Nothing'd stop you except . . . " + +"Except?" + +"Oh, except that it was nailed down, or locked up, or had a policeman +standing guard over it. I'd sure hate to have anything you wanted." + +"Well, you have," Doctor assured him, with a significant nod at Michael +on the chair between them. + +"Br-r-r!" Daughtry shivered. "You give me the creeps. If I thought you +really meant it, San Francisco couldn't hold me two minutes." He +meditated into his beer-glass a moment, then laughed with reassurance. +"No man could get that dog away from me. You see, I'd kill the man +first. I'd just up an' tell 'm, as I'm tellin' you now, I'd kill 'm +first. An' he'd believe me, as you're believin' me now. You know I mean +it. So'd he know I meant it. Why, that dog . . . " + +In sheer inability to express the profundity of his emotion, Dag Daughtry +broke off the sentence and drowned it in his beer-glass. + +Of quite different type was the other person of destiny. Harry Del Mar, +he called himself; and Harry Del Mar was the name that appeared on the +programmes when he was doing Orpheum "time." Although Daughtry did not +know it, because Del Mar was laying off for a vacation, the man did +trained-animal turns for a living. He, too, bought drinks at Daughtry's +table. Young, not over thirty, dark of complexion with large, +long-lashed brown eyes that he fondly believed were magnetic, cherubic of +lip and feature, he belied all his appearance by talking business in +direct business fashion. + +"But you ain't got the money to buy 'm," Daughtry replied, when the other +had increased his first offer of five hundred dollars for Michael to a +thousand. + +"I've got the thousand, if that's what you mean." + +"No," Daughtry shook his head. "I mean he ain't for sale at any price. +Besides, what do you want 'm for?" + +"I like him," Del Mar answered. "Why do I come to this joint? Why does +the crowd come here? Why do men buy wine, run horses, sport actresses, +become priests or bookworms? Because they like to. That's the answer. +We all do what we like when we can, go after the thing we want whether we +can get it or not. Now I like your dog, I want him. I want him a +thousand dollars' worth. See that big diamond on that woman's hand over +there. I guess she just liked it, and wanted it, and got it, never mind +the price. The price didn't mean as much to her as the diamond. Now +that dog of yours--" + +"Don't like you," Dag Daughtry broke in. "Which is strange. He likes +most everybody without fussin' about it. But he bristled at you from the +first. No man'd want a dog that don't like him." + +"Which isn't the question," Del Mar stated quietly. "I like him. As for +him liking or not liking me, that's my look-out, and I guess I can attend +to that all right." + +It seemed to Daughtry that he glimpsed or sensed under the other's +unfaltering cherubicness of expression a steelness of cruelty that was +abysmal in that it was of controlled intelligence. Not in such terms did +Daughtry think his impression. At the most, it was a feeling, and +feelings do not require words in order to be experienced or comprehended. + +"There's an all-night bank," the other went on. "We can stroll over, +I'll cash a cheque, and in half an hour the cash will be in your hand." + +Daughtry shook his head. + +"Even as a business proposition, nothing doing," he said. "Look you. +Here's the dog earnin' twenty dollars a night. Say he works twenty-five +days in the month. That's five hundred a month, or six thousand a year. +Now say that's five per cent., because it's easier to count, it +represents the interest on a capital value of one hundred an' twenty +thousand-dollars. Then we'll suppose expenses and salary for me is +twenty thousand. That leaves the dog worth a hundred thousand. Just to +be fair, cut it in half--a fifty-thousand dog. And you're offerin' a +thousand for him." + +"I suppose you think he'll last for ever, like so much land'," Del Mar +smiled quietly. + +Daughtry saw the point instantly. + +"Give 'm five years of work--that's thirty thousand. Give 'm one year of +work--it's six thousand. An' you're offerin' me one thousand for six +thousand. That ain't no kind of business--for me . . . an' him. Besides, +when he can't work any more, an' ain't worth a cent, he'll be worth just +a plumb million to me, an' if anybody offered it, I'd raise the price." + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +"I'll see you again," Harry Del Mar told Daughtry, at the end of his +fourth conversation on the matter of Michael's sale. + +Wherein Harry Del Mar was mistaken. He never saw Daughtry again, because +Daughtry saw Doctor Emory first. + +Kwaque's increasing restlessness at night, due to the swelling under his +right arm-pit, had began to wake Daughtry up. After several such +experiences, he had investigated and decided that Kwaque was sufficiently +sick to require a doctor. For which reason, one morning at eleven, +taking Kwaque along, he called at Walter Merritt Emory's office and +waited his turn in the crowded reception-room. + +"I think he's got cancer, Doc.," Daughtry said, while Kwaque was pulling +off his shirt and undershirt. "He never squealed, you know, never +peeped. That's the way of niggers. I didn't find our till he got to +wakin' me up nights with his tossin' about an' groanin' in his +sleep.--There! What'd you call it? Cancer or tumour--no two ways about +it, eh?" + +But the quick eye of Walter Merritt Emory had not missed, in passing, the +twisted fingers of Kwaque's left hand. Not only was his eye quick, but +it was a "leper eye." A volunteer surgeon in the first days out in the +Philippines, he had made a particular study of leprosy, and had observed +so many lepers that infallibly, except in the incipient beginnings of the +disease, he could pick out a leper at a glance. From the twisted +fingers, which was the anaesthetic form, produced by +nerve-disintegration, to the corrugated lion forehead (again anaesthetic), +his eyes flashed to the swelling under the right arm-pit and his brain +diagnosed it as the tubercular form. + +Just as swiftly flashed through his brain two thoughts: the first, the +axiom, _whenever and wherever you find a leper, look for the other +leper_; the second, the desired Irish terrier, who was owned by Daughtry, +with whom Kwaque had been long associated. And here all swiftness of eye- +flashing ceased on the part of Walter Merritt Emory. He did not know how +much, if anything, the steward knew about leprosy, and he did not care to +arouse any suspicions. Casually drawing his watch to see the time, he +turned and addressed Daughtry. + +"I should say his blood is out of order. He's run down. He's not used +to the recent life he's been living, nor to the food. To make certain, I +shall examine for cancer and tumour, although there's little chance of +anything like that." + +And as he talked, with just a waver for a moment, his gaze lifted above +Daughtry's eyes to the area of forehead just above and between the eyes. +It was sufficient. His "leper-eye" had seen the "lion" mark of the +leper. + +"You're run down yourself," he continued smoothly. "You're not up to +snuff, I'll wager. Eh?" + +"Can't say that I am," Daughtry agreed. "I guess I got to get back to +the sea an' the tropics and warm the rheumatics outa me." + +"Where?" queried Doctor Emory, almost absently, so well did he feign it, +as if apparently on the verge of returning to a closer examination, of +Kwaque's swelling. + +Daughtry extended his left hand, with a little wiggle of the little +finger advertising the seat of the affliction. Walter Merritt Emory saw, +with seeming careless look out from under careless-drooping eyelids, the +little finger slightly swollen, slightly twisted, with a smooth, almost +shiny, silkiness of skin-texture. Again, in the course of turning to +look at Kwaque, his eyes rested an instant on the lion-lines of +Daughtry's brow. + +"Rheumatism is still the great mystery," Doctor Emory said, returning to +Daughtry as if deflected by the thought. "It's almost individual, there +are so many varieties of it. Each man has a kind of his own. Any +numbness?" + +Daughtry laboriously wiggled his little finger. + +"Yes, sir," he answered. "It ain't as lively as it used to was." + +"Ah," Walter Merritt Emory murmured, with a vastitude of confidence and +assurance. "Please sit down in that chair there. Maybe I won't be able +to cure you, but I promise you I can direct you to the best place to live +for what's the matter with you.--Miss Judson!" + +And while the trained-nurse-apparelled young woman seated Dag Daughtry in +the enamelled surgeon's chair and leaned him back under direction, and +while Doctor Emory dipped his finger-tips into the strongest antiseptic +his office possessed, behind Doctor Emory's eyes, in the midst of his +brain, burned the image of a desired Irish terrier who did turns in +sailor-town cabarets, was rough-coated, and answered to the full name of +Killeny Boy. + +"You've got rheumatism in more places than your little finger," he +assured Daughtry. "There's a touch right here, I'll wager, on your +forehead. One moment, please. Move if I hurt you, Otherwise sit still, +because I don't intend to hurt you. I merely want to see if my diagnosis +is correct.--There, that's it. Move when you feel anything. Rheumatism +has strange freaks.--Watch this, Miss Judson, and I'll wager this form of +rheumatism is new to you. See. He does not resent. He thinks I have +not begun yet . . . " + +And as he talked, steadily, interestingly, he was doing what Dag Daughtry +never dreamed he was doing, and what made Kwaque, looking on, almost +dream he was seeing because of the unrealness and impossibleness of it. +For, with a large needle, Doctor Emory was probing the dark spot in the +midst of the vertical lion-lines. Nor did he merely probe the area. +Thrusting into it from one side, under the skin and parallel to it, he +buried the length of the needle from sight through the insensate +infiltration. This Kwaque beheld with bulging eyes; for his master +betrayed no sign that the thing was being done. + +"Why don't you begin?" Dag Daughtry questioned impatiently. "Besides, my +rheumatism don't count. It's the nigger-boy's swelling." + +"You need a course of treatment," Doctor Emory assured him. "Rheumatism +is a tough proposition. It should never be let grow chronic. I'll fix +up a course of treatment for you. Now, if you'll get out of the chair, +we'll look at your black servant." + +But first, before Kwaque was leaned back, Doctor Emory threw over the +chair a sheet that smelled of having been roasted almost to the scorching +point. As he was about to examine Kwaque, he looked with a slight start +of recollection at his watch. When he saw the time he startled more, and +turned a reproachful face upon his assistant. + +"Miss Judson," he said, coldly emphatic, "you have failed me. Here it +is, twenty before twelve, and you knew I was to confer with Doctor Hadley +over that case at eleven-thirty sharp. How he must be cursing me! You +know how peevish he is." + +Miss Judson nodded, with a perfect expression of contrition and humility, +as if she knew all about it, although, in reality, she knew only all +about her employer and had never heard till that moment of his engagement +at eleven-thirty. + +"Doctor Hadley's just across the hall," Doctor Emory explained to +Daughtry. "It won't take me five minutes. He and I have a disagreement. +He has diagnosed the case as chronic appendicitis and wants to operate. I +have diagnosed it as pyorrhea which has infected the stomach from the +mouth, and have suggested emetine treatment of the mouth as a cure for +the stomach disorder. Of course, you don't understand, but the point is +that I've persuaded Doctor Hadley to bring in Doctor Granville, who is a +dentist and a pyorrhea expert. And they're all waiting for me these ten +minutes! I must run. + +"I'll return inside five minutes," he called back as the door to the hall +was closing upon him.--"Miss Judson, please tell those people in the +reception-room to be patient." + +He did enter Doctor Hadley's office, although no sufferer from pyorrhea +or appendicitis awaited him. Instead, he used the telephone for two +calls: one to the president of the board of health; the other to the +chief of police. Fortunately, he caught both at their offices, +addressing them familiarly by their first names and talking to them most +emphatically and confidentially. + +Back in his own quarters, he was patently elated. + +"I told him so," he assured Miss Judson, but embracing Daughtry in the +happy confidence. "Doctor Granville backed me up. Straight pyorrhea, of +course. That knocks the operation. And right now they're jolting his +gums and the pus-sacs with emetine. Whew! A fellow likes to be right. I +deserve a smoke. Do you mind, Mr. Daughtry?" + +And while the steward shook his head, Doctor Emory lighted a big Havana +and continued audibly to luxuriate in his fictitious triumph over the +other doctor. As he talked, he forgot to smoke, and, leaning quite +casually against the chair, with arrant carelessness allowed the live +coal at the end of his cigar to rest against the tip of one of Kwaque's +twisted fingers. A privy wink to Miss Judson, who was the only one who +observed his action, warned her against anything that might happen. + +"You know, Mr. Daughtry," Walter Merritt Emory went on enthusiastically, +while he held the steward's eyes with his and while all the time the live +end of the cigar continued to rest against Kwaque's finger, "the older I +get the more convinced I am that there are too many ill-advised and hasty +operations." + +Still fire and flesh pressed together, and a tiny spiral of smoke began +to arise from Kwaque's finger-end that was different in colour from the +smoke of a cigar-end. + +"Now take that patient of Doctor Hadley's. I've saved him, not merely +the risk of an operation for appendicitis, but the cost of it, and the +hospital expenses. I shall charge him nothing for what I did. Hadley's +charge will be merely nominal. Doctor Granville, at the outside, will +cure his pyorrhea with emetine for no more than a paltry fifty dollars. +Yes, by George, besides the risk to his life, and the discomfort, I've +saved that man, all told, a cold thousand dollars to surgeon, hospital, +and nurses." + +And while he talked on, holding Daughtry's eyes, a smell of roast meat +began to pervade the air. Doctor Emory smelled it eagerly. So did Miss +Judson smell it, but she had been warned and gave no notice. Nor did she +look at the juxtaposition of cigar and finger, although she knew by the +evidence of her nose that it still obtained. + +"What's burning?" Daughtry demanded suddenly, sniffing the air and +glancing around. + +"Pretty rotten cigar," Doctor Emory observed, having removed it from +contact with Kwaque's finger and now examining it with critical +disapproval. He held it close to his nose, and his face portrayed +disgust. "I won't say cabbage leaves. I'll merely say it's something I +don't know and don't care to know. That's the trouble. They get out a +good, new brand of cigar, advertise it, put the best of tobacco into it, +and, when it has taken with the public, put in inferior tobacco and ride +the popularity of it. No more in mine, thank you. This day I change my +brand." + +So speaking, he tossed the cigar into a cuspidor. And Kwaque, leaning +back in the queerest chair in which he had ever sat, was unaware that the +end of his finger had been burned and roasted half an inch deep, and +merely wondered when the medicine doctor would cease talking and begin +looking at the swelling that hurt his side under his arm. + +And for the first time in his life, and for the ultimate time, Dag +Daughtry fell down. It was an irretrievable fall-down. Life, in its +freedom of come and go, by heaving sea and reeling deck, through the home +of the trade-winds, back and forth between the ports, ceased there for +him in Walter Merritt Emory's office, while the calm-browed Miss Judson +looked on and marvelled that a man's flesh should roast and the man wince +not from the roasting of it. + +Doctor Emory continued to talk, and tried a fresh cigar, and, despite the +fact that his reception-room was overflowing, delivered, not merely a +long, but a live and interesting, dissertation on the subject of cigars +and of the tobacco leaf and filler as grown and prepared for cigars in +the tobacco-favoured regions of the earth. + +"Now, as regards this swelling," he was saying, as he began a belated and +distant examination of Kwaque's affliction, "I should say, at a glance, +that it is neither tumour nor cancer, nor is it even a boil. I should +say . . . " + +A knock at the private door into the hall made him straighten up with an +eagerness that he did not attempt to mask. A nod to Miss Judson sent her +to open the door, and entered two policemen, a police sergeant, and a +professionally whiskered person in a business suit with a carnation in +his button-hole. + +"Good morning, Doctor Masters," Emory greeted the professional one, and, +to the others: "Howdy, Sergeant;" "Hello, Tim;" "Hello, Johnson--when did +they shift you off the Chinatown squad?" + +And then, continuing his suspended sentence, Walter Merritt Emory held +on, looking intently at Kwaque's swelling: + +"I should say, as I was saying, that it is the finest, ripest, +perforating ulcer of the _bacillus leprae_ order, that any San Francisco +doctor has had the honour of presenting to the board of health." + +"Leprosy!" exclaimed Doctor Masters. + +And all started at his pronouncement of the word. The sergeant and the +two policemen shied away from Kwaque; Miss Judson, with a smothered cry, +clapped her two hands over her heart; and Dag Daughtry, shocked but +sceptical, demanded: + +"What are you givin' us, Doc.?" + +"Stand still! don't move!" Walter Merritt Emory said peremptorily to +Daughtry. "I want you to take notice," he added to the others, as he +gently touched the live-end of his fresh cigar to the area of dark skin +above and between the steward's eyes. "Don't move," he commanded +Daughtry. "Wait a moment. I am not ready yet." + +And while Daughtry waited, perplexed, confused, wondering why Doctor +Emory did not proceed, the coal of fire burned his skin and flesh, till +the smoke of it was apparent to all, as was the smell of it. With a +sharp laugh of triumph, Doctor Emory stepped back. + +"Well, go ahead with what you was goin' to do," Daughtry grumbled, the +rush of events too swift and too hidden for him to comprehend. "An' when +you're done with that, I just want you to explain what you said about +leprosy an' that nigger-boy there. He's my boy, an' you can't pull +anything like that off on him . . . or me." + +"Gentlemen, you have seen," Doctor Emory said. "Two undoubted cases of +it, master and man, the man more advanced, with the combination of both +forms, the master with only the anaesthetic form--he has a touch of it, +too, on his little finger. Take them away. I strongly advise, Doctor +Masters, a thorough fumigation of the ambulance afterward." + +"Look here . . . " Dag Daughtry began belligerently. + +Doctor Emory glanced warningly to Doctor Masters, and Doctor Masters +glanced authoritatively at the sergeant who glanced commandingly at his +two policemen. But they did not spring upon Daughtry. Instead, they +backed farther away, drew their clubs, and glared intimidatingly at him. +More convincing than anything else to Daughtry was the conduct of the +policemen. They were manifestly afraid of contact with him. As he +started forward, they poked the ends of their extended clubs towards his +ribs to ward him off. + +"Don't you come any closer," one warned him, flourishing his club with +the advertisement of braining him. "You stay right where you are until +you get your orders." + +"Put on your shirt and stand over there alongside your master," Doctor +Emory commanded Kwaque, having suddenly elevated the chair and spilled +him out on his feet on the floor. + +"But what under the sun . . . " Daughtry began, but was ignored by his +quondam friend, who was saying to Doctor Masters: + +"The pest-house has been vacant since that Japanese died. I know the +gang of cowards in your department so I'd advise you to give the dope to +these here so that they can disinfect the premises when they go in." + +"For the love of Mike," Daughtry pleaded, all of stunned belligerence +gone from him in his state of stunned conviction that the dread disease +possessed him. He touched his finger to his sensationless forehead, then +smelled it and recognized the burnt flesh he had not felt burning. "For +the love of Mike, don't be in such a rush. If I've got it, I've got it. +But that ain't no reason we can't deal with each other like white men. +Give me two hours an' I'll get outa the city. An' in twenty-four I'll be +outa the country. I'll take ship--" + +"And continue to be a menace to the public health wherever you are," +Doctor Masters broke in, already visioning a column in the evening +papers, with scare-heads, in which he would appear the hero, the St. +George of San Francisco standing with poised lance between the people and +the dragon of leprosy. + +"Take them away," said Waiter Merritt Emory, avoiding looking Daughtry in +the eyes. + +"Ready! March!" commanded the sergeant. + +The two policemen advanced on Daughtry and Kwaque with extended clubs. + +"Keep away, an' keep movin'," one of the policemen growled fiercely. "An' +do what we say, or get your head cracked. Out you go, now. Out the door +with you. Better tell that coon to stick right alongside you." + +"Doc., won't you let me talk a moment?" Daughtry begged of Emory. + +"The time for talking is past," was the reply. "This is the time for +segregation.--Doctor Masters, don't forget that ambulance when you're +quit of the load." + +So the procession, led by the board-of-heath doctor and the sergeant, and +brought up in the rear by the policemen with their protectively extended +clubs, started through the doorway. + +Whirling about on the threshold, at the imminent risk of having his skull +cracked, Dag Daughtry called back: + +"Doc! My dog! You know 'm." + +"I'll get him for you," Doctor Emory consented quickly. "What's the +address?" + +"Room eight-seven, Clay street, the Bowhead Lodging House, you know the +place, entrance just around the corner from the Bowhead Saloon. Have 'm +sent out to me wherever they put me--will you?" + +"Certainly I will," said Doctor Emory, "and you've got a cockatoo, too?" + +"You bet, Cocky! Send 'm both along, please, sir." + +* * * * * + +"My!" said Miss Judson, that evening, at dinner with a certain young +interne of St. Joseph's Hospital. "That Doctor Emory is a wizard. No +wonder he's successful. Think of it! Two filthy lepers in our office to- +day! One was a coon. And he knew what was the matter the moment he laid +eyes on them. He's a caution. When I tell you what he did to them with +his cigar! And he was cute about it! He gave me the wink first. And +they never dreamed what he was doing. He took his cigar and . . . " + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +The dog, like the horse, abases the base. Being base, Waiter Merritt +Emory was abased by his desire for the possession of Michael. Had there +been no Michael, his conduct would have been quite different. He would +have dealt with Daughtry as Daughtry had described, as between white men. +He would have warned Daughtry of his disease and enabled him to take ship +to the South Seas or to Japan, or to other countries where lepers are not +segregated. This would have worked no hardship on those countries, since +such was their law and procedure, while it would have enabled Daughtry +and Kwaque to escape the hell of the San Francisco pest-house, to which, +because of his baseness, he condemned them for the rest of their lives. + +Furthermore, when the expense of the maintenance of armed guards over the +pest-house, day and night, throughout the years, is considered, Walter +Merritt Emory could have saved many thousands of dollars to the +tax-payers of the city and county of San Francisco, which thousands of +dollars, had they been spent otherwise, could have been diverted to the +reduction of the notorious crowding in school-rooms, to purer milk for +the babies of the poor, or to an increase of breathing-space in the park +system for the people of the stifling ghetto. But had Walter Merritt +Emory been thus considerate, not only would Daughtry and Kwaque have +sailed out and away over the sea, but with them would have sailed +Michael. + +Never was a reception-roomful of patients rushed through more +expeditiously than was Doctor Emory's the moment the door had closed upon +the two policemen who brought up Daughtry's rear. And before he went to +his late lunch, Doctor Emory was away in his machine and down into the +Barbary Coast to the door of the Bowhead Lodging House. On the way, by +virtue of his political affiliations, he had been able to pick up a +captain of detectives. The addition of the captain proved necessary, for +the landlady put up a stout argument against the taking of the dog of her +lodger. But Milliken, captain of detectives, was too well known to her, +and she yielded to the law of which he was the symbol and of which she +was credulously ignorant. + +As Michael started out of the room on the end of a rope, a plaintive call +of reminder came from the window-sill, where perched a tiny, snow-white +cockatoo. + +"Cocky," he called. "Cocky." + +Walter Merritt Emory glanced back and for no more than a moment +hesitated. "We'll send for the bird later," he told the landlady, who, +still mildly expostulating as she followed them downstairs, failed to +notice that the captain of the detectives had carelessly left the door to +Daughtry's rooms ajar. + +* * * * * + +But Walter Merritt Emory was not the only base one abased by desire of +possession of Michael. In a deep leather chair, his feet resting in +another deep leather chair, at the Indoor Yacht Club, Harry Del Mar +yielded to the somniferous digestion of lunch, which was for him +breakfast as well, and glanced through the first of the early editions of +the afternoon papers. His eyes lighted on a big headline, with a brief +five lines under it. His feet were instantly drawn down off the chair +and under him as he stood up erect upon them. On swift second thought, +he sat down again, pressed the electric button, and, while waiting for +the club steward, reread the headline and the brief five lines. + +In a taxi, and away, heading for the Barbary Coast, Harry Del Mar saw +visions that were golden. They took on the semblance of yellow, twenty- +dollar gold pieces, of yellow-backed paper bills of the government +stamping of the United States, of bank books, and of rich coupons ripe +for the clipping--and all shot through the flashings of the form of a +rough-coated Irish terrier, on a galaxy of brilliantly-lighted stages, +mouth open, nose upward to the drops, singing, ever singing, as no dog +had ever been known to sing in the world before. + +* * * * * + +Cocky himself was the first to discover that the door was ajar, and was +looking at it with speculation (if by "speculation" may be described the +mental processes of a bird, in some mysterious way absorbing into its +consciousness a fresh impression of its environment and preparing to act, +or not act, according to which way the fresh impression modifies its +conduct). Humans do this very thing, and some of them call it "free +will." Cocky, staring at the open door, was in just the stage of +determining whether or not he should more closely inspect that crack of +exit to the wider world, which inspection, in turn, would determine +whether or not he should venture out through the crack, when his eyes +beheld the eyes of the second discoverer staring in. + +The eyes were bestial, yellow-green, the pupils dilating and narrowing +with sharp swiftness as they sought about among the lights and glooms of +the room. Cocky knew danger at the first glimpse--danger to the +uttermost of violent death. Yet Cocky did nothing. No panic stirred his +heart. Motionless, one eye only turned upon the crack, he focused that +one eye upon the head and eyes of the gaunt gutter-cat whose head had +erupted into the crack like an apparition. + +Alert, dilating and contracting, as swift as cautious, and infinitely +apprehensive, the pupils vertically slitted in jet into the midmost of +amazing opals of greenish yellow, the eyes roved the room. They alighted +on Cocky. Instantly the head portrayed that the cat had stiffened, +crouched, and frozen. Almost imperceptibly the eyes settled into a +watching that was like to the stony stare of a sphinx across aching and +eternal desert sands. The eyes were as if they had so stared for +centuries and millenniums. + +No less frozen was Cocky. He drew no film across his one eye that showed +his head cocked sideways, nor did the passion of apprehension that +whelmed him manifest itself in the quiver of a single feather. Both +creatures were petrified into the mutual stare that is of the hunter and +the hunted, the preyer and the prey, the meat-eater and the meat. + +It was a matter of long minutes, that stare, until the head in the +doorway, with a slight turn, disappeared. Could a bird sigh, Cocky would +have sighed. But he made no movement as he listened to the slow, +dragging steps of a man go by and fade away down the hall. + +Several minutes passed, and, just as abruptly the apparition +reappeared--not alone the head this time, but the entire sinuous form as +it glided into the room and came to rest in the middle of the floor. The +eyes brooded on Cocky, and the entire body was still save for the long +tail, which lashed from one side to the other and back again in an +abrupt, angry, but monotonous manner. + +Never removing its eyes from Cocky, the cat advanced slowly until it +paused not six feet away. Only the tail lashed back and forth, and only +the eyes gleamed like jewels in the full light of the window they faced, +the vertical pupils contracting to scarcely perceptible black slits. + +And Cocky, who could not know death with the clearness of concept of a +human, nevertheless was not altogether unaware that the end of all things +was terribly impending. As he watched the cat deliberately crouch for +the spring, Cocky, gallant mote of life that he was, betrayed his one and +forgivable panic. + +"Cocky! Cocky!" he called plaintively to the blind, insensate walls. + +It was his call to all the world, and all powers and things and +two-legged men-creatures, and Steward in particular, and Kwaque, and +Michael. The burden of his call was: "It is I, Cocky. I am very small +and very frail, and this is a monster to destroy me, and I love the +light, bright world, and I want to live and to continue to live in the +brightness, and I am so very small, and I'm a good little fellow, with a +good little heart, and I cannot battle with this huge, furry, hungry +thing that is going to devour me, and I want help, help, help. I am +Cocky. Everybody knows me. I am Cocky." + +This, and much more, was contained in his two calls of: "Cocky! Cocky!" + +And there was no answer from the blind walls, from the hall outside, nor +from all the world, and, his moment of panic over, Cocky was his brave +little self again. He sat motionless on the window-sill, his head cocked +to the side, with one unwavering eye regarding on the floor, so +perilously near, the eternal enemy of all his kind. + +The human quality of his voice had startled the gutter-cat, causing her +to forgo her spring as she flattened down her ears and bellied closer to +the floor. + +And in the silence that followed, a blue-bottle fly buzzed rowdily +against an adjacent window-pane, with occasional loud bumps against the +glass tokening that he too had his tragedy, a prisoner pent by baffling +transparency from the bright world that blazed so immediately beyond. + +Nor was the gutter-cat without her ill and hurt of life. Hunger hurt +her, and hurt her meagre breasts that should have been full for the seven +feeble and mewing little ones, replicas of her save that their eyes were +not yet open and that they were grotesquely unsteady on their soft, young +legs. She remembered them by the hurt of her breasts and the prod of her +instinct; also she remembered them by vision, so that, by the subtle +chemistry of her brain, she could see them, by way of the broken screen +across the ventilator hole, down into the cellar in the dark +rubbish-corner under the stairway, where she had stolen her lair and +birthed her litter. + +And the vision of them, and the hurt of her hunger stirred her afresh, so +that she gathered her body and measured the distance for the leap. But +Cocky was himself again. + +"Devil be damned! Devil be damned!" he shouted his loudest and most +belligerent, as he ruffled like a bravo at the gutter-cat beneath him, so +that he sent her crouching, with startlement, lower to the floor, her +ears wilting rigidly flat and down, her tail lashing, her head turning +about the room so that her eyes might penetrate its obscurest corners in +quest of the human whose voice had so cried out. + +All of which the gutter-cat did, despite the positive evidence of her +senses that this human noise had proceeded from the white bird itself on +the window-sill. + +The bottle fly bumped once again against its invisible prison wall in the +silence that ensued. The gutter-cat prepared and sprang with sudden +decision, landing where Cocky had perched the fraction of a second +before. Cocky had darted to the side, but, even as he darted, and as the +cat landed on the sill, the cat's paw flashed out sidewise and Cocky +leaped straight up, beating the air with his wings so little used to +flying. The gutter-cat reared on her hind-legs, smote upward with one +paw as a child might strike with its hat at a butterfly. But there was +weight in the cat's paw, and the claws of it were outspread like so many +hooks. + +Struck in mid-air, a trifle of a flying machine, all its delicate gears +tangled and disrupted, Cocky fell to the floor in a shower of white +feathers, which, like snowflakes, eddied slowly down after, and after the +plummet-like descent of the cat, so that some of them came to rest on her +back, startling her tense nerves with their gentle impact and making her +crouch closer while she shot a swift glance around and overhead for any +danger that might threaten. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +Harry Del Mar found only a few white feathers on the floor of Dag +Daughtry's room in the Bowhead Lodging House, and from the landlady +learned what had happened to Michael. The first thing Harry Del Mar did, +still retaining his taxi, was to locate the residence of Doctor Emory and +make sure that Michael was confined in an outhouse in the back yard. Next +he engaged passage on the steamship _Umatilla_, sailing for Seattle and +Puget Sound ports at daylight. And next he packed his luggage and paid +his bills. + +In the meantime, a wordy war was occurring in Walter Merritt Emory's +office. + +"The man's yelling his head off," Doctor Masters was contending. "The +police had to rap him with their clubs in the ambulance. He was violent. +He wanted his dog. It can't be done. It's too raw. You can't steal his +dog this way. He'll make a howl in the papers." + +"Huh!" quoth Walter Merritt Emory. "I'd like to see a reporter with +backbone enough to go within talking distance of a leper in the +pest-house. And I'd like to see the editor who wouldn't send a +pest-house letter (granting it'd been smuggled past the guards) out to be +burned the very second he became aware of its source. Don't you worry, +Doc. There won't be any noise in the papers." + +"But leprosy! Public health! The dog has been exposed to his master. +The dog itself is a peripatetic source of infection." + +"Contagion is the better and more technical word, Doc.," Walter Merritt +Emory soothed with the sting of superior knowledge. + +"Contagion, then," Doctor Masters took him up. "The public must be +considered. It must not run the risk of being infected--" + +"Of contracting the contagion," the other corrected smoothly. + +"Call it what you will. The public--" + +"Poppycock," said Walter Merritt Emory. "What you don't know about +leprosy, and what the rest of the board of health doesn't know about +leprosy, would fill more books than have been compiled by the men who +have expertly studied the disease. The one thing they have eternally +tried, and are eternally trying, is to inoculate one animal outside man +with the leprosy that is peculiar to man. Horses, rabbits, rats, +donkeys, monkeys, mice, and dogs--heavens, they have tried it on them +all, tens of thousands of times and a hundred thousand times ten thousand +times, and never a successful inoculation! They have never succeeded in +inoculating it on one man from another. Here--let me show you." + +And from his shelves Waiter Merritt Emory began pulling down his +authorities. + +"Amazing . . . most interesting . . . " Doctor Masters continued to emit +from time to time as he followed the expert guidance of the other through +the books. "I never dreamed . . . the amount of work they have done is +astounding . . . " + +"But," he said in conclusion, "there is no convincing a layman of the +matter contained on your shelves. Nor can I so convince my public. Nor +will I try to. Besides, the man is consigned to the living death of life- +long imprisonment in the pest-house. You know the beastly hole it is. He +loves the dog. He's mad over it. Let him have it. I tell you it's +rotten unfair and cruel, and I won't stand for it." + +"Yes, you will," Walter Merritt Emory assured him coolly. "And I'll tell +you why." + +He told him. He said things that no doctor should say to another, but +which a politician may well say, and has often said, to another +politician--things which cannot bear repeating, if, for no other reason, +because they are too humiliating and too little conducive to pride for +the average American citizen to know; things of the inside, secret +governments of imperial municipalities which the average American +citizen, voting free as a king at the polls, fondly thinks he manages; +things which are, on rare occasion, partly unburied and promptly reburied +in the tomes of reports of Lexow Committees and Federal Commissions. + +* * * * * + +And Walter Merritt Emory won his desire of Michael against Doctor +Masters; had his wife dine with him at Jules' that evening and took her +to see Margaret Anglin in celebration of the victory; returned home at +one in the morning, in his pyjamas went out to take a last look at +Michael, and found no Michael. + +* * * * * + +The pest-house of San Francisco, as is naturally the case with +pest-houses in all American cities, was situated on the bleakest, +remotest, forlornest, cheapest space of land owned by the city. Poorly +protected from the Pacific Ocean, chill winds and dense fog-banks +whistled and swirled sadly across the sand-dunes. Picnicking parties +never came there, nor did small boys hunting birds' nests or playing at +being wild Indians. The only class of frequenters was the suicides, who, +sad of life, sought the saddest landscape as a fitting scene in which to +end. And, because they so ended, they never repeated their visits. + +The outlook from the windows was not inspiriting. A quarter of a mile in +either direction, looking out along the shallow canyon of the sand-hills, +Dag Daughtry could see the sentry-boxes of the guards, themselves armed +and more prone to kill than to lay hands on any escaping pest-man, much +less persuavively discuss with him the advisability of his return to the +prison house. + +On the opposing sides of the prospect from the windows of the four walls +of the pest-house were trees. Eucalyptus they were, but not the royal +monarchs that their brothers are in native habitats. Poorly planted, by +politics, illy attended, by politics, decimated and many times repeatedly +decimated by the hostile forces of their environment, a straggling +corporal's guard of survivors, they thrust their branches, twisted and +distorted, as if writhing in agony, into the air. Scrub of growth they +were, expending the major portion of their meagre nourishment in their +roots that crawled seaward through the insufficient sand for anchorage +against the prevailing gales. + +Not even so far as the sentry-boxes were Daughtry and Kwaque permitted to +stroll. A hundred yards inside was the dead-line. Here, the guards came +hastily to deposit food-supplies, medicines, and written doctors' +instructions, retreating as hastily as they came. Here, also, was a +blackboard upon which Daughtry was instructed to chalk up his needs and +requests in letters of such size that they could be read from a distance. +And on this board, for many days, he wrote, not demands for beer, +although the six-quart daily custom had been broken sharply off, but +demands like: + + WHERE IS MY DOG? + + HE IS AN IRISH TERRIER. + + HE IS ROUGH-COATED. + + HIS NAME IS KILLENY BOY. + + I WANT MY DOG. + + I WANT TO TALK TO DOC. EMORY. + + TELL DOC. EMORY TO WRITE TO ME ABOUT MY DOG. + +One day, Dag Daughtry wrote: + + IF I DON'T GET MY DOG I WILL KILL DOC. EMORY. + +Whereupon the newspapers informed the public that the sad case of the two +lepers at the pest-house had become tragic, because the white one had +gone insane. Public-spirited citizens wrote to the papers, declaiming +against the maintenance of such a danger to the community, and demanding +that the United States government build a national leprosarium on some +remote island or isolated mountain peak. But this tiny ripple of +interest faded out in seventy-two hours, and the reporter-cubs proceeded +variously to interest the public in the Alaskan husky dog that was half a +bear, in the question whether or not Crispi Angelotti was guilty of +having cut the carcass of Giuseppe Bartholdi into small portions and +thrown it into the bay in a grain-sack off Fisherman's Wharf, and in the +overt designs of Japan upon Hawaii, the Philippines, and the Pacific +Coast of North America. + +And, outside of imprisonment, nothing happened of interest to Dag +Daughtry and Kwaque at the pest-house until one night in the late fall. A +gale was not merely brewing. It was coming on to blow. Because, in a +basket of fruit, stated to have been sent by the young ladies of Miss +Foote's Seminary, Daughtry had read a note artfully concealed in the +heart of an apple, telling him on the forthcoming Friday night to keep a +light burning in his window. Daughtry received a visitor at five in the +morning. + +It was Charles Stough Greenleaf, the Ancient Mariner himself. Having +wallowed for two hours through the deep sand of the eucalyptus forest, he +fell exhausted against the penthouse door. When Daughtry opened it, the +ancient one blew in upon him along with a gusty wet splatter of the +freshening gale. Daughtry caught him first and supported him toward a +chair. But, remembering his own affliction, he released the old man so +abruptly as to drop him violently into the chair. + +"My word, sir," said Daughtry. "You must 'a' ben havin' a time of +it.--Here, you fella Kwaque, this fella wringin' wet. You fella take 'm +off shoe stop along him." + +But before Kwaque, immediately kneeling, could touch hand to the +shoelaces, Daughtry, remembering that Kwaque was likewise unclean, had +thrust him away. + +"My word, I don't know what to do," Daughtry murmured, staring about +helplessly as he realised that it was a leper-house, that the very chair +in which the old man sat was a leper-chair, that the very floor on which +his exhausted feet rested was a leper-floor. + +"I'm glad to see you, most exceeding glad," the Ancient Mariner panted, +extending his hand in greeting. + +Dag Daughtry avoided it. + +"How goes the treasure-hunting?" he queried lightly. "Any prospects in +sight?" + +The Ancient Mariner nodded, and with returning breath, at first +whispering, gasped out: + +"We're all cleared to sail on the first of the ebb at seven this morning. +She's out in the stream now, a tidy bit of a schooner, the _Bethlehem_, +with good lines and hull and large cabin accommodations. She used to be +in the Tahiti trade, before the steamers ran her out. Provisions are +good. Everything is most excellent. I saw to that. I cannot say I like +the captain. I've seen his type before. A splendid seaman, I am +certain, but a Bully Hayes grown old. A natural born pirate, a very +wicked old man indeed. Nor is the backer any better. He is middle-aged, +has a bad record, and is not in any sense of the word a gentleman, but he +has plenty of money--made it first in California oil, then grub-staked a +prospector in British Columbia, cheated him out of his share of the big +lode he discovered and doubled his own wealth half a dozen times over. A +very undesirable, unlikeable sort of a man. But he believes in luck, and +is confident that he'll make at least fifty millions out of our adventure +and cheat me out of my share. He's as much a pirate as is the captain +he's engaged." + +"Mr. Greenleaf, I congratulate you, sir," Daughtry said. "And you have +touched me, sir, touched me to the heart, coming all the way out here on +such a night, and running such risks, just to say good-bye to poor Dag +Daughtry, who always meant somewhat well but had bad luck." + +But while he talked so heartily, Daughtry saw, in a resplendent +visioning, all the freedom of a schooner in the great South Seas, and +felt his heart sink in realisation that remained for him only the pest- +house, the sand-dunes, and the sad eucalyptus trees. + +The Ancient Mariner sat stiffly upright. + +"Sir, you have hurt me. You have hurt me to the heart." + +"No offence, sir, no offence," Daughtry stammered in apology, although he +wondered in what way he could have hurt the old gentleman's feelings. + +"You are my friend, sir," the other went on, gravely censorious. "I am +your friend, sir. And you give me to understand that you think I have +come out here to this hell-hole to say good-bye. I came out here to get +you, sir, and your nigger, sir. The schooner is waiting for you. All is +arranged. You are signed on the articles before the shipping +commissioner. Both of you. Signed on yesterday by proxies I arranged +for myself. One was a Barbadoes nigger. I got him and the white man out +of a sailors' boarding-house on Commercial Street and paid them five +dollars each to appear before the Commissioner and sign on." + +"But, my God, Mr. Greenleaf, you don't seem to grasp it that he and I are +lepers." + +Almost with a galvanic spring, the Ancient Mariner was out of the chair +and on his feet, the anger of age and of a generous soul in his face as +he cried: + +"My God, sir, what you don't seem to grasp is that you are my friend, and +that I am your friend." + +Abruptly, still under the pressure of his wrath, he thrust out his hand. + +"Steward, Daughtry. Mr. Daughtry, friend, sir, or whatever I may name +you, this is no fairy-story of the open boat, the cross-bearings +unnamable, and the treasure a fathom under the sand. This is real. I +have a heart. That, sir"--here he waved his extended hand under +Daughtry's nose--"is my hand. There is only one thing you may do, must +do, right now. You must take that hand in your hand, and shake it, with +your heart in your hand as mine is in my hand." + +"But . . . but. . . " Daughtry faltered. + +"If you don't, then I shall not depart from this place. I shall remain +here, die here. I know you are a leper. You can't tell me anything +about that. There's my hand. Are you going to take it? My heart is +there in the palm of it, in the pulse in every finger-end of it. If you +don't take it, I warn you I'll sit right down here in this chair and die. +I want you to understand I am a man, sir, a gentleman. I am a friend, a +comrade. I am no poltroon of the flesh. I live in my heart and in my +head, sir--not in this feeble carcass I cursorily inhabit. Take that +hand. I want to talk with you afterward." + +Dag Daughtry extended his hand hesitantly, but the Ancient Mariner seized +it and pressed it so fiercely with his age-lean fingers as to hurt. + +"Now we can talk," he said. "I have thought the whole matter over. We +sail on the _Bethlehem_. When the wicked man discovers that he can never +get a penny of my fabulous treasure, we will leave him. He will be glad +to be quit of us. We, you and I and your nigger, will go ashore in the +Marquesas. Lepers roam about free there. There are no regulations. I +have seen them. We will be free. The land is a paradise. And you and I +will set up housekeeping. A thatched hut--no more is needed. The work +is trifling. The freedom of beach and sea and mountain will be ours. For +you there will be sailing, swimming, fishing, hunting. There are +mountain goats, wild chickens and wild cattle. Bananas and plantains +will ripen over our heads--avocados and custard apples, also. The red +peppers grow by the door, and there will be fowls, and the eggs of fowls. +Kwaque shall do the cooking. And there will be beer. I have long noted +your thirst unquenchable. There will be beer, six quarts of it a day, +and more, more. + +"Quick. We must start now. I am sorry to tell you that I have vainly +sought your dog. I have even paid detectives who were robbers. Doctor +Emory stole Killeny Boy from you, but within a dozen hours he was stolen +from Doctor Emory. I have left no stone unturned. Killeny Boy is gone, +as we shall be gone from this detestable hole of a city. + +"I have a machine waiting. The driver is paid well. Also, I have +promised to kill him if he defaults on me. It bears just a bit north of +east over the sandhill on the road that runs along the other side of the +funny forest . . . That is right. We will start now. We can discuss +afterward. Look! Daylight is beginning to break. The guards must not +see us . . . " + +Out into the storm they passed, Kwaque, with a heart wild with gladness, +bringing up the rear. At the beginning Daughtry strove to walk aloof, +but in a trice, in the first heavy gust that threatened to whisk the +frail old man away, Dag Daughtry's hand was grasping the other's arm, his +own weight behind and under, supporting and impelling forward and up the +hill through the heavy sand. + +"Thank you, steward, thank you, my friend," the Ancient Mariner murmured +in the first lull between the gusts. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +Not altogether unwillingly, in the darkness of night, despite that he +disliked the man, did Michael go with Harry Del Mar. Like a burglar the +man came, with infinite caution of silence, to the outhouse in Doctor +Emory's back yard where Michael was a prisoner. Del Mar knew the theatre +too well to venture any hackneyed melodramatic effect such as an electric +torch. He felt his way in the darkness to the door of the outhouse, +unlatched it, and entered softly, feeling with his hands for the wire- +haired coat. + +And Michael, a man-dog and a lion-dog in all the stuff of him, bristled +at the instant of intrusion, but made no outcry. Instead, he smelled out +the intruder and recognised him. Disliking the man, nevertheless he +permitted the tying of the rope around his neck and silently followed him +out to the sidewalk, down to the corner, and into the waiting taxi. + +His reasoning--unless reason be denied him--was simple. This man he had +met, more than once, in the company of Steward. Amity had existed +between him and Steward, for they had sat at table, and drunk together. +Steward was lost. Michael knew not where to find him, and was himself a +prisoner in the back yard of a strange place. What had once happened, +could again happen. It had happened that Steward, Del Mar, and Michael +had sat at table together on divers occasions. It was probable that such +a combination would happen again, was going to happen now, and, once +more, in the bright-lighted cabaret, he would sit on a chair, Del Mar on +one side, and on the other side beloved Steward with a glass of beer +before him--all of which might be called "leaping to a conclusion"; for +conclusion there was, and upon the conclusion Michael acted. + +Now Michael could not reason to this conclusion nor think to this +conclusion, in words. "Amity," as an instance, was no word in his +consciousness. Whether or not he thought to the conclusion in +swift-related images and pictures and swift-welded composites of images +and pictures, is a problem that still waits human solution. The point +is: _he did think_. If this be denied him, then must he have acted +wholly by instinct--which would seem more marvellous on the face of it +than if, in dim ways, he had performed a vague thought-process. + +However, into the taxi and away through the maze of San Francisco's +streets, Michael lay alertly on the floor near Del Mar's feet, making no +overtures of friendliness, by the same token making no demonstration of +the repulsion of the man's personality engendered in him. For Harry Del +Mar, who was base, and who had been further abased by his money-making +desire for the possession of Michael, had had his baseness sensed by +Michael from the beginning. That first meeting in the Barbary Coast +cabaret, Michael had bristled at him, and stiffened belligerently, when +he laid his hand on Michael's head. Nor had Michael thought about the +man at all, much less attempted any analysis of him. Something had been +wrong with that hand--the perfunctory way in which it had touched him +under a show of heartiness that could well deceive the onlooker. The +_feel_ of it had not been right. There had been no warmth in it, no +heart, no communication of genuine good approach from the brain and the +soul of the man of which it was the telegraphic tentacle and transmitter. +In short, the message or feel had not been a good message or feel, and +Michael had bristled and stiffened without thinking, but by mere +_knowing_, which is what men call "intuition." + +Electric lights, a shed-covered wharf, mountains of luggage and freight, +the noisy toil of 'longshoremen and sailors, the staccato snorts of +donkey engines and the whining sheaves as running lines ran through the +blocks, a crowd of white-coated stewards carrying hand-baggage, the +quartermaster at the gangway foot, the gangway sloping steeply up to the +_Umatilla's_ promenade deck, more quartermasters and gold-laced ship's +officers at the head of the gangway, and more crowd and confusion +blocking the narrow deck--thus Michael knew, beyond all peradventure, +that he had come back to the sea and its ships, where he had first met +Steward, where he had been always with Steward, save for the recent +nightmare period in the great city. Nor was there absent from the +flashing visions of his consciousness the images and memories of Kwaque +and Cocky. Whining eagerly, he strained at the leash, risking his tender +toes among the many inconsiderate, restless, leather-shod feet of the +humans, as he quested and scented for Cocky and Kwaque, and, most of all, +for Steward. + +Michael accepted his disappointment in not immediately meeting them, for +from the dawn of consciousness, the limitations and restrictions of dogs +in relation to humans had been hammered into him in the form of concepts +of patience. The patience of waiting, when he wanted to go home and when +Steward continued to sit at table and talk and drink beer, was his, as +was the patience of the rope around the neck, the fence too high to +scale, the narrowed-walled room with the closed door which he could never +unlatch but which humans unlatched so easily. So that he permitted +himself to be led away by the ship's butcher, who on the _Umatilla_ had +the charge of all dog passengers. Immured in a tiny between-decks cubby +which was filled mostly with boxes and bales, tied as well by the rope +around his neck, he waited from moment to moment for the door to open and +admit, realised in the flesh, the resplendent vision of Steward which +blazed through the totality of his consciousness. + +Instead, although Michael did not guess it then, and, only later, divined +it as a vague manifestation of power on the part of Del Mar, the well- +tipped ship's butcher opened the door, untied him, and turned him over to +the well-tipped stateroom steward who led him to Del Mar's stateroom. Up +to the last, Michael was convinced that he was being led to Steward. +Instead, in the stateroom, he found only Del Mar. "No Steward," might be +described as Michael's thought; but by _patience_, as his mood and key, +might be described his acceptance of further delay in meeting up with his +god, his best beloved, his Steward who was his own human god amidst the +multitude of human gods he was encountering. + +Michael wagged his tail, flattened his ears, even his crinkled ear, a +trifle, and smiled, all in a casual way of recognition, smelled out the +room to make doubly sure that there was no scent of Steward, and lay down +on the floor. When Del Mar spoke to him, he looked up and gazed at him. + +"Now, my boy, times have changed," Del Mar addressed him in cold, brittle +tones. "I'm going to make an actor out of you, and teach you what's +what. First of all, come here . . . COME HERE!" + +Michael obeyed, without haste, without lagging, and patently without +eagerness. + +"You'll get over that, my lad, and put pep into your motions when I talk +to you," Del Mar assured him; and the very manner of his utterance was a +threat that Michael could not fail to recognise. "Now we'll just see if +I can pull off the trick. You listen to me, and sing like you did for +that leper guy." + +Drawing a harmonica from his vest pocket, he put it to his lips and began +to play "Marching through Georgia." + +"Sit down!" he commanded. + +Again Michael obeyed, although all that was Michael was in protest. He +quivered as the shrill-sweet strains from the silver reeds ran through +him. All his throat and chest was in the impulse to sing; but he +mastered it, for he did not care to sing for this man. All he wanted of +him was Steward. + +"Oh, you're stubborn, eh?" Del Mar sneered at him. "The matter with you +is you're thoroughbred. Well, my boy, it just happens I know your kind +and I reckon I can make you get busy and work for me just as much as you +did for that other guy. Now get busy." + +He shifted the tune on into "Georgia Camp Meeting." But Michael was +obdurate. Not until the melting strains of "Old Kentucky Home" poured +through him did he lose his self-control and lift his mellow-throated +howl that was the call for the lost pack of the ancient millenniums. +Under the prodding hypnosis of this music he could not but yearn and burn +for the vague, forgotten life of the pack when the world was young and +the pack was the pack ere it was lost for ever through the endless +centuries of domestication. + +"Ah, ha," Del Mar chuckled coldly, unaware of the profound history and +vast past he evoked by his silver reeds. + +A loud knock on the partition wall warned him that some sleepy passenger +was objecting. + +"That will do!" he said sharply, taking the harmonica from his lips. And +Michael ceased, and hated him. "I guess I've got your number all right. +And you needn't think you're going to sleep here scratching fleas and +disturbing my sleep." + +He pressed the call-button, and, when his room-steward answered, turned +Michael over to him to be taken down below and tied up in the crowded +cubby-hole. + +* * * * * + +During the several days and nights on the _Umatilla_, Michael learned +much of what manner of man Harry Del Mar was. Almost, might it be said, +he learned Del Mar's pedigree without knowing anything of his history. +For instance he did not know that Del Mar's real name was Percival +Grunsky, and that at grammar school he had been called "Brownie" by the +girls and "Blackie" by the boys. No more did he know that he had gone +from half-way-through grammar school directly into the industrial reform +school; nor that, after serving two years, he had been paroled out by +Harris Collins, who made a living, and an excellent one, by training +animals for the stage. Much less could he know the training that for six +years Del Mar, as assistant, had been taught to give the animals, and, +thereby, had received for himself. + +What Michael did know was that Del Mar had no pedigree and was a scrub as +compared with thoroughbreds such as Steward, Captain Kellar, and _Mister_ +Haggin of Meringe. And he learned it swiftly and simply. In the day- +time, fetched by a steward, Michael would be brought on deck to Del Mar, +who was always surrounded by effusive young ladies and matrons who +lavished caresses and endearments upon Michael. This he stood, although +much bored; but what irked him almost beyond standing were the feigned +caresses and endearments Del Mar lavished on him. He knew the +cold-blooded insincerity of them, for, at night, when he was brought to +Del Mar's room, he heard only the cold brittle tones, sensed only the +threat and the menace of the other's personality, felt, when touched by +the other's hand, only a stiffness and sharpness of contact that was like +to so much steel or wood in so far as all subtle tenderness of heart and +spirit was absent. + +This man was two-faced, two-mannered. No thoroughbred was anything but +single-faced and single-mannered. A thoroughbred, hot-blooded as it +might be, was always sincere. But in this scrub was no sincerity, only a +positive insincerity. A thoroughbred had passion, because of its hot +blood; but this scrub had no passion. Its blood was cold as its +deliberateness, and it did nothing save deliberately. These things he +did not think. He merely realized them, as any creature realizes itself +in _liking_ and in not _liking_. + +To cap it all, the last night on board, Michael lost his thoroughbred +temper with this man who had no temper. It came to a fight. And Michael +had no chance. He raged royally and fought royally, leaping to the +attack, after being knocked over twice by open-handed blows under his +ear. Quick as Michael was, slashing South Sea niggers by virtue of his +quickness and cleverness, he could not touch his teeth to the flesh of +this man, who had been trained for six years with animals by Harris +Collins. So that, when he leaped, open-mouthed, for the bite, Del Mar's +right hand shot out, gripped his under-jaw as he was in the air, and +flipped him over in a somersaulting fall to the floor on his back. Once +again he leapt open-mouthed to the attack, and was filliped to the floor +so hard that almost the last particle of breath was knocked out of him. +The next leap was nearly his last. He was clutched by the throat. Two +thumbs pressed into his neck on either side of the windpipe directly on +the carotid arteries, shutting off the blood to his brain and giving him +most exquisite agony, at the same time rendering him unconscious far more +swiftly than the swiftest anaesthetic. Darkness thrust itself upon him; +and, quivering on the floor, glimmeringly he came back to the light of +the room and to the man who was casually touching a match to a cigarette +and cautiously keeping an observant eye on him. + +"Come on," Del Mar challenged. "I know your kind. You can't get my +goat, and maybe I can't get yours entirely, but I can keep you under my +thumb to work for me. Come on, you!" + +And Michael came. Being a thoroughbred, despite that he knew he was +beaten by this two-legged thing which was not warm human but was so alien +and hard that he might as well attack the wall of a room with his teeth, +or a tree-trunk, or a cliff of rock, Michael leapt bare-fanged for the +throat. And all that he leapt against was training, formula. The +experience was repeated. His throat was gripped, the thumbs shut off the +blood from his brain, and darkness smote him. Had he been more than a +normal thoroughbred dog, he would have continued to assail his +impregnable enemy until he burst his heart or fell in a fit. But he was +normal. Here was something unassailable, adamantine. As little might he +win victory from it, as from the cement-paved sidewalk of a city. The +thing was a devil, with the hardness and coldness, the wickedness and +wisdom, of a devil. It was as bad as Steward was good. Both were two- +legged. Both were gods. But this one was an evil god. + +He did not reason all this, nor any of it. Yet, transmuted into human +terms of thought and understanding, it adequately describes the fulness +of his state of mind toward Del Mar. Had Michael been entangled in a +fight with a warm god, he could have raged and battled blindly, +inflicting and receiving hurt in the chaos of conflict, as such a god, +being warm, would have likewise received and given hurt, being only a +flesh-and-blood, living, breathing entity after all. But this two-legged +god-devil did not rage blindly and was incapable of passional heat. He +was like so much cunning, massive steel machinery, and he did what +Michael could never dream he did--and, for that matter, which few humans +do and which all animal trainers do: _he kept one thought ahead of +Michael's thought all the time_, and therefore, was able to have ready +one action always in anticipation of Michael's next action. This was the +training he had received from Harris Collins, who, withal he was a +sentimental and doting husband and father, was the arch-devil when it +came to animals other than human ones, and who reigned in an animal hell +which he had created and made lucrative. + +* * * * * + +Michael went ashore in Seattle all eagerness, straining at his leash +until he choked and coughed and was coldly cursed by Del Mar. For +Michael was mastered by his expectation that he would meet Steward, and +he looked for him around the first corner, and around all corners with +undiminished zeal. But amongst the multitudes of men there was no +Steward. Instead, down in the basement of the New Washington Hotel, +where electric lights burned always, under the care of the baggage +porter, he was tied securely by the neck in the midst of Alpine ranges of +trunks which were for ever being heaped up, sought over, taken down, +carried away, or added to. + +Three days of this dolorous existence he passed. The porters made +friends with him and offered him prodigious quantities of cooked meats +from the leavings of the dining-room. Michael was too disappointed and +grief-stricken over Steward to overeat himself, while Del Mar, +accompanied by the manager of the hotel, raised a great row with the +porters for violating the feeding instructions. + +"That guy's no good," said the head porter to assistant, when Del Mar had +departed. "He's greasy. I never liked greasy brunettes anyway. My +wife's a brunette, but thank the Lord she ain't greasy." + +"Sure," agreed the assistant. "I know his kind. Why, if you'd stick a +knife into him he wouldn't bleed blood. It'd be straight liquid lard." + +Whereupon the pair of them immediately presented Michael with vaster +quantities of meat which he could not eat because the desire for Steward +was too much with him. + +In the meantime Del Mar sent off two telegrams to New York, the first to +Harris Collins' animal training school, where his troupe of dogs was +boarding through his vacation: + + "_Sell my dogs. You know what they can do and what they are worth. Am + done with them. Deduct the board and hold the balance for me until I + see you. I have the limit here of a dog. Every turn I ever pulled is + put in the shade by this one. He's a ten strike. Wait till you see + him_." + +The second, to his booking agent: + + "_Get busy. Book me over the best. Talk it up. I have the turn. A + winner. Nothing like it. Don't talk up top price but way over top + price. Prepare them for the dog when I give them the chance for the + once over. You know me. I am giving it straight. This will head the + bill anywhere all the time_." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + + +Came the crate. Because Del Mar brought it into the baggage-room, +Michael was suspicious of it. A minute later his suspicion was +justified. Del Mar invited him to go into the crate, and he declined. +With a quick deft clutch on the collar at the back of his neck, Del Mar +jerked him off his footing and thrust him in, or partly in, rather, +because he had managed to get a hold on the edge of the crate with his +two forepaws. The animal trainer wasted no time. He brought the +clenched fist of his free hand down in two blows, rat-tat, on Michael's +paws. And Michael, at the pain, relaxed both holds. The next instant he +was thrust inside, snarling his indignation and rage as he vainly flung +himself at the open bars, while Del Mar was locking the stout door. + +Next, the crate was carried out to an express wagon and loaded in along +with a number of trunks. Del Mar had disappeared the moment he had +locked the door, and the two men in the wagon, which was now bouncing +along over the cobblestones, were strangers. There was just room in the +crate for Michael to stand upright, although he could not lift his head +above the level of his shoulders. And so standing, his head pressed +against the top, a rut in the road, jolting the wagon and its contents, +caused his head to bump violently. + +The crate was not quite so long as Michael, so that he was compelled to +stand with the end of his nose pressing against the end of the crate. An +automobile, darting out from a cross-street, caused the driver of the +wagon to pull in abruptly and apply the brake. With the crate thus +suddenly arrested, Michael's body was precipitated forward. There was no +brake to stop him, unless the soft end of his nose be considered the +brake, for it was his nose that brought his body to rest inside the +crate. + +He tried lying down, confined as the space was, and made out better, +although his lips were cut and bleeding by having been forced so sharply +against his teeth. But the worst was to come. One of his forepaws +slipped out through the slats or bars and rested on the bottom of the +wagon where the trunks were squeaking, screeching, and jigging. A rut in +the roadway made the nearest trunk tilt one edge in the air and shift +position, so that when it tilted back again it rested on Michael's paw. +The unexpectedness of the crushing hurt of it caused him to yelp and at +the same time instinctively and spasmodically to pull back with all his +strength. This wrenched his shoulder and added to the agony of the +imprisoned foot. + +And blind fear descended upon Michael, the fear that is implanted in all +animals and in man himself--_the fear of the trap_. Utterly beside +himself, though he no longer yelped, he flung himself madly about, +straining the tendons and muscles of his shoulder and leg and further and +severely injuring the crushed foot. He even attacked the bars with his +teeth in his agony to get at the monster thing outside that had laid hold +of him and would not let him go. Another rut saved him, however, tilting +the trunk just sufficiently to enable his violent struggling to drag the +foot clear. + +At the railroad station, the crate was handled, not with deliberate +roughness, but with such carelessness that it half-slipped out of a +baggageman's hands, capsized sidewise, and was caught when it was past +the man's knees but before it struck the cement floor. But, Michael, +sliding helplessly down the perpendicular bottom of the crate, fetched up +with his full weight on the injured paw. + +"Huh!" said Del Mar a little later to Michael, having strolled down the +platform to where the crate was piled on a truck with other baggage +destined for the train. "Got your foot smashed. Well, it'll teach you a +lesson to keep your feet inside." + +"That claw is a goner," one of the station baggage-men said, +straightening up from an examination of Michael through the bars. + +Del Mar bent to a closer scrutiny. + +"So's the whole toe," he said, drawing his pocket-knife and opening a +blade. "I'll fix it in half a jiffy if you'll lend a hand." + +He unlocked the box and dipped Michael out with the customary strangle- +hold on the neck. He squirmed and struggled, dabbing at the air with the +injured as well as the uninjured forepaw and increasing his pain. + +"You hold the leg," Del Mar commanded. "He's safe with that grip. It +won't take a second." + +Nor did it take longer. And Michael, back in the box and raging, was one +toe short of the number which he had brought into the world. The blood +ran freely from the crude but effective surgery, and he lay and licked +the wound and was depressed with apprehension of he knew not what +terrible fate awaited him and was close at hand. Never, in his +experience of men, had he been so treated, while the confinement of the +box was maddening with its suggestion of the trap. Trapped he was, and +helpless, and the ultimate evil of life had happened to Steward, who had +evidently been swallowed up by the Nothingness which had swallowed up +Meringe, the _Eugenie_, the Solomon Islands, the _Makambo_, Australia, +and the _Mary Turner_. + +Suddenly, from a distance, came a bedlam of noise that made Michael prick +up his ears and bristle with premonition of fresh disaster. It was a +confused yelping, howling, and barking of many dogs. + +"Holy Smoke!--It's them damned acting dogs," growled the baggageman to +his mate. "There ought to be a law against dog-acts. It ain't decent." + +"It's Peterson's Troupe," said the other. "I was on when they come in +last week. One of 'em was dead in his box, and from what I could see of +him it looked mighty like he'd had the tar knocked outa him." + +"Got a wollopin' from Peterson most likely in the last town and then was +shipped along with the bunch and left to die in the baggage car." + +The bedlam increased as the animals were transferred from the wagon to a +platform truck, and when the truck rolled up and stopped alongside +Michael's he made out that it was piled high with crated dogs. In truth, +there were thirty-five dogs, of every sort of breed and mostly mongrel, +and that they were far from happy was attested by their actions. Some +howled, some whimpered, others growled and raged at one another through +the slots, and many maintained a silence of misery. Several licked and +nursed bruised feet. Smaller dogs that did not fight much were crammed +two or more into single crates. Half a dozen greyhounds were crammed +into larger crates that were anything save large enough. + +"Them's the high-jumpers," said the first baggageman. "An' look at the +way they're packed. Peterson ain't going to pay any more excess baggage +than he has to. Not half room enough for them to stand up. It must be +hell for them from the time they leave one town till they arrive at the +next." + +But what the baggageman did not know was that in the towns the hell was +not mitigated, that the dogs were still confined in their too-narrow +prisons, that, in fact, they were life-prisoners. Rarely, except for +their acts, were they taken out from their cages. From a business +standpoint, good care did not pay. Since mongrel dogs were cheap, it was +cheaper to replace them when they died than so to care for them as to +keep them from dying. + +What the baggageman did not know, and what Peterson did know, was that of +these thirty-five dogs not one was a surviving original of the troupe +when it first started out four years before. Nor had there been any +originals discarded. The only way they left the troupe and its cages was +by dying. Nor did Michael know even as little as the baggageman knew. He +knew nothing save that here reigned pain and woe and that it seemed he +was destined to share the same fate. + +Into the midst of them, when with more howlings and yelpings they were +loaded into the baggage car, was Michael's cage piled. And for a day and +a part of two nights, travelling eastward, he remained in the dog +inferno. Then they were loaded off in some large city, and Michael +continued on in greater quietness and comfort, although his injured foot +still hurt and was bruised afresh whenever his crate was moved about in +the car. + +What it was all about--why he was kept in his cramped prison in the +cramped car--he did not ask himself. He accepted it as unhappiness and +misery, and had no more explanation for it than for the crushing of the +paw. Such things happened. It was life, and life had many evils. The +_why_ of things never entered his head. He knew _things_ and some small +bit of the _how_ of things. What was, _was_. Water was wet, fire hot, +iron hard, meat good. He accepted such things as he accepted the +everlasting miracles of the light and of the dark, which were no miracles +to him any more than was his wire coat a miracle, or his beating heart, +or his thinking brain. + +In Chicago, he was loaded upon a track, carted through the roaring +streets of the vast city, and put into another baggage-car which was +quickly in motion in continuation of the eastward journey. It meant more +strange men who handled baggage, as it meant in New York, where, from +railroad baggage-room to express wagon he was exchanged, for ever a +crated prisoner and dispatched to one, Harris Collins, on Long Island. + +First of all came Harris Collins and the animal hell over which he ruled. +But the second event must be stated first. Michael never saw Harry Del +Mar again. As the other men he had known had stepped out of life, which +was a way they had, so Harry Del Mar stepped out of Michael's purview of +life as well as out of life itself. And his stepping out was literal. A +collision on the elevated, a panic scramble of the uninjured out upon the +trestle over the street, a step on the third rail, and Harry Del Mar was +engulfed in the Nothingness which men know as death and which is +nothingness in so far as such engulfed ones never reappear nor walk the +ways of life again. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + + +Harris Collins was fifty-two years of age. He was slender and dapper, +and in appearance and comportment was so sweet- and gentle-spirited that +the impression he radiated was almost of sissyness. He might have taught +a Sunday-school, presided over a girls' seminary, or been a president of +a humane society. + +His complexion was pink and white, his hands were as soft as the hands of +his daughters, and he weighed a hundred and twelve pounds. Moreover, he +was afraid of his wife, afraid of a policeman, afraid of physical +violence, and lived in constant dread of burglars. But the one thing he +was not afraid of was wild animals of the most ferocious sorts, such as +lions, tigers, leopards, and jaguars. He knew the game, and could +conquer the most refractory lion with a broom-handle--not outside the +cage, but inside and locked in. + +It was because he knew the game and had learned it from his father before +him, a man even smaller than himself and more fearful of all things +except animals. This father, Noel Collins, had been a successful animal +trainer in England, before emigrating to America, and in America he had +continued the success and laid the foundation of the big animal training +school at Cedarwild, which his son had developed and built up after him. +So well had Harris Collins built on his father's foundation that the +place was considered a model of sanitation and kindness. It entertained +many visitors, who invariably went away with their souls filled with +ecstasy over the atmosphere of sweetness and light that pervaded the +place. Never, however, were they permitted to see the actual training. +On occasion, performances were given them by the finished products which +verified all their other delightful and charming conclusions about the +school. But had they seen the training of raw novices, it would have +been a different story. It might even have been a riot. As it was, the +place was a zoo, and free at that; for, in addition to the animals he +owned and trained and bought and sold, a large portion of the business +was devoted to boarding trained animals and troupes of animals for owners +who were out of engagements, or for estates of such owners which were in +process of settlement. From mice and rats to camels and elephants, and +even, on occasion, to a rhinoceros or a pair of hippopotamuses, he could +supply any animal on demand. + +When the Circling Brothers' big three-ring show on a hard winter went +into the hands of the receivers, he boarded the menagerie and the horses +and in three months turned a profit of fifteen thousand dollars. More--he +mortgaged all he possessed against the day of the auction, bought in the +trained horses and ponies, the giraffe herd and the performing elephants, +and, in six months more was quit of an of them, save the pony Repeater +who turned air-springs, at another profit of fifteen thousand dollars. As +for Repeater, he sold the pony several months later for a sheer profit of +two thousand. While this bankruptcy of the Circling Brothers had been +the greatest financial achievement of Harris Collin's life, nevertheless +he enjoyed no mean permanent income from his plant, and, in addition, +split fees with the owners of his board animals when he sent them to the +winter Hippodrome shows, and, more often than not, failed to split any +fee at all when he rented the animals to moving-picture companies. + +Animal men, the country over, acknowledged him to be, not only the +richest in the business, but the king of trainers and the grittiest man +who ever went into a cage. And those who from the inside had seen him +work were agreed that he had no soul. Yet his wife and children, and +those in his small social circle, thought otherwise. They, never seeing +him at work, were convinced that no softer-hearted, more sentimental man +had ever been born. His voice was low and gentle, his gestures were +delicate, his views on life, the world, religion and politics, the +mildest. A kind word melted him. A plea won him. He gave to all local +charities, and was gravely depressed for a week when the Titanic went +down. And yet--the men in the trained-animal game acknowledged him the +nerviest and most nerveless of the profession. And yet--his greatest +fear in the world was that his large, stout wife, at table, should crown +him with a plate of hot soup. Twice, in a tantrum, she had done this +during their earlier married life. In addition to his fear that she +might do it again, he loved her sincerely and devotedly, as he loved his +children, seven of them, for whom nothing was too good or too expensive. + +So well did he love them, that the four boys from the beginning he +forbade from seeing him _work_, and planned gentler careers for them. +John, the oldest, in Yale, had elected to become a man of letters, and, +in the meantime, ran his own automobile with the corresponding standard +of living such ownership connoted in the college town of New Haven. +Harold and Frederick were down at a millionaires' sons' academy in +Pennsylvania; and Clarence, the youngest, at a prep. school in +Massachusetts, was divided in his choice of career between becoming a +doctor or an aviator. The three girls, two of them twins, were pledged +to be cultured into ladies. Elsie was on the verge of graduating from +Vassar. Mary and Madeline, the twins, in the most select and most +expensive of seminaries, were preparing for Vassar. All of which +required money which Harris Collins did not grudge, but which strained +the earning capacity of his animal-training school. It compelled him to +work the harder, although his wife and the four sons and three daughters +did not dream that he actually worked at all. Their idea was that by +virtue of superior wisdom he merely superintended, and they would have +been terribly shocked could they have seen him, club in hand, thrashing +forty mongrel dogs, in the process of training, which had become excited +and out of hand. + +A great deal of the work was done by his assistants, but it was Harris +Collins who taught them continually what to do and how to do it, and who +himself, on more important animals, did the work and showed them how. His +assistants were almost invariably youths from the reform schools, and he +picked them with skilful eye and intuition. Control of them, under their +paroles, with intelligence and coldness on their part, were the +conditions and qualities he sought, and such combination, as a matter of +course, carried with it cruelty. Hot blood, generous impulses, +sentimentality, were qualities he did not want for his business; and the +Cedarwild Animal School was business from the first tick of the clock to +the last bite of the lash. In short, Harris Collins, in the totality of +results, was guilty of causing more misery and pain to animals than all +laboratories of vivisection in Christendom. + +And into this animal hell Michael descended--although his arrival was +horizontal, across three thousand five hundred miles, in the same crate +in which he had been placed at the New Washington Hotel in Seattle. Never +once had he been out of the crate during the entire journey, and +filthiness, as well as wretchedness, characterized his condition. Thanks +to his general good health, the wound of the amputated toe was in the +process of uneventful healing. But dirt clung to him, and he was +infested with fleas. + +Cedarwild, to look at, was anything save a hell. Velvet lawns, gravelled +walks and drives, and flowers formally growing, led up to the group of +long low buildings, some of frame and some of concrete. But Michael was +not received by Harris Collins, who, at the moment, sat in his private +office, Harry Del Mar's last telegram on his desk, writing a memorandum +to his secretary to query the railroad and the express companies for the +whereabouts of a dog, crated and shipped by one, Harry Del Mar, from +Seattle and consigned to Cedarwild. It was a pallid-eyed youth of +eighteen in overalls who received Michael, receipted for him to the +expressman, and carried his crate into a slope-floored concrete room that +smelled offensively and chemically clean. + +Michael was impressed by his surroundings but not attracted by the youth, +who rolled up his sleeves and encased himself in large oilskin apron +before he opened the crate. Michael sprang out and staggered about on +legs which had not walked for days. This particular two-legged god was +uninteresting. He was as cold as the concrete floor, as methodical as a +machine; and in such fashion he went about the washing, scrubbing, and +disinfecting of Michael. For Harris Collins was scientific and +antiseptic to the last word in his handling of animals, and Michael was +scientifically made clean, without deliberate harshness, but without any +slightest hint of gentleness or consideration. + +Naturally, he did not understand. On top of all he had already +experienced, not even knowing executioners and execution chambers, for +all he knew this bare room of cement and chemical smell might well be the +place of the ultimate life-disaster and this youth the god who was to +send him into the dark which had engulfed all he had known and loved. +What Michael did know beyond the shadow of any doubt was that it was all +coldly ominous and terribly strange. He endured the hand of the youth- +god on the scruff of his neck, after the collar had been unbuckled; but +when the hose was turned on him, he resented and resisted. The youth, +merely working by formula, tightened the safe grip on the scruff of +Michael's neck and lifted him clear of the floor, at the same time, with +the other hand, directing the stream of water into his mouth and +increasing it to full force by the nozzle control. Michael fought, and +was well drowned for his pains, until he gasped and strangled helplessly. + +After that he resisted no more, and was washed out and scrubbed out and +cleansed out with the hose, a big bristly brush, and much carbolic soap, +the lather of which got into and stung his eyes and nose, causing him to +weep copiously and sneeze violently. Apprehensive of what might at any +moment happen to him, but by this time aware that the youth was neither +positive nor negative for kindness or harm, Michael continued to endure +without further battling, until, clean and comfortable, he was put away +into a pen, sweet and wholesome, where he slept and for the time being +forgot. The place was the hospital, or segregation ward, and a week of +imprisonment was spent therein, in which nothing happened in the way of +development of germ diseases, and nothing happened to him except regular +good food, pure drinking-water, and absolute isolation from contact with +all life save the youth-god who, like an automaton, attended on him. + +Michael had yet to meet Harris Collins, although, from a distance, often +he heard his voice, not loud, but very imperative. That the owner of +this voice was a high god, Michael knew from the first sound of it. Only +a high god, a master over ordinary gods, could be so imperative. Will +was in that voice, and accustomedness to command. Any dog would have so +decided as quickly as Michael did. And any dog would have decided that +there was no love nor lovableness in the god behind the voice, nothing to +warm one's heart nor to adore. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV + + +It was at eleven in the morning that the pale youth-god put collar and +chain on Michael, led him out of the segregation ward, and turned him +over to a dark youth-god who wasted no time of greeting on him and +manifested no friendliness. A captive at the end of a chain, on the way +Michael quickly encountered other captives going in his direction. There +were three of them, and never had he seen the like. Three slouching, +ambling monsters of bears they were, and at sight of them Michael +bristled and uttered the lowest of growls; for he knew them, out of his +heredity (as a domestic cow knows her first wolf), as immemorial enemies +from the wild. But he had travelled too far, seen too much, and was +altogether too sensible, to attack them. Instead, walking stiff-legged +and circumspectly, but smelling with all his nose the strange scent of +the creatures, he followed at the end of his chain his own captor god. + +Continually a multitude of strange scents invaded his nostrils. Although +he could not see through walls, he got the smells he was later to +identify of lions, leopards, monkeys, baboons, and seals and sea-lions. +All of which might have stunned an ordinary dog; but the effect on him +was to make him very alert and at the same time very subdued. It was as +if he walked in a new and monstrously populous jungle and was +unacquainted with its ways and denizens. + +As he was entering the arena, he shied off to the side more +stiff-leggedly than ever, bristled all along his neck and back, and +growled deep and low in his throat. For, emerging from the arena, came +five elephants. Small elephants they were, but to him they were the +hugest of monsters, in his mind comparable only with the cow-whale of +which he had caught fleeting glimpses when she destroyed the schooner +_Mary Turner_. But the elephants took no notice of him, each with its +trunk clutching the tail of the one in front of it as it had been taught +to do in making an exit. + +Into the arena, he came, the bears following on his heels. It was a +sawdust circle the size of a circus ring, contained inside a square +building that was roofed over with glass. But there were no seats about +the ring, since spectators were not tolerated. Only Harris Collins and +his assistants, and buyers and sellers of animals and men in the +profession, were ever permitted to behold how animals were tormented into +the performance of tricks to make the public open its mouth in +astonishment or laughter. + +Michael forgot about the bears, who were quickly at work on the other +side of the circle from that to which he was taken. Some men, rolling +out stout bright-painted barrels which elephants could not crush by +sitting on, attracted his attention for a moment. Next, in a pause on +the part of the man who led him, he regarded with huge interest a piebald +Shetland pony. It lay on the ground. A man sat on it. And ever and +anon it lifted its head from the sawdust and kissed the man. This was +all Michael saw, yet he sensed something wrong about it. He knew not +why, had no evidence why, but he felt cruelty and power and unfairness. +What he did not see was the long pin in the man's hand. Each time he +thrust this in the pony's shoulder, the pony, stung by the pain and +reflex action, lifted its head, and the man was deftly ready to meet the +pony's mouth with his own mouth. To an audience the impression would be +that in such fashion the pony was expressing its affection for the +master. + +Not a dozen feet away another Shetland, a coal-black one, was behaving as +peculiarly as it was being treated. Ropes were attached to its forelegs, +each rope held by an assistant, who jerked on the same stoutly when a +third man, standing in front of the pony, tapped it on the knees with a +short, stiff whip of rattan. Whereupon the pony went down on its knees +in the sawdust in a genuflection to the man with the whip. The pony did +not like it, sometimes so successfully resisting with spread, taut legs +and mutinous head-tossings, as to overcome the jerk of the ropes, and, at +the same time wheeling, to fall heavily on its side or to uprear as the +pull on the ropes was relaxed. But always it was lined up again to face +the man who rapped its knees with the rattan. It was being taught merely +how to kneel in the way that is ever a delight to the audiences who see +only the results of the schooling and never dream of the manner of the +schooling. For, as Michael was quickly sensing, knowledge was here +learned by pain. In short, this was the college of pain, this Cedarwild +Animal School. + +Harris Collins himself nodded the dark youth-god up to him, and turned an +inquiring and estimating gaze on Michael. + +"The Del Mar dog, sir," said the youth-god. + +Collins's eyes brightened, and he looked Michael over more carefully. + +"Do you know what he can do?" he queried. + +The youth shook his head. + +"Harry was a keen one," Collins went on, apparently to the youth-god but +mostly for his own benefit, being given to thinking aloud. "He picked +this dog as a winner. And now what can he do? That's the question. Poor +Harry's gone, and we don't know what he can do.--Take off the chain." + +Released Michael regarded the master-god and waited for what might +happen. A squall of pain from one of the bears across the ring hinted to +him what he might expect. + +"Come here," Collins commanded in his cold, hard tones. + +Michael came and stood before him. + +"Lie down!" + +Michael lay down, although he did it slowly, with advertised reluctance. + +"Damned thoroughbred!" Collins sneered at him. "Won't put any pep into +your motions, eh? Well, we'll take care of that.--Get up!--Lie down!--Get +up!--Lie down!--Get up!" + +His commands were staccato, like revolver shots or the cracks of whips, +and Michael obeyed them in his same slow, reluctant way. + +"Understands English, at any rate," said Collins. + +"Wonder if he can turn the double flip," he added, expressing the golden +dream of all dog-trainers. "Come on, we'll try him for a flip. Put the +chain on him. Come over here, Jimmy. Put another lead on him." + +Another reform-school graduate youth obeyed, snapping a girth about +Michael's loins, to which was attached a thin rope. + +"Line him up," Collins commanded. "Ready?--Go!" + +And the most amazing, astounding indignity was wreaked upon Michael. At +the word "Go!", simultaneously, the chain on his collar jerked him up and +back in the air, the rope on his hindquarters jerked that portion of him +under, forward, and up, and the still short stick in Collins's hand hit +him under the lower jaw. Had he had any previous experience with the +manoeuvre, he would have saved himself part of the pain at least by +springing and whirling backward in the air. As it was, he felt as if +being torn and wrenched apart while at the same time the blow under his +jaw stung him and almost dazed him. And, at the same time, whirled +violently into the air, he fell on the back of his head in the sawdust. + +Out of the sawdust he soared in rage, neck-hair erect, throat a-snarl, +teeth bared to bite, and he would have sunk his teeth into the flesh of +the master-god had he not been the slave of cunning formula. The two +youths knew their work. One tightened the lead ahead, the other to the +rear, and Michael snarled and bristled his impotent wrath. Nothing could +he do, neither advance, nor retreat, nor whirl sideways. The youth in +front by the chain prevented him from attacking the youth behind, and the +youth behind, with the rope, prevented him from attacking the youth in +front, and both prevented him from attacking Collins, whom he knew +incontrovertibly to be the master of evil and hurt. + +Michael's wrath was as superlative as was his helplessness. He could +only bristle and tear his vocal chords with his rage. But it was a very +ancient and boresome experience to Collins. He was even taking advantage +of the moment to glance across the arena and size up what the bears were +doing. + +"Oh, you thoroughbred," he sneered at Michael, returning his attention to +him. "Slack him! Let go!" + +The instant his bonds were released, Michael soared at Collins, and +Collins, timing and distancing with the accuracy of long years, kicked +him under the jaw and whirled him back and down into the sawdust. + +"Hold him!" Collins ordered. "Line him out!" + +And the two youths, pulling in opposite directions with chain and rope, +stretched him into helplessness. + +Collins glanced across the ring to the entrance, where two teams of heavy +draft-horses were entering, followed by a woman dressed to +over-dressedness in the last word of a stylish street-costume. + +"I fancy he's never done any flipping," Collins remarked, coming back to +the problem of Michael for a moment. "Take off your lead, Jimmy, and go +over and help Smith.--Johnny, hold him to one side there and mind your +legs. Here comes Miss Marie for her first lesson, and that mutt of a +husband of hers can't handle her." + +Michael did not understand the scene that followed, which he witnessed, +for the youth led him over to look on at the arranging of the woman and +the four horses. Yet, from her conduct, he sensed that she, too, was +captive and ill-treated. In truth, she was herself being trained +unwillingly to do a trick. She had carried herself bravely right to the +moment of the ordeal, but the sight of the four horses, ranged two and +two opposing her, with the thing patent that she was to hold in her hands +the hooks on the double-trees and form the link that connected the two +spans which were to pull in opposite directions--at the sight of this her +courage failed her and she shrank back, drooping and cowering, her face +buried in her hands. + +"No, no, Billikens," she pleaded to the stout though youthful man who was +her husband. "I can't do it. I'm afraid. I'm afraid." + +"Nonsense, madam," Collins interposed. "The trick is absolutely safe. +And it's a good one, a money-maker. Straighten up a moment." With his +hands he began feeling out her shoulders and back under her jacket. "The +apparatus is all right." He ran his hands down her arms. "Now! Drop +the hooks." He shook each arm, and from under each of the fluffy lace +cuffs fell out an iron hook fast to a thin cable of steel that evidently +ran up her sleeves. "Not that way! Nobody must see. Put them back. Try +it again. They must come down hidden in your palms. Like this. +See.--That's it. That's the idea." + +She controlled herself and strove to obey, though ever and anon she cast +appealing glances to Billikens, who stood remote and aloof, his brows +wrinkled with displeasure. + +Each of the men driving the harnessed spans lifted up the double-trees so +that the girl could grasp the hooks. She tried to take hold, but broke +down again. + +"If anything breaks, my arms will be torn out of me," she protested. + +"On the contrary," Collins reassured her. "You will lose merely most of +your jacket. The worst that can happen will be the exposure of the trick +and the laugh on you. But the apparatus isn't going to break. Let me +explain again. The horses do not pull against you. They pull against +each other. The audience thinks that they are pulling against you.--Now +try once more. Take hold the double-trees, and at the same moment slip +down the hooks and connect.--Now!" + +He spoke sharply. She shook the hooks down out of her sleeves, but drew +back from grasping the double-trees. Collins did not betray his +vexation. Instead, he glanced aside to where the kissing pony and the +kneeling pony were leaving the ring. But the husband raged at her: + +"By God, Julia, if you throw me down this way!" + +"Oh, I'll try, Billikens," she whimpered. "Honestly, I'll try. See! I'm +not afraid now." + +She extended her hands and clasped the double-trees. With a thin writhe +of a smile, Collins investigated the insides of her clenched hands to +make sure that the hooks were connected. + +"Now brace yourself! Spread your legs. And straighten out." With his +hands he manipulated her arms and shoulders into position. "Remember, +you've got to meet the first of the strain with your arms straight out. +After the strain is on, you couldn't bend 'em if you wanted to. But if +the strain catches them bent, the wire'll rip the hide off of you. +Remember, straight out, extended, so that they form a straight line with +each other and with the flat of your back and shoulders. That's it. +Ready now." + +"Oh, wait a minute," she begged, forsaking the position. "I'll do it--oh, +I will do it, but, Billikens, kiss me first, and then I won't care if my +arms are pulled out." + +The dark youth who held Michael, and others looking on, grinned. Collins +dissembled whatever grin might have troubled for expression, and +murmured: + +"All the time in the world, madam. The point is, the first time must +come off right. After that you'll have the confidence.--Bill, you'd +better love her up before she tackles it." + +And Billikens, very angry, very disgusted, very embarrassed, obeyed, +putting his arms around his wife and kissing her neither too +perfunctorily nor very long. She was a pretty young thing of a woman, +perhaps twenty years old, with an exceedingly childish, girlish face and +a slender-waisted, generously moulded body of fully a hundred and forty +pounds. + +The embrace and kiss of her husband put courage into her. She stiffened +and steeled herself, and with compressed lips, as he stepped clear of +her, muttered, "Ready." + +"Go!" Collins commanded. + +The four horses, under the urge of the drivers, pressed lazily into their +collars and began pulling. + +"Give 'em the whip!" Collins barked, his eyes on the girl and noting that +the pull of the apparatus was straight across her. + +The lashes fell on the horses' rumps, and they leaped, and surged, and +plunged, with their huge steel-shod hoofs, the size of soup-plates, +tearing up the sawdust into smoke. + +And Billikens forgot himself. The terribleness of the sight painted the +honest anxiety for the woman on his face. And her face was a +kaleidoscope. At the first, tense and fearful, it was like that of a +Christian martyr meeting the lions, or of a felon falling through the +trap. Next, and quickly, came surprise and relief in that there was no +hurt. And, finally, her face was proudly happy with a smile of triumph. +She even smiled to Billikens her pride at making good her love to him. +And Billikens relaxed and looked love and pride back, until, on the spur +of the second, Harris Collins broke in: + +"This ain't a smiling act! Get that smile off your face. The audience +has got to think you're carrying the pull. Show that you are. Make your +face stiff till it cracks. Show determination, will-power. Show great +muscular effort. Spread your legs more. Bring up the muscles through +your skirt just as if you was really working. Let 'em pull you this way +a bit and that way a bit. Give 'em to. Spread your legs more. Make a +noise on your face as if you was being pulled to pieces an' that all that +holds you is will-power.--That's the idea! That's the stuff! It's a +winner, Bill! It's a winner!--Throw the leather into 'em! Make 'm jump! +Make 'm get right down and pull the daylights out of each other!" + +The whips fell on the horses, and the horses struggled in all their +hugeness and might to pull away from the pain of the punishment. It was +a spectacle to win approval from any audience. Each horse averaged +eighteen hundredweight; thus, to the eye of the onlooker, seven thousand +two hundred pounds of straining horse-flesh seemed wrenching and dragging +apart the slim-waisted, delicately bodied, hundred-and-forty pound woman +in her fancy street costume. It was a sight to make women in circus +audiences scream with terror and turn their faces away. + +"Slack down!" Collins commanded the drivers. + +"The lady wins," he announced, after the manner of a ringmaster.--"Bill, +you've got a mint in that turn.--Unhook, madam, unhook!" + +Marie obeyed, and, the hooks still dangling from her sleeves, made a +short run to Billikens, into whose arms she threw herself, her own arms +folding him about the neck as she exclaimed before she kissed him: + +"Oh, Billikens, I knew I could do it all the time! I was brave, wasn't +I!" + +"A give-away," Collins's dry voice broke in on her ecstasy. "Letting all +the audience see the hooks. They must go up your sleeves the moment you +let go.--Try it again. And another thing. When you finish the turn, no +chestiness. No making out how easy it was. Make out it was the very +devil. Show yourself weak, just about to collapse from the strain. Give +at the knees. Make your shoulders cave in. The ringmaster will half +step forward to catch you before you faint. That's your cue. Beat him +to it. Stiffen up and straighten up with an effort of will-power--will- +power's the idea, gameness, and all that, and kiss your hands to the +audience and make a weak, pitiful sort of a smile, as though your heart's +been pulled 'most out of you and you'll have to go to the hospital, but +for right then that you're game an' smiling and kissing your hands to the +audience that's riping the seats up and loving you.--Get me, madam? You, +Bill, get the idea! And see she does it.--Now, ready! Be a bit wistful +as you look at the horses.--That's it! Nobody'd guess you'd palmed the +hooks and connected them.--Straight out!--Let her go!" + +And again the thirty-six-hundredweight of horses on either side pitted +its strength against the similar weight on the other side, and the +seeming was that Marie was the link of woman-flesh being torn asunder. + +A third and a fourth time the turn was rehearsed, and, between turns, +Collins sent a man to his office, for the Del Mar telegram. + +"You take her now, Bill," he told Marie's husband, as, telegram in hand, +he returned to the problem of Michael. "Give her half a dozen tries +more. And don't forget, any time any jay farmer thinks he's got a span +that can pull, bet him on the side your best span can beat him. That +means advance advertising and some paper. It'll be worth it. The +ringmaster'll favour you, and your span can get the first jump. If I was +young and footloose, I'd ask nothing better than to go out with your +turn." + +Harris Collins, in the pauses gazing down at Michael, read Del Mar's +Seattle telegram: + + "_Sell my dogs. You know what they can do and what they are worth. Am + done with them. Deduct the board and hold the balance until I see + you. I have the limit of a dog. Every turn I ever pulled is put in + the shade by this one. He's a ten strike. Wait till you see him_." + +Over to one side in the busy arena, Collins contemplated Michael. + +"Del Mar was the limit himself," he told Johnny, who held Michael by the +chain. "When he wired me to sell his dogs it meant he had a better turn, +and here's only one dog to show for it, a damned thoroughbred at that. He +says it's the limit. It must be, but in heaven's name, what is its turn? +It's never done a flip in its life, much less a double flip. What do you +think, Johnny? Use your head. Suggest something." + +"Maybe it can count," Johnny advanced. + +"And counting-dogs are a drug on the market. Well, anyway, let's try." + +And Michael, who knew unerringly how to count, refused to perform. + +"If he was a regular dog, he could walk anyway," was Collins' next idea. +"We'll try him." + +And Michael went through the humiliating ordeal of being jerked erect on +his hind legs by Johnny while Collins with the stick cracked him under +the jaw and across the knees. In his wrath, Michael tried to bite the +master-god, and was jerked away by the chain. When he strove to +retaliate on Johnny, that imperturbable youth, with extended arm, merely +lifted him into the air on his chain and strangled him. + +"That's off," quoth Collins wearily. "If he can't stand on his hind legs +he can't barrel-jump--you've heard about Ruth, Johnny. She was a winner. +Jump in and out of nail-kegs, on her hind legs, without ever touching +with her front ones. She used to do eight kegs, in one and out into the +next. Remember when she was boarded here and rehearsed. She was a gold- +mine, but Carson didn't know how to treat her, and she croaked off with +penumonia at Cripple Creek." + +"Wonder if he can spin plates on his nose," Johnny volunteered. + +"Can't stand up on hind legs," Collins negatived. "Besides, nothing like +the limit in a turn like that. This dog's got a specially. He ain't +ordinary. He does some unusual thing unusually well, and it's up to us +to locate it. That comes of Harry dying so inconsiderately and leaving +this puzzle-box on my hands. I see I just got to devote myself to him. +Take him away, Johnny. Number Eighteen for him. Later on we can put him +in the single compartments." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + + +Number Eighteen was a big compartment or cage in the dog row, large +enough with due comfort for a dozen Irish terriers like Michael. For +Harris Collins was scientific. Dogs on vacation, boarding at the +Cedarwild Animal School, were given every opportunity to recuperate from +the hardships and wear and tear of from six months to a year and more on +the road. It was for this reason that the school was so popular a +boarding-place for performing animals when the owners were on vacation or +out of "time." Harris Collins kept his animals clean and comfortable and +guarded from germ diseases. In short, he renovated them against their +next trips out on vaudeville time or circus engagement. + +To the left of Michael, in Number Seventeen, were five grotesquely +clipped French poodles. Michael could not see them, save when he was +being taken out or brought back, but he could smell them and hear them, +and, in his loneliness, he even started a feud of snarling bickeringness +with Pedro, the biggest of them who acted as clown in their turn. They +were aristocrats among performing animals, and Michael's feud with Pedro +was not so much real as play-acted. Had he and Pedro been brought +together they would have made friends in no time. But through the slow +monotonous drag of the hours they developed a fictitious excitement and +interest in mouthing their quarrel which each knew in his heart of hearts +was no quarrel at all. + +In Number Nineteen, on Michael's right, was a sad and tragic company. +They were mongrels, kept spotlessly and germicidally clean, who were +unattached and untrained. They composed a sort of reserve of raw +material, to be worked into established troupes when an extra one or a +substitute was needed. This meant the hell of the arena where the +training went on. Also, in spare moments, Collins, or his assistants, +were for ever trying them out with all manner of tricks in the quest of +special aptitudes on their parts. Thus, a mongrel semblance to a cooker +spaniel of a dog was tried out for several days as a pony-rider who would +leap through paper hoops from the pony's back, and return upon the back +again. After several falls and painful injuries, it was rejected for the +feat and tried out as a plate-balancer. Failing in this, it was made +into a see-saw dog who, for the rest of the turn, filled into the +background of a troupe of twenty dogs. + +Number Nineteen was a place of perpetual quarrelling and pain. Dogs, +hurt in the training, licked their wounds, and moaned, or howled, or were +irritable to excess on the slightest provocation. Always, when a new dog +entered--and this was a regular happening, for others were continually +being taken away to hit the road--the cage was vexed with quarrels and +battles, until the new dog, by fighting or by non resistance, had +commanded or been taught its proper place. + +Michael ignored the denizens of Number Nineteen. They could sniff and +snarl belligerently across at him, but he took no notice, reserving his +companionship for the play-acted and perennial quarrel with Pedro. Also, +Michael was out in the arena more often and far longer hours than any of +them. + +"Trust Harry not to make a mistake on a dog," was Collins's judgment; and +constantly he strove to find in Michael what had made Del Mar declare him +a ten strike and the limit. + +Every indignity, in the attempt to find out, was wreaked upon Michael. +They tried him at hurdle-jumping, at walking on forelegs, at pony-riding, +at forward flips, and at clowning with other dogs. They tried him at +waltzing, all his legs cord-fastened and dragged and jerked and slacked +under him. They spiked his collar in some of the attempted tricks to +keep him from lurching from side to side or from falling forward or +backward. They used the whip and the rattan stick; and twisted his nose. +They attempted to make a goal-keeper of him in a football game between +two teams of pain-driven and pain-bitten mongrels. And they dragged him +up ladders to make him dive into a tank of water. + +Even they essayed to make him "loop the loop"--rushing him down an +inclined trough at so high speed of his legs, accelerated by the slash of +whips on his hindquarters, that, with such initial momentum, had he put +his heart and will into it, he could have successfully run up the inside +of the loop, and across the inside of the top of it, back-downward, like +a fly on the ceiling, and on and down and around and out of the loop. But +he refused the will and the heart, and every time, when he was unable at +the beginning to leap sideways out of the inclined trough, he fell +grievously from the inside of the loop, bruising and injuring himself. + +"It isn't that I expect these things are what Harry had in mind," Collins +would say, for always he was training his assistants; "but that through +them I may get a cue to his specially, whatever in God's name it is, that +poor Harry must have known." + +Out of love, at the wish of his love-god, Steward, Michael would have +striven to learn these tricks and in most of them would have succeeded. +But here at Cedarwild was no love, and his own thoroughbred nature made +him stubbornly refuse to do under compulsion what he would gladly have +done out of love. As a result, since Collins was no thoroughbred of a +man, the clashes between them were for a time frequent and savage. In +this fighting Michael quickly learned he had no chance. He was always +doomed to defeat. He was beaten by stereotyped formula before he began. +Never once could he get his teeth into Collins or Johnny. He was too +common-sensed to keep up the battling in which he would surely have +broken his heart and his body and gone dumb mad. Instead, he retired +into himself, became sullen, undemonstrative, and, though he never +cowered in defeat, and though he was always ready to snarl and bristle +his hair in advertisement that inside he was himself and unconquered, he +no longer burst out in furious anger. + +After a time, scarcely ever trying him out on a new trick, the chain and +Johnny were dispensed with, and with Collins he spent all Collins's hours +in the arena. He learned, by bitter lessons, that he must follow Collins +around; and follow him he did, hating him perpetually and in his own body +slowly and subtly poisoning himself by the juices of his glands that did +not secrete and flow in quite their normal way because of the pressure +put upon them by his hatred. + +The effect of this, on his body, was not perceptible. This was because +of his splendid constitution and health. Wherefore, since the effect +must be produced somewhere, it was his mind, or spirit, or nature, or +brain, or processes of consciousness, that received it. He drew more and +more within himself, became morose, and brooded much. All of which was +spiritually unhealthful. He, who had been so merry-hearted, even merrier- +hearted than his brother Jerry, began to grow saturnine, and peevish, and +ill-tempered. He no longer experienced impulses to play, to romp around, +to run about. His body became as quiet and controlled as his brain. +Human convicts, in prisons, attain this quietude. He could stand by the +hour, to heel to Collins, uninterested, infinitely bored, while Collins +tortured some mongrel creature into the performance of a trick. + +And much of this torturing Michael witnessed. There were the greyhounds, +the high-jumpers and wide-leapers. They were willing to do their best, +but Collins and his assistants achieved the miracle, if miracle it may be +called, of making them do better than their best. Their best was +natural. Their better than best was unnatural, and it killed some and +shortened the lives of all. Rushed to the springboard and the leap, +always, after the take-off, in mid-air, they had to encounter an +assistant who stood underneath, an extraordinarily long buggy-whip in +hand, and lashed them vigorously. This made them leap from the +springboard beyond their normal powers, hurting and straining and +injuring them in their desperate attempt to escape the whip-lash, to beat +the whip-lash in the air and be past ere it could catch their flying +flanks and sting them like a scorpion. + +"Never will a jumping dog jump his hardest," Collins told his assistants, +"unless he's made to. That's your job. That's the difference between +the jumpers I turn out and some of these dub amateur-jumping outfits that +fail to make good even on the bush circuits." + +Collins continually taught. A graduate from his school, an assistant who +received from him a letter of recommendation, carried a high credential +of a sheepskin into the trained-animal world. + +"No dog walks naturally on its hind legs, much less on its forelegs," +Collins would say. "Dogs ain't built that way. _They have to be made +to_, that's all. That's the secret of all animal training. They have +to. You've got to make them. That's your job. Make them. Anybody who +can't, can't make good in this factory. Put that in your pipe and smoke +it, and get busy." + +Michael saw, without fully appreciating, the use of the spiked saddle on +the bucking mule. The mule was fat and good-natured the first day of its +appearance in the arena. It had been a pet mule in a family of children +until Collins's keen eyes rested on it; and it had known only love and +kindness and much laughter for its foolish mulishness. But Collins's +eyes had read health, vigour, and long life, as well as laughableness of +appearance and action in the long-eared hybrid. + +Barney Barnato he was renamed that first day in the arena, when, also, he +received the surprise of his life. He did not dream of the spike in the +saddle, nor, while the saddle was empty, did it press against him. But +the moment Samuel Bacon, a negro tumbler, got into the saddle, the spike +sank home. He knew about it and was prepared. But Barney, taken by +surprise, arched his back in the first buck he had ever made. It was so +prodigious a buck that Collins eyes snapped with satisfaction, while Sam +landed a dozen feet away in the sawdust. + +"Make good like that," Collins approved, "and when I sell the mule you'll +go along as part of the turn, or I miss my guess. And it will be some +turn. There'll be at least two more like you, who'll have to be nervy +and know how to fall. Get busy. Try him again." + +And Barney entered into the hell of education that later won his +purchaser more time than he could deliver over the best vaudeville +circuits in Canada and the United States. Day after day Barney took his +torture. Not for long did he carry the spiked saddle. Instead, bare- +back, he received the negro on his back, and was spiked and set bucking +just the same; for the spike was now attached to Sam's palm by means of +leather straps. In the end, Barney became so "touchy" about his back +that he almost began bucking if a person as much as looked at it. +Certainly, aware of the stab of pain, he started bucking, whirling, and +kicking whenever the first signal was given of some one trying to mount +him. + +At the end of the fourth week, two other tumblers, white youths, being +secured, the complete, builded turn was performed for the benefit of a +slender, French-looking gentleman, with waxed moustaches. In the end he +bought Barney, without haggling, at Collins's own terms and engaged Sammy +and the other two tumblers as well. Collins staged the trick properly, +as it would be staged in the theatre, even had ready and set up all the +necessary apparatus, and himself acted as ringmaster while the +prospective purchaser looked on. + +Barney, fat as butter, humorous-looking, was led into the square of cloth- +covered steel cables and cloth-covered steel uprights. The halter was +removed and he was turned loose. Immediately he became restless, the +ears were laid back, and he was a picture of viciousness. + +"Remember one thing," Collins told the man who might buy. "If you buy +him, you'll be ringmaster, and you must never, never spike him. When he +comes to know that, you can always put your hands on him any time and +control him. He's good-natured at heart, and he's the gratefullest mule +I've ever seen in the business. He's just got to love you, and hate the +other three. And one warning: if he goes real bad and starts biting, +you'll have to pull out his teeth and feed him soft mashes and crushed +grain that's steamed. I'll give you the recipe for the digestive dope +you'll have to put in. Now--watch!" + +Collins stopped into the ring and caressed Barney, who responded in the +best of tempers and tried affectionately to nudge and shove past on the +way out of the ropes to escape what he knew was coming. + +"See," Collins exposited. "He's got confidence in me. He trusts me. He +knows I've never spiked him and that I always save him in the end. I'm +his good Samaritan, and you'll have to be the same to him if you buy +him.--Now I'll give you your spiel. Of course, you can improve on it to +suit yourself." + +The master-trainer walked out of the rope square, stepped forward to an +imaginary line, and looked down and out and up as if he were gazing at +the pit of the orchestra beneath him, across at the body of the house, +and up into the galleries. + +"Ladies and gentlemen," he addressed the sawdust emptiness before him as +if it were a packed audience, "this is Barney Barnato, the biggest joker +of a mule ever born. He's as affectionate as a Newfoundland puppy--just +watch--" + +Stepping back to the ropes, Collins extended his hand across them, +saying: "Come here, Barney, and show all these people who you love best." + +And Barney twinkled forward on his small hoofs, nozzled the open hand, +and came closer, nozzling up the arm, nudging Collins's shoulders with +his nose, half-rearing as if to get across the ropes and embrace him. +What he was really doing was begging and entreating Collins to take him +away out of the squared ring from the torment he knew awaited him. + +"That's what it means by never spiking him," Collins shot at the man with +the waxed moustaches, as he stepped forward to the imaginary line in the +sawdust, above the imaginary pit of the orchestra, and addressed the +imaginary house. + +"Ladies and gentlemen, Barney Barnato is a josher. He's got forty tricks +up each of his four legs, and the man don't live that he'll let stick on +big back for sixty seconds. I'm telling you this in fair warning, before +I make my proposition. Looks easy, doesn't it?--one minute, the sixtieth +part of an hour, to be precise, sixty seconds, to stick on the back of an +affectionate josher mule like Barney. Well, come on you boys and broncho +riders. To anybody who sticks on for one minute I shall immediately pay +the sum of fifty dollars; for two whole, entire minutes, the sum of five +hundred dollars." + +This was the cue for Samuel Bacon, who advanced across the sawdust, +awkward and grinning and embarrassed, and apparently was helped up to the +stage by the extended hand of Collins. + +"Is your life insured?" Collins demanded. + +Sam shook his head and grinned. + +"Then what are you tackling this for?" + +"For the money," said Sam. "I jes' naturally needs it in my business." + +"What is your business?" + +"None of your business, mister." Here Sam grinned ingratiating apology +for his impertinence and shuffled on his legs. "I might be investin' in +lottery tickets, only I ain't. Do I get the money?--that's _our_ +business." + +"Sure you do," Collins replied. "When you earn it. Stand over there to +one side and wait a moment.--Ladies and gentlemen, if you will forgive +the delay, I must ask for more volunteers.--Any more takers? Fifty +dollars for sixty seconds. Almost a dollar a second . . . if you win. +Better! I'll make it a dollar a second. Sixty dollars to the boy, man, +woman, or girl who sticks on Barney's back for one minute. Come on, +ladies. Remember this is the day of equal suffrage. Here's where you +put it over on your husbands, brothers, sons, fathers, and grandfathers. +Age is no limit.--Grandma, do I get you?" he uttered directly to what +must have been a very elderly lady in a near front row.--"You see," (to +the prospective buyer), "I've got the entire patter for you. You could +do it with two rehearsals, and you can do them right here, free of +charge, part of the purchase." + +The next two tumblers crossed the sawdust and were helped by Collins up +to the imaginary stage. + +"You can change the patter according to the cities you're in," he +explained to the Frenchman. "It's easy to find out the names of the most +despised and toughest neighbourhoods or villages, and have the boys hail +from them." + +Continuing the patter, Collins put the performance on. Sam's first +attempt was brief. He was not half on when he was flung to the ground. +Half a dozen attempts, quickly repeated, were scarcely better, the last +one permitting him to remain on Barney's back nearly ten seconds, and +culminating in a ludicrous fall over Barney's head. Sam withdrew from +the ring, shaking his head dubiously and holding his side as if in pain. +The other lads followed. Expert tumblers, they executed most amazing and +side-splitting fails. Sam recovered and came back. Toward the last, all +three made a combined attack on Barney, striving to mount him +simultaneously from different slants of approach. They were scattered +and flung like chaff, sometimes falling heaped together. Once, the two +white boys, standing apart as if recovering breath, were mowed down by +Sam's flying body. + +"Remember, this is a real mule," Collins told the man with the waxed +moustaches. "If any outsiders butt in for a hack at the money, all the +better. They'll get theirs quick. The man don't live who can stay on +his back a minute . . . if you keep him rehearsed with the spike. He +must live in fear of the spike. Never let him slow up on it. Never let +him forget it. If you lay off any time for a few days, rehearse him with +the spike a couple of times just before you begin again, or else he might +forget it and queer the turn by ambling around with the first outside +rube that mounts him. + +"And just suppose some rube, all hooks of arms and legs and hands, is +managing to stick on anyway, and the minute is getting near up. Just +have Sam here, or any of your three, slide in and spike him from the +palm. That'll be good night for Mr. Rube. You can't lose, and the +audience'll laugh its fool head off. + +"Now for the climax! Watch! This always brings the house down. Get +busy you two!--Sam! Ready!" + +While the white boys threatened to mount Barney from either side and kept +his attention engaged, Sam, from outside, in a sudden fit of rage and +desperation, made a flying dive across the ropes and from in front locked +arms and legs about Barney's neck, tucking his own head close against +Barney's head. And Barney reared up on his hind legs, as he had long +since learned from the many palm-spikings he had received on head and +neck. + +"It's a corker," Collins announced, as Barney, on his hind legs, striking +vainly with his fore, struggled about the ring. "There's no danger. +He'll never fall over backwards. He's a mule, and he's too wise. +Besides, even if he does, all Sam has to do is let go and fall clear." + +The turn over, Barney gladly accepted the halter and was led out of the +square ring and up to the Frenchman. + +"Long life there--look him over," Collins continued to sell. "It's a +full turn, including yourself, four performers, besides the mule, and +besides any suckers from the audience. It's all ready to put on the +boards, and dirt cheap at five thousand." + +The Frenchman winced at the sum. + +"Listen to arithmetic," Collins went on. "You can sell at twelve hundred +a week at least, and you can net eight hundred certain. Six weeks of the +net pays for the turn, and you can book a hundred weeks right off the bat +and have them yelling for more. Wish I was young and footloose. I'd +take it out on the road myself and coin a fortune." + +And Barney was sold, and passed out of the Cedarwild Animal School to the +slavery of the spike and to be provocative of much joy and laughter in +the pleasure-theatre of the world. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + + +"The thing is, Johnny, you can't love dogs into doing professional +tricks, which is the difference between dogs and women," Collins told his +assistant. "You know how it is with any dog. You love it up into lying +down and rolling over and playing dead and all such dub tricks. And then +one day you show him off to your friends, and the conditions are changed, +and he gets all excited and foolish, and you can't get him to do a thing. +Children are like that. Lose their heads in company, forget all their +training, and throw you down." + +"Now on the stage, they got real tricks to do, tricks they don't do, +tricks they hate. And they mightn't be feeling good--got a touch of +cold, or mange, or are sour-balled. What are you going to do? Apologize +to the audience? Besides, on the stage, the programme runs like +clockwork. Got to start performing on the tick of the clock, and +anywhere from one to seven turns a day, all depending what kind of time +you've got. The point is, your dogs have got to get right up and +perform. No loving them, no begging them, no waiting on them. And +there's only the one way. They've got to know when you start, you mean +it." + +"And dogs ain't fools," Johnny opined. "They know when you mean +anything, an' when you don't." + +"Sure thing," Collins nodded approbation. "The moment you slack up on +them is the moment they slack up in their work. You get soft, and see +how quick they begin making mistakes in their tricks. You've got to keep +the fear of God over them. If you don't, they won't, and you'll find +yourself begging for spotted time on the bush circuits." + +Half an hour later, Michael heard, though he understood no word of it, +the master-trainer laying another law down to another assistant. + +"Cross-breds and mongrels are what's needed, Charles. Not one +thoroughbred in ten makes good, unless he's got the heart of a coward, +and that's just what distinguishes them from mongrels and cross-breds. +Like race-horses, they're hot-blooded. They've got sensitiveness, and +pride. Pride's the worst. You listen to me. I was born into the +business and I've studied it all my life. I'm a success. There's only +one reason I'm a success--I KNOW. Get that. I KNOW." + +"Another thing is that cross-breds and mongrels are cheap. You needn't +be afraid of losing them or working them out. You can always get more, +and cheap. And they ain't the trouble in teaching. You can throw the +fear of God into them. That's what's the matter with the thoroughbreds. +You can't throw the fear of God into them." + +"Give a mongrel a real licking, and what's he do? He'll kiss your hand, +and be obedient, and crawl on his belly to do what you want him to do. +They're slave dogs, that's what mongrels are. They ain't got courage, +and you don't want courage in a performing dog. You want fear. Now you +give a thoroughbred a licking and see what happens. Sometimes they die. +I've known them to die. And if they don't die, what do they do? Either +they go stubborn, or vicious, or both. Sometimes they just go to biting +and foaming. You can kill them, but you can't keep them from biting and +foaming. Or they'll go straight stubborn. They're the worst. They're +the passive resisters--that's what I call them. They won't fight back. +You can flog them to death, but it won't buy you anything. They're like +those Christians that used to be burned at the stake or boiled in oil. +They've got their opinions, and nothing you can do will change them. +They'll die first. . . . And they do. I've had them. I was learning +myself . . . and I learned to leave the thoroughbred alone. They beat +you out. They get your goat. You never get theirs. And they're time- +wasters, and patience-wasters, and they're expensive." + +"Take this terrier here." Collins nodded at Michael, who stood several +feet back of him, morosely regarding the various activities of the arena. +"He's both kinds of a thoroughbred, and therefore no good. I've never +given him a real licking, and I never will. It would be a waste of time. +He'll fight if you press him too hard. And he'll die fighting you. He's +too sensible to fight if you don't press him too hard. And if you don't +press him too hard, he'll just stay as he is, and refuse to learn +anything. I'd chuck him right now, except Del Mar couldn't make a +mistake. Poor Harry knew he had a specially, and a crackerjack, and it's +up to me to find it." + +"Wonder if he's a lion dog," Charles suggested. + +"He's the kind that ain't afraid of lions," Collins concurred. "But what +sort of a specially trick could he do with lions? Stick his head in +their mouths? I never heard of a dog doing that, and it's an idea. But +we can try him. We've tried him at 'most everything else." + +"There's old Hannibal," said Charles. "He used to take a woman's head in +his mouth with the old Sales-Sinker shows." + +"But old Hannibal's getting cranky," Collins objected. "I've been +watching him and trying to get rid of him. Any animal is liable to go +off its nut any time, especially wild ones. You see, the life ain't +natural. And when they do, it's good night. You lose your investment, +and, if you don't know your business, maybe your life." + +And Michael might well have been tried out on Hannibal and have lost his +head inside that animal's huge mouth, had not the good fortune of apropos- +ness intervened. For, the next moment, Collins was listening to the +hasty report of his lion-and-tiger keeper. The man who reported was +possibly forty years of age, although he looked half as old again. He +was a withered-faced man, whose face-lines, deep and vertical, looked as +if they had been clawed there by some beast other than himself. + +"Old Hannibal is going crazy," was the burden of his report. + +"Nonsense," said Harris Collins. "It's you that's getting old. He's got +your goat, that's all. I'll show it to you.--Come on along, all of you. +We'll take fifteen minutes off of the work, and I'll show you a show +never seen in the show-ring. It'd be worth ten thousand a week anywhere +. . . only it wouldn't last. Old Hannibal would turn up his toes out of +sheer hurt feelings.--Come on everybody! All hands! Fifteen minutes +recess!" + +And Michael followed at the heels of his latest and most terrible master, +the twain leading the procession of employees and visiting professional +animal men who trooped along behind. As was well known, when Harris +Collins performed he performed only for the elite, for the hoi-polloi of +the trained-animal world. + +The lion-and-tiger man, who had clawed his own face with the beast-claws +of his nature, whimpered protest when he saw his employer's preparation +to enter Hannibal's cage; for the preparation consisted merely in +equipping himself with a broom-handle. + +Hannibal was old, but he was reputed the largest lion in captivity, and +he had not lost his teeth. He was pacing up and down the length of his +cage, heavily and swaying, after the manner of captive animals, when the +unexpected audience erupted into the space before his cage. Yet he took +no notice whatever, merely continuing his pacing, swinging his head from +side to side, turning lithely at each end of his cage, with all the air +of being bent on some determined purpose. + +"That's the way he's been goin' on for two days," whimpered his keeper. +"An' when you go near 'm, he just reaches for you. Look what he done to +me." The man held up his right arm, the shirt and undershirt ripped to +shreds, and red parallel grooves, slightly clotted with blood, showing +where the claws had broken the skin. "An' I wasn't inside. He did it +through the bars, with one swipe, when I was startin' to clean his cage. +Now if he'd only roar, or something. But he never makes a sound, just +keeps on goin' up an' down." + +"Where's the key?" Collins demanded. "Good. Now let me in. And lock it +afterward and take the key out. Lose it, forget it, throw it away. I'll +have all the time in the world to wait for you to find it to let me out." + +And Harris Collins, a sliver of a less than a light-weight man, who lived +in mortal fear that at table the mother of his children would crown him +with a plate of hot soup, went into the cage, before the critical +audience of his employees and professional visitors, armed only with a +broom-handle. Further, the door was locked behind him, and, the moment +he was in, keeping a casual but alert eye on the pacing Hannibal, he +reiterated his order to lock the door and remove the key. + +Half a dozen times the lion paced up and down, declining to take any +notice of the intruder. And then, when his back was turned as he went +down the cage, Collins stepped directly in the way of his return path and +stood still. Coming back and finding his way blocked, Hannibal did not +roar. His muscular movements sliding each into the next like so much +silk of tawny hide, he struck at the obstacle that confronted his way. +But Collins, knowing ahead of the lion what the lion was going to do, +struck first, with the broom-handle rapping the beast on its tender nose. +Hannibal recoiled with a flash of snarl and flashed back a second +sweeping stroke of his mighty paw. Again he was anticipated, and the rap +on his nose sent him into recoil. + +"Got to keep his head down--that way lies safety," the master-trainer +muttered in a low, tense voice. + +"Ah, would you? Take it, then." + +Hannibal, in wrath, crouching for a spring, had lifted his head. The +consequent blow on his nose forced his head down to the floor, and the +king of beasts, nose still to floor, backed away with mouth-snarls and +throat-and-chest noises. + +"Follow up," Collins enunciated, himself following, rapping the nose +again sharply and accelerating the lion's backward retreat. + +"Man is the boss because he's got the head that thinks," Collins preached +the lesson; "and he's just got to make his head boss his body, that's +all, so that he can think one thought ahead of the animal, and act one +act ahead. Watch me get his goat. He ain't the hard case he's trying to +make himself believe he is. And that idea, which he's just starting, has +got to be taken out of him. The broomstick will do it. Watch." + +He backed the animal down the length of the cage, continually rapping at +the nose and keeping it down to the floor. + +"Now I'm going to pile him into the corner." + +And Hannibal, snarling, growling, and spitting, ducking his head and with +short paw-strokes trying to ward off the insistent broomstick, backed +obediently into the corner, crumpled up his hind-parts, and tried to +withdraw his corporeal body within itself in a pain-urged effort to make +it smaller. And always he kept his nose down and himself harmless for a +spring. In the thick of it he slowly raised his nose and yawned. Nor, +because it came up slowly, and because Collins had anticipated the yawn +by being one thought ahead of Hannibal in Hannibal's own brain, was the +nose rapped. + +"That's the goat," Collins announced, for the first time speaking in a +hearty voice in which was no vibration of strain. "When a lion yawns in +the thick of a fight, you know he ain't crazy. He's sensible. He's got +to be sensible, or he'd be springing or lashing out instead of yawning. +He knows he's licked, and that yawn of his merely says: 'I quit. For the +I love of Mike leave me alone. My nose is awful sore. I'd like to get +you, but I can't. I'll do anything you want, and I'll be dreadful good, +but don't hit my poor sore nose.' + +"But man is the boss, and he can't afford to be so easy. Drive the +lesson home that you're boss. Rub it in. Don't stop when he quits. Make +him swallow the medicine and lick the spoon. Make him kiss your foot on +his neck holding him down in the dirt. Make him kiss the stick that's +beaten him.--Watch!" + +And Hannibal, the largest lion in captivity, with all his teeth, captured +out of the jungle after he was full-grown, a veritable king of beasts, +before the menacing broomstick in the hand of a sliver of a man, backed +deeper and more crumpled together into the corner. His back was bowed +up, the very opposite muscular position to that for a spring, while he +drew his head more and more down and under his chest in utter abjectness, +resting his weight on his elbows and shielding his poor nose with his +massive paws, a single stroke of which could have ripped the life of +Collins quivering from his body. + +"Now he might be tricky," Collins announced, "but he's got to kiss my +foot and the stick just the same. Watch!" + +He lifted and advanced his left foot, not tentatively and hesitantly, but +quickly and firmly, bringing it to rest on the lion's neck. The stick +was poised to strike, one act ahead of the lion's next possible act, as +Collins's mind was one thought ahead of the lion's next thought. + +And Hannibal did the forecasted and predestined. His head flashed up, +huge jaws distended, fangs gleaming, to sink into the slender, silken- +hosed ankle above the tan low-cut shoes. But the fangs never sank. They +were scarcely started a fifth of the way of the distance, when the +waiting broomstick rapped on his nose and made him sink it in the floor +under his chest and cover it again with his paws. + +"He ain't crazy," said Collins. "He knows, from the little he knows, +that I know more than him and that I've got him licked to a +fare-you-well. If he was crazy, he wouldn't know, and I wouldn't know +his mind either, and I wouldn't be that one jump ahead of him, and he'd +get me and mess the whole cage up with my insides." + +He prodded Hannibal with the end of the broom-handle, after each prod +poising it for a stroke. And the great lion lay and roared in +helplessness, and at each prod exposed his nose more and lifted it +higher, until, at the end, his red tongue ran out between his fangs and +licked the boot resting none too gently on his neck, and, after that, +licked the broomstick that had administered all the punishment. + +"Going to be a good lion now?" Collins demanded, roughly rubbing his foot +back and forth on Hannibal's neck. + +Hannibal could not refrain from growling his hatred. + +"Going to be a good lion?" Collins repeated, rubbing his foot back and +forth still more roughly. + +And Hannibal exposed his nose and with his red tongue licked again the +tan shoe and the slender, tan-silken ankle that he could have destroyed +with one crunch. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + + +One friend Michael made among the many animals he encountered in the +Cedarwild School, and a strange, sad friendship it was. Sara she was +called, a small, green monkey from South America, who seemed to have been +born hysterical and indignant, and with no appreciation of humour. +Sometimes, following Collins about the arena, Michael would meet her +while she waited to be tried out on some new turn. For, unable or +unwilling to try, she was for ever being tried out on turns, or, with +little herself to do, as a filler-in for more important performers. + +But she always caused confusion, either chattering and squealing with +fright or bickering at the other animals. Whenever they attempted to +make her do anything, she protested indignantly; and if they tried force, +her squalls and cries excited all the animals in the arena and set the +work back. + +"Never mind," said Collins finally. "She'll go into the next monkey band +we make up." + +This was the last and most horrible fate that could befall a monkey on +the stage, to be a helpless marionette, compelled by unseen sticks and +wires, poked and jerked by concealed men, to move and act throughout an +entire turn. + +But it was before this doom was passed upon her that Michael made her +acquaintance. Their first meeting, she sprang suddenly at him, a +screaming, chattering little demon, threatening him with nails and teeth. +And Michael, already deep-sunk in habitual moroseness merely looked at +her calmly, not a ripple to his neck-hair nor a prick to his ears. The +next moment, her fuss and fury quite ignored, she saw him turn his head +away. This gave her pause. Had he sprung at her, or snarled, or shown +any anger or resentment such as did the other dogs when so treated by +her, she would have screamed and screeched and raised a hubbub of +expostulation, crying for help and calling all men to witness how she was +being unwarrantably attacked. + +As it was, Michael's unusual behaviour seemed to fascinate her. She +approached him tentatively, without further racket; and the boy who had +her in charge slacked the thin chain that held her. + +"Hope he breaks her back for her," was his unholy wish; for he hated Sara +intensely, desiring to be with the lions or elephants rather than dancing +attendance on a cantankerous female monkey there was no reasoning with. + +And because Michael took no notice of her, she made up to him. It was +not long before she had her hands on him, and, quickly after that, an arm +around his neck and her head snuggled against his. Then began her +interminable tale. Day after day, catching him at odd times in the ring, +she would cling closely to him and in a low voice, running on and on, +never pausing for breath, tell him, for all he knew, the story of her +life. At any rate, it sounded like the story of her woes and of all the +indignities which had been wreaked upon her. It was one long complaint, +and some of it might have been about her health, for she sniffed and +coughed a great deal and her chest seemed always to hurt her from the way +she had of continually and gingerly pressing the palm of her hand to it. +Sometimes, however, she would cease her complaining, and love and mother +him, uttering occasional series of gentle mellow sounds that were like +croonings. + +Hers was the only hand of affection that was laid on him at Cedarwild, +and she was ever gentle, never pinching him, never pulling his ears. By +the same token, he was the only friend she had; and he came to look +forward to meeting her in the course of the morning work--and this, +despite that every meeting always concluded in a scene, when she fought +with her keeper against being taken away. Her cries and protests would +give way to whimperings and wailings, while the men about laughed at the +strangeness of the love-affair between her and the Irish terrier. + +But Harris Collins tolerated, even encouraged, their friendship. + +"The two sour-balls get along best together," he said. "And it does them +good. Gives them something to live for, and that way lies health. But +some day, mark my words, she'll turn on him and give him what for, and +their friendship will get a terrible smash." + +And half of it he spoke with the voice of prophecy, and, though she never +turned on Michael, the day in the world was written when their friendship +would truly receive a terrible smash. + +"Now seals are too wise," Collins explained one day, in a sort of +extempore lecture to several of his apprentice trainers. "You've just +got to toss fish to them when they perform. If you don't, they won't, +and there's an end of it. But you can't depend on feeding dainties to +dogs, for instance, though you can make a young, untrained pig perform +creditably by means of a nursing bottle hidden up your sleeve." + +"All you have to do is think it over. Do you think you can make those +greyhounds extend themselves with the promise of a bite of meat? It's +the whip that makes them extend.--Look over there at Billy Green. There +ain't another way to teach that dog that trick. You can't love her into +doing it. You can't pay her to do it. There's only one way, and that's +_make_ her." + +Billy Green, at the moment, was training a tiny, nondescript, frizzly- +haired dog. Always, on the stage, he made a hit by drawing from his +pocket a tiny dog that would do this particular trick. The last one had +died from a wrenched back, and he was now breaking in a new one. He was +catching the little mite by the hind-legs and tossing it up in the air, +where, making a half-flip and descending head first, it was supposed to +alight with its forefeet on his hand and there balance itself, its hind +feet and body above it in the air. Again and again he stooped, caught +her hind-legs and flung her up into the half-turn. Almost frozen with +fear, she vainly strove to effect the trick. Time after time, and every +time, she failed to make the balance. Sometimes she fell crumpled; +several times she all but struck the ground: and once, she did strike, on +her side and so hard as to knock the breath out of her. Her master, +taking advantage of the moment to wipe the sweat from his streaming face, +nudged her about with his toe till she staggered weakly to her feet. + +"The dog was never born that'd learn that trick for the promise of a bit +of meat," Collins went on. "Any more than was the dog ever born that'd +walk on its forelegs without having its hind-legs rapped up in the air +with the stick a thousand times. Yet you take that trick there. It's +always a winner, especially with the women--so cunning, you know, so +adorable cute, to be yanked out of its beloved master's pocket and to +have such trust and confidence in him as to allow herself to be tossed +around that way. Trust and confidence hell! He's put the fear of God +into her, that's what." + +"Just the same, to dig a dainty out of your pocket once in a while and +give an animal a nibble, always makes a hit with the audience. That's +about all it's good for, yet it's a good stunt. Audiences like to +believe that the animals enjoy doing their tricks, and that they are +treated like pampered darlings, and that they just love their masters to +death. But God help all of us and our meal tickets if the audiences +could see behind the scenes. Every trained-animal turn would be taken +off the stage instanter, and we'd be all hunting for a job." + +"Yes, and there's rough stuff no end pulled off on the stage right before +the audience's eyes. The best fooler I ever saw was Lottie's. She had a +bunch of trained cats. She loved them to death right before everybody, +especially if a trick wasn't going good. What'd she do? She'd take that +cat right up in her arms and kiss it. And when she put it down it'd +perform the trick all right all right, while the audience applauded its +silly head off for the kindness and humaneness she'd shown. Kiss it? Did +she? I'll tell you what she did. She bit its nose." + +"Eleanor Pavalo learned the trick from Lottie, and used it herself on her +toy dogs. And many a dog works on the stage in a spiked collar, and a +clever man can twist a dog's nose and nobody in the audience any the +wiser. But it's the fear that counts. It's what the dog knows he'll get +afterward when the turn's over that keeps most of them straight." + +"Remember Captain Roberts and his great Danes. They weren't pure-breds, +though. He must have had a dozen of them--toughest bunch of brutes I +ever saw. He boarded them here twice. You couldn't go among them +without a club in your hand. I had a Mexican lad laid up by them. He +was a tough one, too. But they got him down and nearly ate him. The +doctors took over forty stitches in him and shot him full of that Pasteur +dope for hydrophobia. And he always will limp with his right leg from +what the dogs did to him. I tell you, they were the limit. And yet, +every time the curtain went up, Captain Roberts brought the house down +with the first stunt. Those dogs just flocked all over him, loving him +to death, from the looks of it. And were they loving him? They hated +him. I've seen him, right here in the cage at Cedarwild, wade into them +with a club and whale the stuffing impartially out of all of them. Sure, +they loved him not. Just a bit of the same old aniseed was what he used. +He'd soak small pieces of meat in aniseed oil and stick them in his +pockets. But that stunt would only work with a bunch of giant dogs like +his. It was their size that got it across. Had they been a lot of +ordinary dogs it would have looked silly. And, besides, they didn't do +their regular tricks for aniseed. They did it for Captain Roberts's +club. He was a tough bird himself." + +"He used to say that the art of training animals was the art of inspiring +them with fear. One of his assistants told me a nasty one about him +afterwards. They had an off month in Los Angeles, and Captain Roberts +got it into his head he was going to make a dog balance a silver dollar +on the neck of a champagne bottle. Now just think that over and try to +see yourself loving a dog into doing it. The assistant said he wore out +about as many sticks as dogs, and that he wore out half a dozen dogs. He +used to get them from the public pound at two and a half apiece, and +every time one died he had another ready and waiting. And he succeeded +with the seventh dog. I'm telling you, it learned to balance a dollar on +the neck of a bottle. And it died from the effects of the learning +within a week after he put it on the stage. Abscesses in the lungs, from +the stick." + +"There was an Englishman came over when I was a youngster. He had +ponies, monkeys, and dogs. He bit the monkey's ears, so that, on the +stage, all he had to do was to make a move as if he was going to bite and +they'd quit their fooling and be good. He had a big chimpanzee that was +a winner. It could turn four somersaults as fast as you could count on +the back of a galloping pony, and he used to have to give it a real +licking about twice a week. And sometimes the lickings were too stiff, +and the monkey'd get sick and have to lay off. But the owner solved the +problem. He got to giving him a little licking, a mere taste of the +stick, regular, just before the turn came on. And that did it in his +case, though with some other case the monkey most likely would have got +sullen and not acted at all." + +It was on that day that Harris Collins sold a valuable bit of information +to a lion man who needed it. It was off time for him, and his three +lions were boarding at Cedarwild. Their turn was an exciting and even +terrifying one, when viewed from the audience; for, jumping about and +roaring, they were made to appear as if about to destroy the slender +little lady who performed with them and seemed to hold them in subjection +only by her indomitable courage and a small riding-switch in her hand. + +"The trouble is they're getting too used to it," the man complained. +"Isadora can't prod them up any more. They just won't make a showing." + +"I know them," Collins nodded. "They're pretty old now, and they're +spirit-broken besides. Take old Sark there. He's had so many blank +cartridges fired into his ears that he's stone deaf. And Selim--he lost +his heart with his teeth. A Portuguese fellow who was handling him for +the Barnum and Bailey show did that for him. You've heard?" + +"I've often wondered," the man shook his head. "It must have been a +smash." + +"It was. The Portuguese did it with an iron bar. Selim was sulky and +took a swipe at him with his paw, and he whopped it to him full in the +mouth just as he opened it to let out a roar. He told me about it +himself. Said Selim's teeth rattled on the floor like dominoes. But he +shouldn't have done it. It was destroying valuable property. Anyway, +they fired him for it." + +"Well, all three of them ain't worth much to me now," said their owner. +"They won't play up to Isadora in that roaring and rampaging at the end. +It really made the turn. It was our finale, and we always got a great +hand for it. Say, what am I going to do about it anyway? Ditch it? Or +get some young lions?" + +"Isadora would be safer with the old ones," Collins said. + +"Too safe," Isadora's husband objected. "Of course, with younger lions, +the work and responsibility piles up on me. But we've got to make our +living, and this turn's about busted." + +Harris Collins shook his head. + +"What d'ye mean?--what's the idea?" the man demanded eagerly. + +"They'll live for years yet, seeing how captivity has agreed with them," +Collins elucidated. "If you invest in young lions you run the risk of +having them pass out on you. And you can go right on pulling the trick +off with what you've got. All you've got to do is to take my advice . . . " + +The master-trainer paused, and the lion man opened his mouth to speak. + +"Which will cost you," Collins went on deliberately, "say three hundred +dollars." + +"Just for some advice?" the other asked quickly. + +"Which I guarantee will work. What would you have to pay for three new +lions? Here's where you make money at three hundred. And it's the +simplest of advice. I can tell it to you in three words, which is at the +rate of a hundred dollars a word, and one of the words is 'the.'" + +"Too steep for me," the other objected. "I've got a make a living." + +"So have I," Collins assured him. "That's why I'm here. I'm a +specialist, and you're paying a specialist's fee. You'll be as mad as a +hornet when I tell you, it's that simple; and for the life of me I can't +understand why you don't already know it." + +"And if it don't work?" was the dubious query. + +"If it don't work, you don't pay." + +"Well, shoot it along," the lion man surrendered. + +"_Wire the cage_," said Collins. + +At first the man could not comprehend; then the light began to break on +him. + +"You mean . . . ?" + +"Just that," Collins nodded. "And nobody need be the wiser. Dry +batteries will do it beautifully. You can install them nicely under the +cage floor. All Isadora has to do when she's ready is to step on the +button; and when the electricity shoots through their feet, if they don't +go up in the air and rampage and roar around to beat the band, not only +can you keep the three hundred, but I'll give you three hundred more. I +know. I've seen it done, and it never misses fire. It's just as though +they were dancing on a red-hot stove. Up they go, and every time they +come down they burn their feet again. + +"But you'll have to put the juice into them slowly," Collins warned. +"I'll show you how to do the wiring. Just a weak battery first, so as +they can work up to it, and then stronger and stronger to the curtain. +And they never get used to it. As long as they live they'll dance just +as lively as the first time. What do you think of it?" + +"It's worth three hundred all right," the man admitted. "I wish I could +make my money that easy." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + + +"Guess I'll have to wash my hands of him," Collins told Johnny. "I know +Del Mar must have been right when he said he was the limit, but I can't +get a clue to it." + +This followed upon a fight between Michael and Collins. Michael, more +morose than ever, had become even crusty-tempered, and, scarcely with +provocation at all, had attacked the man he hated, failing, as ever, to +put his teeth into him, and receiving, in turn, a couple of smashing +kicks under his jaw. + +"He's like a gold-mine all right all right," Collins meditated, "but I'm +hanged if I can crack it, and he's getting grouchier every day. Look at +him. What'd he want to jump me for? I wasn't rough with him. He's +piling up a sour-ball that'll make him fight a policeman some day." + +A few minutes later, one of his patrons, a tow-headed young man who was +boarding and rehearsing three performing leopards at Cedarwild, was +asking Collins for the loan of an Airedale. + +"I've only got one left now," he explained, "and I ain't safe without +two." + +"What's happened to the other one?" the master-trainer queried. + +"Alphonso--that's the big buck leopard--got nasty this morning and +settled his hash. I had to put him out of his misery. He was gutted +like a horse in the bull-ring. But he saved me all right. If it hadn't +been for him I'd have got a mauling. Alphonso gets these bad streaks +just about every so often. That's the second dog he's killed for me." + +Collins shook his head. + +"Haven't got an Airedale," he said, and just then his eyes chanced to +fall on Michael. "Try out the Irish terrier," he suggested. "They're +like the Airedale in disposition. Pretty close cousins, at any rate." + +"I pin my faith on the Airedale when it comes to lion dogs," the leopard +man demurred. + +"So's an Irish terrier a lion dog. Take that one there. Look at the +size and weight of him. Also, take it from me, he's all spunk. He'll +stand up to anything. Try him out. I'll lend him to you. If he makes +good I'll sell him to you cheap. An Irish terrier for a leopard dog will +be a novelty." + +"If he gets fresh with them cats he'll find his finish," Johnny told +Collins, as Michael was led away by the leopard man. + +"Then, maybe, the stage will lose a star," Collins answered, with a shrug +of shoulders. "But I'll have him off my chest anyway. When a dog gets a +perpetual sour-ball like that he's finished. Never can do a thing with +them. I've had them on my hands before." + +* * * * * + +And Michael went to make the acquaintance of Jack, the surviving +Airedale, and to do his daily turn with the leopards. In the big spotted +cats he recognized the hereditary enemy, and, even before he was thrust +into the cage, his neck was all a-prickle as the skin nervously tightened +and the hair uprose stiff-ended. It was a nervous moment for all +concerned, the introduction of a new dog into the cage. The tow-headed +leopard man, who was billed on the boards as Raoul Castlemon and was +called Ralph by his intimates, was already in the cage. The Airedale was +with him, while outside stood several men armed with iron bars and long +steel forks. These weapons, ready for immediate use, were thrust between +the bars as a menace to the leopards who were, very much against their +wills, to be made to perform. + +They resented Michael's intrusion on the instant, spitting, lashing their +long tails, and crouching to spring. At the same instant the trainer +spoke with sharp imperativeness and raised his whip, while the men on the +outside lifted their irons and advanced them intimidatingly into the +cage. And the leopards, bitter-wise of the taste of the iron, remained +crouched, although they still spat and whipped their tails angrily. + +Michael was no coward. He did not slink behind the man for protection. +On the other hand, he was too sensible to rush to attack such formidable +creatures. What he did do, with bristling neck-hair, was to stalk stiff- +leggedly across the cage, turn about with his face toward the danger, and +stalk stiffly back, coming to a pause alongside of Jack, who gave him a +good-natured sniff of greeting. + +"He's the stuff," the trainer muttered in a curiously tense voice. "They +don't get his goat." + +The situation was deservedly tense, and Ralph developed it with cautious +care, making no abrupt movements, his eyes playing everywhere over dogs +and leopards and the men outside with the prods and bars. He made the +savage cats come out of their crouch and separate from one another. At +his word of command, Jack walked about among them. Michael, on his own +initiative, followed. And, like Jack, he walked very stiffly on his +guard and very circumspectly. + +One of them, Alphonso, spat suddenly at him. He did not startle, though +his hair rippled erect and he bared his fangs in a silent snarl. At the +same moment the nearest iron bar was shoved in threateningly close to +Alphonso, who shifted his yellow eyes from Michael to the bar and back +again and did not strike out. + +The first day was the hardest. After that the leopards accepted Michael +as they accepted Jack. No love was lost on either side, nor were +friendly overtures ever offered. Michael was quick to realize that it +was the men and dogs against the cats and that the men and does must +stand together. Each day he spent from an hour to two hours in the cage, +watching the rehearsing, with nothing for him and Jack to do save stand +vigilantly on guard. Sometimes, when the leopards seemed better natured, +Ralph even encouraged the two dogs to lie down. But, on bad mornings, he +saw to it that they were ever ready to spring in between him and any +possible attack. + +For the rest of the time Michael shared his large pen with Jack. They +were well cared for, as were all animals at Cedarwild, receiving frequent +scrubbings and being kept clean of vermin. For a dog only three years +old, Jack was very sedate. Either he had never learned to play or had +already forgotten how. On the other hand, he was sweet-tempered and +equable, and he did not resent the early shows of crustiness which +Michael made. And Michael quickly ceased from being crusty and took +pleasure in their quiet companionship. There were no demonstrations. +They were content to lie awake by the hour, merely pleasantly aware of +each other's proximity. + +Occasionally, Michael could hear Sara making a distant scene or sending +out calls which he knew were for him. Once she got away from her keeper +and located Michael coming out of the leopard cage. With a shrill squeal +of joy she was upon him, clinging to him and chattering the hysterical +tale of all her woes since they had been parted. The leopard man looked +on tolerantly and let her have her few minutes. It was her keeper who +tore her away in the end, cling as she would to Michael, screaming all +the while like a harridan. When her hold was broken, she sprang at the +man in a fury, and, before he could throttle her to subjection, sank her +teeth into his thumb and wrist. All of which was provocative of great +hilarity to the onlookers, while her squalls and cries excited the +leopards to spitting and leaping against their bars. And, as she was +borne away, she set up a soft wailing like that of a heart-broken child. + +* * * * * + +Although Michael proved a success with the leopards, Raoul Castlemon +never bought him from Collins. One morning, several days later, the +arena was vexed by uproar and commotion from the animal cages. The +excitement, starting with revolver shots, was communicated everywhere. +The various lions raised a great roaring, and the many dogs barked +frantically. All tricks in the arena stopped, the animals temporarily +unstrung and unable to continue. Several men, among them Collins, ran in +the direction of the cages. Sara's keeper dropped her chain in order to +follow. + +"It's Alphonso--shillings to pence it is," Collins called to one of his +assistants who was running beside him. "He'll get Ralph yet." + +The affair was all but over and leaping to its culmination when Collins +arrived. Castlemon was just being dragged out, and as Collins ran he +could see the two men drop him to the ground so that they might slam the +cage-door shut. Inside, in so wildly struggling a tangle on the floor +that it was difficult to discern what animals composed it, were Alphonso, +Jack, and Michael looked together. Men danced about outside, thrusting +in with iron bars and trying to separate them. In the far end of the +cage were the other two leopards, nursing their wounds and snarling and +striking at the iron rods that kept them out of the combat. + +Sara's arrival and what followed was a matter of seconds. Trailing her +chain behind her, the little green monkey, the tailed female who knew +love and hysteria and was remote cousin to human women, flashed up to the +narrow cage-bars and squeezed through. Simultaneously the tangle +underwent a violent upheaval. Flung out with such force as to be smashed +against the near end of the cage, Michael fell to the floor, tried to +spring up, but crumpled and sank down, his right shoulder streaming blood +from a terrible mauling and crushing. To him Sara leaped, throwing her +arms around him and mothering him up to her flat little hairy breast. She +uttered solicitous cries, and, as Michael strove to rise on his ruined +foreleg, scolded him with sharp gentleness and with her arms tried to +hold him away from the battle. Also, in an interval, her eyes malevolent +in her rage, she chattered piercing curses at Alphonso. + +A crowbar, shoved into his side, distracted the big leopard. He struck +at the weapon with his paw, and, when it was poked into him again, flung +himself upon it, biting the naked iron with his teeth. With a second +fling he was against the cage bars, with a single slash of paw ripping +down the forearm of the man who had poked him. The crowbar was dropped +as the man leaped away. Alphonso flung back on Jack, a sorry antagonist +by this time, who could only pant and quiver where he lay in the welter +of what was left of him. + +Michael had managed to get up on his three legs and was striving to +stumble forward against the restraining arms of Sara. The mad leopard +was on the verge of springing upon them when deflected by another prod of +the iron. This time he went straight at the man, fetching up against the +cage-bars with such fierceness as to shake the structure. + +More men began thrusting with more rods, but Alphonso was not to be +balked. Sara saw him coming and screamed her shrillest and savagest at +him. Collins snatched a revolver from one of the men. + +"Don't kill him!" Castlemon cried, seizing Collins's arm. + +The leopard man was in a bad way himself. One arm dangled helplessly at +his side, while his eyes, filling with blood from a scalp wound, he wiped +on the master-trainer's shoulder so that he might see. + +"He's my property," he protested. "And he's worth a hundred sick monkeys +and sour-balled terriers. Anyway, we'll get them out all right. Give me +a chance.--Somebody mop my eyes out, please. I can't see. I've used up +my blank cartridges. Has anybody any blanks?" + +One moment Sara would interpose her body between Michael and the leopard, +which was still being delayed by the prodding irons; and the next moment +she would turn to screech at the fanged cat is if by very advertisement +of her malignancy she might intimidate him into keeping back. + +Michael, dragging her with him, growling and bristling, staggered forward +a couple of three-legged steps, gave at the ruined shoulder, and +collapsed. And then Sara did the great deed. With one last scream of +utmost fury, she sprang full into the face of the monstrous cat, tearing +and scratching with hands and feet, her mouth buried into the roots of +one of its stubby ears. The astounded leopard upreared, with his +forepaws striking and ripping at the little demon that would not let go. + +The fight and the life in the little green monkey lasted a short ten +seconds. But this was sufficient for Collins to get the door ajar and +with a quick clutch on Michael's hind-leg jerk him out and to the ground. + + + + +CHAPTER XXX + + +No rough-and-ready surgery of the Del Mar sort obtained at Cedarwild, +else Michael would not have lived. A real surgeon, skilful and +audacious, came very close to vivisecting him as he radically repaired +the ruin of a shoulder, doing things he would not have dared with a human +but which proved to be correct for Michael. + +"He'll always be lame," the surgeon said, wiping his hands and gazing +down at Michael, who lay, for the most part of him, a motionless prisoner +set in plaster of Paris. "All the healing, and there's plenty of it, +will have to be by first intention. If his temperature shoots up we'll +have to put him out of his misery. What's he worth?" + +"He has no tricks," Collins answered. "Possibly fifty dollars, and +certainly not that now. Lame dogs are not worth teaching tricks to." + +Time was to prove both men wrong. Michael was not destined to permanent +lameness, although in after-years his shoulder was always tender, and, on +occasion, when the weather was damp, he was compelled to ease it with a +slight limp. On the other hand, he was destined to appreciate to a great +price and to become the star performer Harry Del Mar had predicted of +him. + +In the meantime he lay for many weary days in the plaster and abstained +from raising a dangerous temperature. The care taken of him was +excellent. But not out of love and affection was it given. It was +merely a part of the system at Cedarwild which made the institution such +a success. When he was taken out of the plaster, he was still denied +that instinctive pleasure which all animals take in licking their wounds, +for shrewdly arranged bandages were wrapped and buckled on him. And when +they were finally removed, there were no wounds to lick; though deep in +the shoulder was a pain that required months in which to die out. + +Harris Collins bothered him no more with trying to teach him tricks, and, +one day, loaned him as a filler-in to a man and woman who had lost three +of their dog-troupe by pneumonia. + +"If he makes out you can have him for twenty dollars," Collins told the +man, Wilton Davis. + +"And if he croaks?" Davis queried. + +Collins shrugged his shoulders. "I won't sit up nights worrying about +him. He's unteachable." + +And when Michael departed from Cedarwild in a crate on an express wagon, +he might well have never returned, for Wilton Davis was notorious among +trained-animal men for his cruelty to dogs. Some care he might take of a +particular dog with a particularly valuable trick, but mere fillers-in +came too cheaply. They cost from three to five dollars apiece. Worse +than that, so far as he was concerned, Michael had cost nothing. And if +he died it meant nothing to Davis except the trouble of finding another +dog. + +The first stage of Michael's new adventure involved no unusual hardship, +despite the fact that he was so cramped in his crate that he could not +stand up and that the jolting and handling of the crate sent countless +twinges of pain shooting through his shoulder. The journey was only to +Brooklyn, where he was duly delivered to a second-rate theatre, Wilton +Davis being so indifferent a second-rate animal man that he could never +succeed in getting time with the big circuits. + +The hardship of the cramped crate began after Michael had been carried +into a big room above the stage and deposited with nearly a score of +similarly crated dogs. A sorry lot they were, all of them scrubs and +most of them spirit-broken and miserable. Several had bad sores on their +heads from being knocked about by Davis. No care was taken of these +sores, and they were not improved by the whitening that was put on them +for concealment whenever they performed. Some of them howled lamentably +at times, and every little while, as if it were all that remained for +them to do in their narrow cells, all of them would break out into +barking. + +Michael was the only one who did not join in these choruses. Long since, +as one feature of his developing moroseness, he had ceased from barking. +He had become too unsociable for any such demonstrations; nor did he +pattern after the example of some of the sourer-tempered dogs in the +room, who were for ever bickering and snarling through the slats of their +cages. In fact, Michael's sourness of temper had become too profound +even for quarrelling. All he desired was to be let alone, and of this he +had a surfeit for the first forty-eight hours. + +Wilton Davis had assembled his troupe ahead of time, so that the change +of programme was five days away. Having taken advantage of this to go to +see his wife's people over in New Jersey, he had hired one of the stage- +hands to feed and water his dogs. This the stage-hand would have done, +had he not had the misfortune to get into an altercation with a barkeeper +which culminated in a fractured skull and an ambulance ride to the +receiving hospital. To make the situation perfect for what followed, the +theatre was closed for three days in order to make certain alterations +demanded by the Fire Commissioners. + +No one came near the room, and after several hours Michael grew aware of +hunger and thirst. The time passed, and the desire for food was +supplanted by the desire for water. By nightfall the barking and yelping +became continuous, changing through the long night hours to whimpering +and whining. Michael alone made no sound, suffering dumbly in the bedlam +of misery. + +Morning of the second day dawned; the slow hours dragged by to the second +night; and the darkness of the second night drew down upon a scene behind +the scenes, sufficient of itself to condemn all trained-animal acts in +all theatres and show-tents of all the world. Whether Michael dreamed or +was in semi-delirium, there is no telling; but, whichever it was, he +lived most of his past life over again. Again he played as a puppy on +the broad verandas of _Mister_ Haggin's plantation bungalow at Meringe; +or, with Jerry, stalked the edges of the jungle down by the river-bank to +spy upon the crocodiles; or, learning from _Mister_ Haggin and Bob, and +patterning after Biddy and Terrence, to consider black men as lesser and +despised gods who must for ever be kept strictly in their places. + +On the schooner _Eugenie_ he sailed with Captain Kellar, his second +master, and on the beach at Tulagi lost his heart to Steward of the magic +fingers and sailed away with him and Kwaque on the steamer _Makambo_. +Steward was most in his visions, against a hazy background of vessels, +and of individuals like the Ancient Mariner, Simon Nishikanta, Grimshaw, +Captain Doane, and little old Ah Moy. Nor least of all did Scraps +appear, and Cocky, the valiant-hearted little fluff of life gallantly +bearing himself through his brief adventure in the sun. And it would +seem to Michael that on one side, clinging to him, Cocky talked farrago +in his ear, and on the other side Sara clung to him and chattered an +interminable and incommunicable tale. And then, deep about the roots of +his ears would seem to prod the magic, caressing fingers of Steward the +beloved. + +"I just don't I have no luck," Wilton Davis mourned, gazing about at his +dogs, the air still vibrating with the string of oaths he had at first +ripped out. + +"That comes of trusting a drunken stage-hand," his wife remarked +placidly. "I wouldn't be surprised if half of them died on us now." + +"Well, this is no time for talk," Davis snarled, proceeding to take off +his coat. "Get busy, my love, and learn the worst. Water's what they +need. I'll give them a tub of it." + +Bucketful by bucketful, from the tap at the sink in the corner, he filled +a large galvanized-iron tub. At sound of the running water the dogs +began whimpering and yelping and moaning. Some tried to lick his hands +with their swollen tongues as he dragged them roughly out of their cages. +The weaker ones crawled and bellied toward the tub, and were over-trod by +the stronger ones. There was not room for all, and the stronger ones +drank first, with much fighting and squabbling and slashing of fangs. +Into the foremost of this was Michael, slashing and being slashed, but +managing to get hasty gulps of the life-saving fluid. Davis danced about +among them, kicking right and left, so that all might have a chance. His +wife took a hand, laying about her with a mop. It was a pandemonium of +pain, for, their parched throats softened by the water, they were again +able to yelp and cry out loudly all their hurt and woe. + +Several were too weak to get to the water, so it was carried to them and +doused and splashed into their mouths. It seemed that they would never +be satisfied. They lay in collapse all about the room, but every little +while one or another would crawl over to the tub and try to drink more. +In the meantime Davis had started a fire and filled a caldron with +potatoes. + +"The place stinks like a den of skunks," Mrs. Davis observed, pausing +from dabbing the end of her nose with a powder-puff. "Dearest, we'll +just have to wash them." + +"All right, sweetheart," her husband agreed. "And the quicker the +better. We can get through with it while the potatoes are boiling and +cooling. I'll scrub them and you dry them. Remember that pneumonia, and +do it thoroughly." + +It was quick, rough bathing. Reaching out for the dogs nearest him, he +flung them in turn into the tub from which they had drunk. When they +were frightened, or when they objected in any way, he rapped them on the +head with the scrubbing brush or the bar of yellow laundry soap with +which he was lathering them. Several minutes sufficed for a dog. + +"Drink, damn you, drink--have some more," he would say, as he shoved +their heads down and under the dirty, soapy water. + +He seemed to hold them responsible for their horrible condition, to look +upon their filthiness as a personal affront. + +Michael yielded to being flung into the tub. He recognized that baths +were necessary and compulsory, although they were administered in much +better fashion at Cedarwild, while Kwaque and Steward had made a sort of +love function of it when they bathed him. So he did his best to endure +the scrubbing, and all might have been well had not Davis soused him +under. Michael jerked his head up with a warning growl. Davis suspended +half-way the blow he was delivering with the heavy brush, and emitted a +low whistle of surprise. + +"Hello!" he said. "And look who's here!--Lovey, this is the Irish +terrier I got from Collins. He's no good. Collins said so. Just a fill- +in.--Get out!" he commanded Michael. "That's all you get now, Mr. Fresh +Dog. But take it from me pretty soon you'll be getting it fast enough to +make you dizzy." + +While the potatoes were cooling, Mrs. Davis kept the hungry dogs warned +away by sharp cries. Michael lay down sullenly to one side, and took no +part in the rush for the trough when permission was given. Again Davis +danced among them, kicking away the stronger and the more eager. + +"If they get to fighting after all we've done for them, kick in their +ribs, lovey," he told his wife. + +"There! You would, would you?"--this to a large black dog, accompanied +by a savage kick in the side. The animal yelped its pain as it fled +away, and, from a safe distance, looked on piteously at the steaming +food. + +"Well, after this they can't say I don't never give my dogs a bath," +Davis remarked from the sink, where he was rinsing his arms. "What d'ye +say we call it a day's work, my dear?" Mrs. Davis nodded agreement. "We +can rehearse them to-morrow and next day. That will be plenty of time. +I'll run in to-night and boil them some bran. They'll need an extra meal +after fasting two days." + +The potatoes finished, the dogs were put back in their cages for another +twenty-four hours of close confinement. Water was poured into their +drinking-tins, and, in the evening, still in their cages, they were +served liberally with boiled bran and dog-biscuit. This was Michael's +first food, for he had sulkily refused to go near the potatoes. + +* * * * * + +The rehearsing took place on the stage, and for Michael trouble came at +the very start. The drop-curtain was supposed to go up and reveal the +twenty dogs seated on chairs in a semi-circle. Because, while they were +being thus arranged, the preceding turn was taking place in front of the +drop-curtain, it was imperative that rigid silence should be kept. Next, +when the curtain rose on full stage, the dogs were trained to make a +great barking. + +As a filler-in, Michael had nothing to do but sit on a chair. But he had +to get upon the chair, first, and when Davis so ordered him he +accompanied the order with a clout on the side of the head. Michael +growled warningly. + +"Oh, ho, eh?" the man sneered. "It's Fresh Dog looking for trouble. +Well, you might as well get it over with now so your name can be changed +to Good Dog.--My dear, just keep the rest of them in order while I teach +Fresh Dog lesson number one." + +Of the beating that followed, the least said the better. Michael put up +a fight that was hopeless, and was thoroughly beaten in return. Bruised +and bleeding, he sat on the chair, taking no part in the performance and +only sullenly engendering a deeper and bitterer sourness. To keep silent +before the curtain went up was no hardship for him. But when the curtain +did go up, he declined to join the rest of the dogs in their frantic +barking and yelping. + +The dogs, sometimes alone and sometimes in couples and trios and groups, +left their chairs at command and performed the conventional dog tricks +such as walking on hind-legs, hopping, limping, waltzing, and throwing +somersaults. Wilton Davis's temper was short and his hand heavy +throughout the rehearsal, as the shrill yelps of pain from the lagging +and stupid attested. + +In all, during that day and the forenoon of the next, three long +rehearsals took place. Michael's troubles ceased for the time being. At +command, he silently got on the chair and silently sat there. "Which +shows, dearest, what a bit of the stick will do," Davis bragged to his +wife. Nor did the pair of them dream of the scandalizing part Michael +was going to play in their first performance. + +Behind the curtain all was ready on the full stage. The dogs sat on +their chairs in abject silence with Davis and his wife menacing them to +remain silent, while, in front of the curtain, Dick and Daisy Bell +delighted the matinee audience with their singing and dancing. And all +went well, and no one in the audience would have suspected the full stage +of dogs behind the curtain had not Dick and Daisy, accompanied by the +orchestra, begun to sing "Roll Me Down to Rio." + +Michael could not help it. Even as Kwaque had long before mastered him +by the jews' harp, and Steward by love, and Harry Del Mar by the +harmonica, so now was he mastered by the strains of the orchestra and the +voices of the man and woman lifting the old familiar rhythm, taught him +by Steward, of "Roll Me Down to Rio." Despite himself, despite his +sullenness, the forces compulsive opened his jaws and set all his throat +vibrating in accompaniment. + +From beyond the curtain came a titter of children and women that grew +into a roar and drowned out the voices of Dick and Daisy. Wilton Davis +cursed unbelievably as he sprang down the stage to Michael. But Michael +howled on, and the audience laughed on. Michael was still howling when +the short club smote him. The shock and hurt of it made him break off +and yelp an involuntary cry of pain. + +"Knock his block off, dearest," Mrs. Davis counselled. + +And then ensued battle royal. Davis struck shrewd blows that could be +heard, as were heard the snarls and growls of Michael. The audience, +under the sway of the comic, ignored Dick and Daisy Bell. Their turn was +spoiled. The Davis turn was "queered," as Wilton impressed it. Michael's +block was knocked off within the meaning of the term. And the audience, +on the other side of the curtain, was edified and delighted. + +Dick and Daisy could not continue. The audience wanted what was behind +the curtain, not in front of it. Michael was taken off stage thoroughly +throttled by one of the stage-hands, and the curtain arose on the full +set--full, save for the one empty chair. The boys in the audience first +realized the connection between the empty chair and the previous uproar, +and began clamouring for the absent dog. The audience took up the cry, +the dogs barked more excitedly, and five minutes of hilarity delayed the +turn which, when at last started, was marked by rustiness and erraticness +on the part of the dogs and by great peevishness on the part of Wilton +Davis. + +"Never mind, honey," his imperturbable wife assured him in a stage +whisper. "We'll just ditch that dog and get a regular one. And, anyway, +we've put one over on that Daisy Bell. I ain't told you yet what she +said about me, only last week, to some of my friends." + +Several minutes later, still on the stage and handling his animals, the +husband managed a chance to mutter to his wife: "It's the dog. It's him +I'm after. I'm going to lay him out." + +"Yes, dearest," she agreed. + +The curtain down, with a gleeful audience in front and with the dogs back +in the room over the stage, Wilton Davis descended to look for Michael, +who, instead of cowering in some corner, stood between the legs of the +stage-hand, quivering yet from his mishandling and threatening to fight +as hard as ever if attacked. On his way, Davis encountered the song-and- +dance couple. The woman was in a tearful rage, the man in a dry one. + +"You're a peach of a dog man, you are," he announced belligerently. +"Here's where you get yours." + +"You keep away from me, or I'll lay you out," Wilton Davis responded +desperately, brandishing a short iron bar in his right hand. "Besides, +you just wait if you want to, and I'll lay you out afterward. But first +of all I'm going to lay out that dog. Come on along and see--damn him! +How was I to know? He was a new one. He never peeped in rehearsal. How +was I to know he was going to yap when we arranged the set behind you?" + +"You've raised hell," the manager of the theatre greeted Davis, as the +latter, trailed by Dick Bell, came upon Michael bristling from between +the legs of the stage-hand. + +"Nothing to what I'm going to raise," Davis retorted, shortening his grip +on the iron bar and raising it. "I'm going to kill 'm. I'm going to +beat the life out of him. You just watch." + +Michael snarled acknowledgment of the threat, crouched to spring, and +kept his eyes on the iron weapon. + +"I just guess you ain't goin' to do anything of the sort," the stage-hand +assured Davis. + +"It's my property," the latter asserted with an air of legal +convincingness. + +"And against it I'm goin' to stack up my common sense," was the stage- +hand's reply. "You tap him once, and see what you'll get. Dogs is dogs, +and men is men, but I'm damned if I know what you are. You can't pull +off rough stuff on that dog. First time he was on a stage in his life, +after being starved and thirsted for two days. Oh, I know, Mr. Manager." + +"If you kill the dog it'll cost you a dollar to the garbage man to get +rid of the carcass," the manager took up. + +"I'll pay it gladly," Davis said, again lifting the iron bar. "I've got +some come-back, ain't I?" + +"You animal guys make me sick," the stage-hand uttered. "You just make +me draw the line somewheres. And here it is: you tap him once with that +baby crowbar, and I'll tap you hard enough to lose me my job and to send +you to hospital." + +"Now look here, Jackson . . . " the manager began threateningly. + +"You can't say nothin' to me," was the retort. "My mind's made up. If +that cheap guy lays a finger on that dog I'm just sure goin' to lose my +job. I'm gettin tired anyway of seein' these skates beatin' up their +animals. They've made me sick clean through." + +The manager looked to Davis and shrugged his shoulders helplessly. + +"There's no use pulling off a rough-house," he counselled. "I don't want +to lose Jackson and he'll put you into hospital if he ever gets started. +Send the dog back where you got him. Your wife's told me about him. +Stick him into a box and send him back collect. Collins won't mind. +He'll take the singing out of him and work him into something." + +Davis, with another glance at the truculent Jackson, wavered. + +"I'll tell you what," the manager went on persuasively. "Jackson will +attend to the whole thing, box him up, ship him, everything--won't you, +Jackson?" + +The stage-hand nodded curtly, then reached down and gently caressed +Michael's bruised head. + +"Well," Davis gave in, turning on his heel, "they can make fools of +themselves over dogs, them that wants to. But when they've been in the +business as long as I have . . . " + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + + +A post card from Davis to Collins explained the reasons for Michael's +return. "He sings too much to suit my fancy," was Davis's way of putting +it, thereby unwittingly giving the clue to what Collins had vainly +sought, and which Collins as unwittingly failed to grasp. As he told +Johnny: + +"From the looks of the beatings he's got no wonder he's been singing. +That's the trouble with these animal people. They don't know how to take +care of their property. They hammer its head off and get grouched +because it ain't an angel of obedience.--Put him away, Johnny. Wash him +clean, and put on the regular dressing wherever the skin's broken. I +give him up myself, but I'll find some place for him in the next bunch of +dogs." + +Two weeks later, by sheerest accident, Harris Collins made the discovery +for himself of what Michael was good for. In a spare moment in the +arena, he had sent for him to be tried out by a dog man who needed +several fillers-in. Beyond what he knew, such as at command to stand up, +to lie down, to come here and go there, Michael had done nothing. He had +refused to learn the most elementary things a show-dog should know, and +Collins had left him to go over to another part of the arena where a +monkey band, on a sort of mimic stage, was being arranged and broken in. + +Frightened and mutinous, nevertheless the monkeys were compelled to +perform by being tied to their seats and instruments and by being pulled +and jerked from off stage by wires fastened to their bodies. The leader +of the orchestra, an irascible elderly monkey, sat on a revolving stool +to which he was securely attached. When poked from off the stage by +means of long poles, he flew into ecstasies of rage. At the same time, +by a rope arrangement, his chair was whirled around and around. To an +audience the effect would be that he was angered by the blunders of his +fellow-musicians. And to an audience such anger would be highly +ludicrous. As Collins said: + +"A monkey band is always a winner. It fetches the laugh, and the money's +in the laugh. Humans just have to laugh at monkeys because they're so +similar and because the human has the advantage and feels himself +superior. Suppose we're walking along the street, you and me, and you +slip and fall down. Of course I laugh. That's because I'm superior to +you. I didn't fall down. Same thing if your hat blows off. I laugh +while you chase it down the street. I'm superior. My hat's still on my +head. Same thing with the monkey band. All the fool things of it make +us feel so superior. We don't see ourselves as foolish. That's why we +pay to see the monkeys behave foolish." + +It was scarcely a matter of training the monkeys. Rather was it the +training of the men who operated the concealed mechanisms that made the +monkeys perform. To this Harris Collins was devoting his effort. + +"There isn't any reason why you fellows can't make them play a real tune. +It's up to you, just according to how you pull the wires. Come on. It's +worth going in for. Let's try something you all know. And remember, the +regular orchestra will always help you out. Now, what do you all know? +Something simple, and something the audience'll know, too?" + +He became absorbed in trying out the idea, and even borrowed a circus +rider whose act was to play the violin while standing on the back of a +galloping horse and to throw somersaults on such precarious platform +while still playing the violin. This man he got merely to play simple +airs in slow time, so that the assistants could keep the time and the air +and pull the wires accordingly. + +"Of course, if you make a howling mistake," Collins told them, "that's +when you all pull the wires like mad and poke the leader and whirl him +around. That always brings down the house. They think he's got a real +musical ear and is mad at his orchestra for the discord." + +In the midst of the work, Johnny and Michael came along. + +"That guy says he wouldn't take him for a gift," Johnny reported to his +employer. + +"All right, all right, put him back in the kennels," Collins ordered +hurriedly.--"Now, you fellows, all ready! 'Home, Sweet Home!' Go to it, +Fisher! Now keep the time the rest of you! . . . That's it. With a full +orchestra you're making motions like the tune.--Faster, you, Simmons. You +drag behind all the time." + +And the accident happened. Johnny, instead of immediately obeying the +order and taking Michael back to the kennels, lingered in the hope of +seeing the orchestra leader whirled chattering around on his stool. The +violinist, within a yard of where Michael sat squatted on his haunches, +played the notes of "Home, Sweet Home" with loud slow exactitude and +emphasis. + +And Michael could not help it. No more could he help it than could he +help responding with a snarl when threatened by a club; no more could he +help it than when he had spoiled the turn of Dick and Daisy Bell when +swept by the strains of "Roll Me Down to Rio"; no more could he help it +than could Jerry, on the deck of the _Ariel_, help singing when Villa +Kennan put her arms around him, smothered him deliciously in her cloud of +hair, and sang his memory back into time and the fellowship of the +ancient pack. As with Jerry, was it with Michael. Music was a drug of +dream. He, too, remembered the lost pack and sought it, seeing the bare +hills of snow and the stars glimmering overhead through the frosty +darkness of night, hearing the faint answering howls from other hills as +the pack assembled. Lost the pack was, through the thousands of years +Michael's ancestors had lived by the fires of men; yet remembered always +it was when the magic of rhythm poured through him and flooded his being +with visions and sensations of that Otherwhere which in his own life he +had never known. + +Compounded with the waking dream of Otherwhere, was the memory of Steward +and the love of Steward, with whom he had learned to sing the very series +of notes that now were being reproduced by the circus-rider violinist. +And Michael's jaw dropped down, his throat vibrated, his forefeet made +restless little movements as if in the body he were running, as truly he +was running in the mind, back to Steward, back through all the ages to +the lost pack, and with the shadowy lost pack itself across the snowy +wastes and through the forest aisles in the hunt of the meat. + +The spectral forms of the lost pack were all about him as he sang and ran +in open-eyed dream; the violinist paused in surprise; the men poked the +monkey leader of the monkey orchestra and whirled him about wildly raging +on his revolving stool; and Johnny laughed. But Harris Collins took +note. He had heard Michael accurately follow the air. He had heard him +sing--not merely howl, but _sing_. + +Silence fell. The monkey leader ceased revolving and chattering. The +men who had poked him held poles and wires suspended in their hands. The +rest of the monkey orchestra merely shivered in apprehension of what next +atrocity should be perpetrated. The violinist stared. Johnny still +heaved from his laughter. But Harris Collins pondered, scratched his +head, and continued to ponder. + +"You can't tell me . . . " he began vaguely. "I know it. I heard it. +That dog carried the tune. Didn't he now? I leave it to all of you. +Didn't he? The damned dog sang. I'll stake my life on it.--Hold on, you +fellows; rest the monkeys off. This is worth following up.--Mr. +Violinist, play that over again, now, 'Home, Sweet Home,'--let her go. +Press her strong, and loud, and slow.--Now watch, all of you, and listen, +and tell me if I'm crazy, or if that dog ain't carrying the tune.--There! +What d'ye call it? Ain't it?" + +There was no discussion. Michael's jaw dropped and his forefeet began +their restless lifting after several measures had been played. And +Harris Collins stepped close to him and sang with him and in accord. + +"Harry Del Mar was right when he said that dog was the limit and sold his +troupe. He knew. The dog's a dog Caruso. No howling chorus of mutts +such as Kingman used to carry around with him, but a real singer, a +soloist. No wonder he wouldn't learn tricks. He had his specially all +the time. And just to think of it! I as good as gave him away to that +dog-killing Wilton Davis. Only he came back.--Johnny, take extra care of +him after this. Bring him up to the house this afternoon, and I'll give +him a real try-out. My daughter plays the violin. We'll see what music +he'll sing with her. There's a mint of money in him, take it from me." + +* * * * * + +Thus was Michael discovered. The afternoon's try-out was partially +successful. After vainly attempting strange music on him, Collins found +that he could sing, and would sing, "God Save the King" and "Sweet Bye +and Bye." Many hours of many days were spent in the quest. Vainly he +tried to teach Michael new airs. Michael put no heart of love in the +effort and sullenly abstained. But whenever one of the songs he had +learned from Steward was played, he responded. He could not help +responding. The magic was stronger than he. In the end, Collins +discovered five of the six songs he knew: "God Save the King," "Sweet Bye +and Bye," "Lead, Kindly Light," "Home, Sweet Home," and "Roll Me Down to +Rio." Michael never sang "Shenandoah," because Collins and Collins's +daughter did not know the old sea-chanty and therefore were unable to +suggest it to him. + +"Five songs are enough, if he won't never learn another note," Collins +concluded. "They'll make him a bill-topper anywhere. There's a mint in +him. Hang me if I wouldn't take him out on the road myself if only I was +young and footloose." + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII + + +And so Michael was ultimately sold to one Jacob Henderson for two +thousand dollars. "And I'm giving him away to you at that," said +Collins. "If you don't refuse five thousand for him before six months, I +don't know anything about the show game. He'll skin that last arithmetic +dog of yours to a finish and you won't have to show yourself and work +every minute of the turn. And if you don't insure him for fifty thousand +as soon as he's made good you'll be a fool. Why, I wouldn't ask anything +better, if I was young and footloose, than to take him out on the road +myself." + +Henderson proved totally different from any master Michael had had. The +man was a neutral sort of creature. He was neither good nor evil. He +neither drank, smoked, nor swore; nor did he go to church or belong to +the Y.M.C.A. He was a vegetarian without being a bigoted one, liked +moving pictures when they were concerned with travel, and spent most of +his spare time in reading Swedenborg. He had no temper whatever. Nobody +had ever witnessed anger in him, and all said he had the patience of Job. +He was even timid of policemen, freight agents, and conductors, though he +was not afraid of them. He was not afraid of anything, any more than was +he enamoured of anything save Swedenborg. He was as colourless of +character as the neutral-coloured clothes he wore, as the +neutral-coloured hair that sprawled upon his crown, as the +neutral-coloured eyes with which he observed the world. Nor was he a +fool any more than was he a wise man or a scholar. He gave little to +life, asked little of life, and, in the show business, was a recluse in +the very heart of life. + +Michael neither liked nor disliked him, but, rather, merely accepted him. +They travelled the United States over together, and they never had a +quarrel. Not once did Henderson raise his voice sharply to Michael, and +not once did Michael snarl a warning at him. They simply endured +together, existed together, because the currents of life had drifted them +together. Of course, there was no heart-bond between them. Henderson +was master. Michael was Henderson's chattel. Michael was as dead to him +as he was himself dead to all things. + +Yet Jacob Henderson was fair and square, business-like and methodical. +Once each day, when not travelling on the interminable trains, he gave +Michael a thorough bath and thoroughly dried him afterward. He was never +harsh nor hasty in the bathing. Michael never was aware whether he liked +or disliked the bathing function. It was all one, part of his own fate +in the world as it was part of Henderson's fate to bathe him every so +often. + +Michael's own work was tolerably easy, though monotonous. Leaving out +the eternal travelling, the never-ending jumps from town to town and from +city to city, he appeared on the stage once each night for seven nights +in the week and for two afternoon performances in the week. The curtain +went up, leaving him alone on the stage in the full set that befitted a +bill-topper. Henderson stood in the wings, unseen by the audience, and +looked on. The orchestra played four of the pieces Michael had been +taught by Steward, and Michael sang them, for his modulated howling was +truly singing. He never responded to more than one encore, which was +always "Home, Sweet Home." After that, while the audience clapped and +stamped its approval and delight of the dog Caruso, Jacob Henderson would +appear on the stage, bowing and smiling in stereotyped gladness and +gratefulness, rest his right hand on Michael's shoulders with a +play-acted assumption of comradeliness, whereupon both Henderson and +Michael would bow ere the final curtain went down. + +And yet Michael was a prisoner, a life-prisoner. Fed well, bathed well, +exercised well, he never knew a moment of freedom. When travelling, days +and nights he spent in the cage, which, however, was generous enough to +allow him to stand at full height and to turn around without too +uncomfortable squirming. Sometimes, in hotels in country towns, out of +the crate he shared Henderson's room with him. Otherwise, unless other +animals were hewing on the same circuit time, he had, outside his cage, +the freedom of the animal room attached to the particular theatre where +he performed for from three days to a week. + +But there was never a chance, never a moment, when he might run free of a +cage about him, of the walls of a room restricting him, of a chain +shackled to the collar about his throat. In good weather, in the +afternoons, Henderson often took him for a walk. But always it was at +the end of a chain. And almost always the way led to some park, where +Henderson fastened the other end of the chain to the bench on which he +sat and browsed Swedenborg. Not one act of free agency was left to +Michael. Other dogs ran free, playing with one another, or behaving +bellicosely. If they approached him for purposes of investigation or +acquaintance, Henderson invariably ceased from his reading long enough to +drive them away. + +A life prisoner to a lifeless gaoler, life was all grey to Michael. His +moroseness changed to a deep-seated melancholy. He ceased to be +interested in life and in the freedom of life. Not that he regarded the +play of life about him with a jaundiced eye, but, rather, that his eyes +became unseeing. Debarred from life, he ignored life. He permitted +himself to become a sheer puppet slave, eating, taking his baths, +travelling in his cage, performing regularly, and sleeping much. + +He had pride--the pride of the thoroughbred; the pride of the North +American Indian enslaved on the plantations of the West Indies who died +uncomplaining and unbroken. So Michael. He submitted to the cage and +the iron of the chain because they were too strong for his muscles and +teeth. He did his slave-task of performance and rendered obedience to +Jacob Henderson; but he neither loved nor feared that master. And +because of this his spirit turned in on itself. He slept much, brooded +much, and suffered unprotestingly a great loneliness. Had Henderson made +a bid for his heart, he would surely have responded; but Henderson had a +heart only for the fantastic mental gyrations of Swedenborg, and merely +made his living out of Michael. + +Sometimes there were hardships. Michael accepted them. Especially hard +did he find railroad travel in winter-time, when, on occasion, fresh from +the last night's performance in a town, he remained for hours in his +crate on a truck waiting for the train that would take him to the next +town of performance. There was a night on a station platform in +Minnesota, when two dogs of a troupe, on the next truck to his, froze to +death. He was himself well frosted, and the cold bit abominably into his +shoulder wounded by the leopard; but a better constitution and better +general care of him enabled him to survive. + +Compared with other show animals, he was well treated. And much of the +ill-treatment accorded other animals on the same turn with him he did not +comprehend or guess. One turn, with which he played for three months, +was a scandal amongst all vaudeville performers. Even the hardiest of +them heartily disliked the turn and the man, although Duckworth, and +Duckworth's Trained Cats and Rats, were an invariable popular success. + +"Trained cats!" sniffed dainty little Pearl La Pearle, the bicyclist. +"Crushed cats, that's what they are. All the cat has been beaten out of +their blood, and they've become rats. You can't tell me. I know." + +"Trained rats!" Manuel Fonseca, the contortionist, exploded in the bar- +room of the Hotel Annandale, after refusing to drink with Duckworth. +"Doped rats, believe me. Why don't they jump off when they crawl along +the tight rope with a cat in front and a cat behind? Because they ain't +got the life in 'm to jump. They're doped, straight doped when they're +fresh, and starved afterward so as to making a saving on the dope. They +never are fed. You can't tell me. I know. Else why does he use up +anywhere to forty or fifty rats a week! I know his express shipments, +when he can't buy 'm in the towns." + +"My Gawd!" protested Miss Merle Merryweather, the Accordion Girl, who +looked like sixteen on the stage, but who, in private life among her +grand-children, acknowledged forty-eight. "My Gawd, how the public can +fall for it gets my honest-to-Gawd goat. I looked myself yesterday +morning early. Out of thirty rats there were seven dead,--starved to +death. He never feeds them. They're dying rats, dying of starvation, +when they crawl along that rope. That's why they crawl. If they had a +bit of bread and cheese in their tummies they'd jump and run to get away +from the cats. They're dying, they're dying right there on the rope, +trying to crawl as a dying man would try to crawl away from a tiger that +was eating him. And my Gawd! The bonehead audience sits there and +applauds the show as an educational act!" + +But the audience! "Wonderful things kindness will do with animals," said +a member of one, a banker and a deacon. "Even human love can be taught +to them by kindness. The cat and the rat have been enemies since the +world began. Yet here, to-night, we have seen them doing highly trained +feats together, and neither a cat committed one hostile or overt act +against a rat, nor ever a rat showed it was afraid of a cat. Human +kindness! The power of human kindness!" + +"The lion and the lamb," said another. "We have it that when the +millennium comes the lion and the lamb will lie down together--and +outside each other, my dear, outside each other. And this is a forecast, +a proving up, by man, ahead of the day. Cats and rats! Think of it. And +it shows conclusively the power of kindness. I shall see to it at once +that we get pets for our own children, our palm branches. They shall +learn kindness early, to the dog, the cat, yes, even the rat, and the +pretty linnet in its cage." + +"But," said his dear, beside him, "you remember what Blake said: + + "'A Robin Redbreast in a cage + Puts all heaven in a rage.'" + +"Ah--but not when it is treated truly with kindness, my dear. I shall +immediately order some rabbits, and a canary or two, and--what sort of a +dog would you prefer our dear little ones to have to play with, my +sweet?" + +And his dear looked at him in all his imperturbable, complacent +self-consciousness of kindness, and saw herself the little rural school- +teacher who, with Ella Wheeler Wilcox and Lord Byron as her idols, and +with the dream of herself writing "Poems of Passion," had come up to +Topeka Town to be beaten by the game into marrying the solid, substantial +business man beside her, who enjoyed delight in the spectacle of cats and +rats walking the tight-rope in amity, and who was blissfully unaware that +she was the Robin Redbreast in a cage that put all heaven in a rage. + +"The rats are bad enough," said Miss Merle Merryweather. "But look how +he uses up the cats. He's had three die on him in the last two weeks to +my certain knowledge. They're only alley-cats, but they've got feelings. +It's that boxing match that does for them." + +The boxing match, sure always of a great hand from the audience, +invariably concluded Duckworth's turn. Two cats, with small +boxing-gloves, were put on a table for a friendly bout. Naturally, the +cats that performed with the rats were too cowed for this. It was the +fresh cats he used, the ones with spunk and spirit . . . until they lost +all spunk and spirit or sickened and died. To the audience it was a side- +splitting, playful encounter between four-legged creatures who thus +displayed a ridiculous resemblance to superior, two-legged man. But it +was not playful to the cats. They were always excited into starting a +real fight with each other off stage just before they were brought on. In +the blows they struck were anger and pain and bewilderment and fear. And +the gloves just would come off, so that they were ripping and tearing at +each other, biting as well as making the fur fly, like furies, when the +curtain went down. In the eyes of the audience this apparent impromptu +was always the ultimate scream, and the laughter and applause would +compel the curtain up again to reveal Duckworth and an assistant stage- +hand, as if caught by surprise, fanning the two belligerents with towels. + +But the cats themselves were so continually torn and scratched that the +wounds never had a chance to heal and became infected until they were a +mass of sores. On occasion they died, or, when they had become too +abjectly spiritless to attack even a rat, were set to work on the tight- +rope with the doped starved rats that were too near dead to run away from +them. And, as Miss Merle Merryweather said: the bonehead audiences, +tickled to death, applauded Duckworth's Trained Cats and Rats as an +educational act! + +A big chimpanzee that covered one of the circuits with Michael had an +antipathy for clothes. Like a horse that fights the putting on of the +bridle, and, after it is on, takes no further notice of it, so the big +chimpanzee fought the putting on the clothes. Once on, it was ready to +go out on the stage and through its turn. But the rub was in putting on +the clothes. It took the owner and two stage-hands, pulling him up to a +ring in the wall and throttling him, to dress him--and this, despite the +fact that the owner had long since knocked out his incisors. + +All this cruelty Michael sensed without knowing. And he accepted it as +the way of life, as he accepted the daylight and the dark, the bite of +the frost on bleak and windy station platforms, the mysterious land of +Otherwhere that he knew in dreams and song, the equally mysterious +Nothingness into which had vanished Meringe Plantation and ships and +oceans and men and Steward. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII + + +For two years Michael sang his way over the United States, to fame for +himself and to fortune for Jacob Henderson. There was never any time +off. So great was his success, that Henderson refused flattering offers +to cross the Atlantic to show in Europe. But off-time did come to +Michael when Henderson fell ill of typhoid in Chicago. + +It was a three-months' vacation for Michael, who, well treated but still +a prisoner, spent it in a caged kennel in Mulcachy's Animal Home. +Mulcachy, one of Harris Collins's brightest graduates, had emulated his +master by setting up in business in Chicago, where he ran everything with +the same rigid cleanliness, sanitation, and scientific cruelty. Michael +received nothing but the excellent food and the cleanliness; but, a +solitary and brooding prisoner in his cage, he could not help but sense +the atmosphere of pain and terror about him of the animals being broken +for the delight of men. + +Mulcachy had originated aphorisms of his own which he continually +enunciated, among which were: + +"Take it from me, when an animal won't give way to pain, it can't be +broke. Pain is the only school-teacher." + +"Just as you got to take the buck out of a broncho, you've got to take +the bite out of a lion." + +"You can't break animals with a feather duster. The thicker the skull +the thicker the crowbar." + +"They'll always beat you in argument. First thing is to club the +argument out of them." + +"Heart-bonds between trainers and animals! Son, that's dope for the +newspaper interviewer. The only heart-bond I know is a stout stick with +some iron on the end of it." + +"Sure you can make 'm eat outa your hand. But the thing to watch out for +is that they don't eat your hand. A blank cartridge in the nose just +about that time is the best preventive I know." + +There were days when all the air was vexed with roars and squalls of +ferocity and agony from the arena, until the last animal in the cages was +excited and ill at ease. In truth, since it was Mulcachy's boast that he +could break the best animal living, no end of the hardest cases fell to +his hand. He had built a reputation for succeeding where others failed, +and, endowed with fearlessness, callousness, and cunning, he never let +his reputation wane. There was nothing he dared not tackle, and, when he +gave up an animal, the last word was said. For it, remained nothing but +to be a cage-animal, in solitary confinement, pacing ever up and down, +embittered with all the world of man and roaring its bitterness to the +most delicious enthrillment of the pay-spectators. + +During the three months spent by Michael in Mulcachy's Animal Home, +occurred two especially hard cases. Of course, the daily chant of +ordinary pain of training went on all the time through the working hours, +such as of "good" bears and lions and tigers that were made amenable +under stress, and of elephants derricked and gaffed into making the head- +stand or into the beating of a bass drum. But the two cases that were +exceptional, put a mood of depression and fear into all the listening +animals, such as humans might experience in an ante-room of hell, +listening to the flailing and the flaying of their fellows who had +preceded them into the torture-chamber. + +The first was of the big Indian tiger. Free-born in the jungle, and free +all his days, master, according to his nature and prowess, of all other +living creatures including his fellow-tigers, he had come to grief in the +end; and, from the trap to the cramped cage, by elephant-back and +railroad and steamship, ever in the cramped cage, he had journeyed across +seas and continents to Mulcachy's Animal Home. Prospective buyers had +examined but not dared to purchase. But Mulcachy had been undeterred. +His own fighting blood leapt hot at sight of the magnificent striped cat. +It was a challenge of the brute in him to excel. And, two weeks of hell, +for the great tiger and for all the other animals, were required to teach +him his first lesson. + +Ben Bolt he had been named, and he arrived indomitable and +irreconcilable, though almost paralysed from eight weeks of cramp in his +narrow cage which had restricted all movement. Mulcachy should have +undertaken the job immediately, but two weeks were lost by the fact that +he had got married and honeymooned for that length of time. And in that +time, in a large cage of concrete and iron, Ben Bolt had exercised and +recovered the use of his muscles, and added to his hatred of the +two-legged things, puny against him in themselves, who by trick and wile +had so helplessly imprisoned him. + +So, on this morning when hell yawned for him, he was ready and eager to +meet all comers. They came, equipped with formulas, nooses, and forked +iron bars. Five of them tossed nooses in through the bars upon the floor +of his cage. He snarled and struck at the curling ropes, and for ten +minutes was a grand and impossible wild creature, lacking in nothing save +the wit and the patience possessed by the miserable two-legged things. +And then, impatient and careless of the inanimate ropes, he paused, +snarling at the men, with one hind foot resting inside a noose. The next +moment, craftily lifted up about the girth of his leg by an iron fork, +the noose tightened and the bite of it sank home into his flesh and +pride. He leaped, he roared, he was a maniac of ferocity. Again and +again, almost burning their palms, he tore the rope smoking through their +hands. But ever they took in the slack and paid it out again, until, ere +he was aware, a similar noose tightened on his foreleg. What he had done +was nothing to what he now did. But he was stupid and impatient. The +man-creatures were wise and patient, and a third leg and a fourth leg +were finally noosed, so that, with many men tailing on to the ropes, he +was dragged ignominiously on his side to the bars, and, ignominiously, +through the bars were hauled his four legs, his chiefest weapons of +offence after his terribly fanged jaws. + +And then a puny man-creature, Mulcachy himself, dared openly and brazenly +to enter the cage and approach him. He sprang to be at him, or, rather, +strove so to spring, but was withstrained by his four legs through the +bars which he could not draw back and get under him. And Mulcachy knelt +beside him, dared kneel beside him, and helped the fifth noose over his +head and round his neck. Then his head was drawn to the bars as +helplessly as his legs had been drawn through. Next, Mulcachy laid hands +on him, on his head, on his ears, on his very nose within an inch of his +fangs; and he could do nothing but snarl and roar and pant for breath as +the noose shut off his breathing. + +Quivering, not with fear but with rage, Ben Bolt perforce endured the +buckling around his throat of a thick, broad collar of leather to which +was attached a very stout and a very long trailing rope. After that, +when Mulcachy had left the cage, one by one the five nooses were artfully +manipulated off his legs and his neck. Again, after this prodigious +indignity, he was free--within his cage. He went up into the air. With +returning breath he roared his rage. He struck at the trailing rope that +offended his nerves, clawed at the trap of the collar that encased his +neck, fell, rolled over, offended his body-nerves more and more by +entangling contacts with the rope, and for half an hour exhausted himself +in the futile battle with the inanimate thing. Thus tigers are broken. + +At the last, wearied, even with sensations of sickness from the nervous +strain put upon himself by his own anger, he lay down in the middle of +the floor, lashing his tail, hating with his eyes, and accepting the +clinging thing about his neck which he had learned he could not get rid +of. + +To his amazement, if such a thing be possible in the mental processes of +a tiger, the rear door to his cage was thrown open and left open. He +regarded the aperture with belligerent suspicion. No one and no +threatening danger appeared in the doorway. But his suspicion grew. +Always, among these man-animals, occurred what he did not know and could +not comprehend. His preference was to remain where he was, but from +behind, through the bars of the cage, came shouts and yells, the lash of +whips, and the painful thrusts of the long iron forks. Dragging the rope +behind him, with no thought of escape, but in the hope that he would get +at his tormentors, he leaped into the rear passage that ran behind the +circle of permanent cages. The passage way was deserted and dark, but +ahead he saw light. With great leaps and roars, he rushed in that +direction, arousing a pandemonium of roars and screams from the animals +in the cages. + +He bounded through the light, and into the light, dazzled by the +brightness of it, and crouched down, with long, lashing tail, to orient +himself to the situation. But it was only another and larger cage that +he was in, a very large cage, a big, bright performing-arena that was all +cage. Save for himself, the arena was deserted, although, overhead, +suspended from the roof-bars, were block-and-tackle and seven strong iron +chairs that drew his instant suspicion and caused him to roar at them. + +For half an hour he roamed the arena, which was the greatest area of +restricted freedom he had known in the ten weeks of his captivity. Then, +a hooked iron rod, thrust through the bars, caught and drew the bight of +his trailing rope into the hands of the men outside. Immediately ten of +them had hold of it, and he would have charged up to the bars at them had +not, at that moment, Mulcachy entered the arena through a door on the +opposite side. No bars stood between Ben Bolt and this creature, and Ben +Bolt charged him. Even as he charged he was aware of suspicion in that +the small, fragile man-creature before him did not flee or crouch down, +but stood awaiting him. + +Ben Bolt never reached him. First, with an access of caution, he +craftily ceased from his charge, and, crouching, with lashing tail, +studied the man who seemed so easily his. Mulcachy was equipped with a +long-lashed whip and a sharp-pronged fork of iron. + +In his belt, loaded with blank cartridges, was a revolver. + +Bellying closer to the ground, Ben Bolt advanced upon him, creeping +slowly like a cat stalking a mouse. When he came to his next pause, +which was within certain leaping distance, he crouched lower, gathered +himself for the leap, then turned his head to regard the men at his back +outside the cage. The trailing rope in their hands, to his neck, he had +forgotten. + +"Now you might as well be good, old man," Mulcachy addressed him in soft, +caressing tones, taking a step toward him and holding in advance the iron +fork. + +This merely incensed the huge, magnificent creature. He rumbled a low, +tense growl, flattened his ears back, and soared into the air, his paws +spread so that the claws stood out like talons, his tail behind him as +stiff and straight as a rod. Neither did the man crouch or flee, nor did +the beast attain to him. At the height of his leap the rope tightened +taut on his neck, causing him to describe a somersault and fall heavily +to the floor on his side. + +Before he could regain his feet, Mulcachy was upon him, shouting to his +small audience: "Here's where we pound the argument out of him!" And +pound he did, on the nose with the butt of the whip, and jab he did, with +the iron fork to the ribs. He rained a hurricane of blows and jabs on +the animal's most sensitive parts. Ever Ben Bolt leaped to retaliate, +but was thrown by the ten men tailed on to the rope, and, each time, even +as he struck the floor on his side, Mulcachy was upon him, pounding, +smashing, jabbing. His pain was exquisite, especially that of his tender +nose. And the creature who inflicted the pain was as fierce and terrible +as he, even more so because he was more intelligent. In but few minutes, +dazed by the pain, appalled by his inability to rend and destroy the man +who inflicted it, Ben Bolt lost his courage. He fled ignominiously +before the little, two-legged creature who was more terrible than himself +who was a full-grown Royal Bengal tiger. He leaped high in the air in +sheer panic; he ran here and there, with lowered head, to avoid the rain +of pain. He even charged the sides of the arena, springing up and vainly +trying to climb the slippery vertical bars. + +Ever, like an avenging devil, Mulcachy pursued and smashed and jabbed, +gritting through his teeth: "You will argue, will you? I'll teach you +what argument is! There! Take that! And that! And that!" + +"Now I've got him afraid of me, and the rest ought to be easy," he +announced, resting off and panting hard from his exertions, while the +great tiger crouched and quivered and shrank back from him against the +base of the arena-bars. "Take a five-minute spell, you fellows, and +we'll got our breaths." + +Lowering one of the iron chairs, and attaching it firmly in its place on +the floor, Mulcachy prepared for the teaching of the first trick. Ben +Bolt, jungle-born and jungle-reared, was to be compelled to sit in the +chair in ludicrous and tragic imitation of man-creatures. But Mulcachy +was not quite ready. The first lesson of fear of him must be reiterated +and driven home. + +Stepping to a near safe distance, he lashed Ben Bolt on the nose. He +repeated it. He did it a score of times, and scores of times. Turn his +head as he would, ever Ben Bolt received the bite of the whip on his +fearfully bruised nose; for Mulcachy was as expert as a stage-driver in +his manipulation of the whip, and unerringly the lash snapped and cracked +and stung Ben Bolt's nose wherever Ben Bolt at the moment might have it. + +When it became maddeningly unendurable, he sprang, only to be jerked back +by the ten strong men who held the rope to his neck. And wrath, and +ferocity, and intent to destroy, passed out utterly from the tiger's +inflamed brain, until he knew fear, again and again, always fear and only +fear, utter and abject fear, of this human mite who searched him with +such pain. + +Then the lesson of the first trick was taken up. Mulcachy tapped the +chair sharply with the butt of the whip to draw the animal's attention to +it, then flicked the whip-lash sharply on his nose. At the same moment, +an attendant, through the bars behind, drove an iron fork into his ribs +to force him away from the bars and toward the chair. He crouched +forward, then shrank back against the side-bars. Again the chair was +rapped, his nose was lashed, his ribs were jabbed, and he was forced by +pain toward the chair. This went on interminably--for a quarter of an +hour, for half an hour, for an hour; for the men-animals had the patience +of gods while he was only a jungle-brute. Thus tigers are broken. And +the verb means just what it means. A performing animal is _broken_. +Something _breaks_ in an animal of the wild ere such an animal submits to +do tricks before pay-audiences. + +Mulcachy ordered an assistant to enter the arena with him. Since he +could not compel the tiger directly to sit in the chair, he must employ +other means. The rope about Ben Bolt's neck was passed up through the +bars and rove through the block-and-tackle. At signal from Mulcachy, the +ten men hauled away. Snarling, struggling, choking, in a fresh madness +of terror at this new outrage, Ben Bolt was slowly hoisted by his neck up +from the floor, until, quite clear of it, whirling, squirming, battling, +suspended by his neck like a man being hanged, his wind was shut off and +he began to suffocate. He coiled and twisted, the splendid muscles of +his body enabling him almost to tie knots in it. + +The block-and-tackle, running like a trolley on the overhead track, made +it possible for the assistant to seize his tail and drag him through the +air till he was above the chair. His helpless body guided thus by the +tail, his chest jabbed by the iron fork in Mulcachy's hands, the rope was +suddenly lowered, and Ben Bolt, with swimming brain, found himself seated +in the chair. On the instant he leaped for the floor, received a blow on +the nose from the heavy whip-handle, and had a blank cartridge fired +straight into his nostril. His madness of pain and fear was multiplied. +He sprang away in flight, but Mulcachy's voice rang out, "Hoist him!" and +he slowly rose in the air again, hanging by his neck, and began to +strangle. + +Once more he was swung into position by his tail, jabbed in the chest, +and lowered suddenly on the run--but so suddenly, with a frantic twist of +his body on his part, that he fell violently across the chair on his +belly. What little wind was left him from the strangling, seemed to have +been ruined out of him by the violence of the fall. The glare in his +eyes was maniacal and swimming. He panted frightfully, and his head +rolled back and forth. Slaver dripped from his mouth, blood ran from his +nose. + +"Hoist away!" Mulcachy shouted. + +And again, struggling frantically as the tightening collar shut off his +wind, Ben Bolt was slowly lifted into the air. So wildly did he struggle +that, ere his hind feet were off the floor, he pranced back and forth, so +that when he was heaved clear his body swung like a huge pendulum. Over +the chair, he was dropped, and for a fraction of a second the posture was +his of a man sitting in a chair. Then he uttered a terrible cry and +sprang. + +It was neither snarl, nor growl, nor roar, that cry, but a sheer scream, +as if something had broken inside of him. He missed Mulcachy by inches, +as another blank cartridge exploded up his other nostril and as the men +with the rope snapped him back so abruptly as almost to break his neck. + +This time, lowered quickly, he sank into the chair like a half-empty sack +of meal, and continued so to sink, until, crumpling at the middle, his +great tawny head falling forward, he lay on the floor unconscious. His +tongue, black and swollen, lolled out of his mouth. As buckets of water +were poured on him he groaned and moaned. And here ended the first +lesson. + +"It's all right," Mulcachy said, day after day, as the teaching went on. +"Patience and hard work will pull off the trick. I've got his goat. He's +afraid of me. All that's required is time, and time adds to value with +an animal like him." + +Not on that first day, nor on the second, nor on the third, did the +requisite something really break inside Ben Bolt. But at the end of a +fortnight it did break. For the day came when Mulcachy rapped the chair +with his whip-butt, when the attendant through the bars jabbed the iron +fork into Ben Bolt's ribs, and when Ben Bolt, anything but royal, +slinking like a beaten alley-cat, in pitiable terror, crawled over to the +chair and sat down in it like a man. He now was an "educated" tiger. The +sight of him, so sitting, tragically travestying man, has been +considered, and is considered, "educative" by multitudinous audiences. + +The second case, that of St. Elias, was a harder one, and it was marked +down against Mulcachy as one of his rare failures, though all admitted +that it was an unavoidable failure. St. Elias was a huge monster of an +Alaskan bear, who was good-natured and even facetious and humorous after +the way of bears. But he had a will of his own that was correspondingly +as stubborn as his bulk. He could be persuaded to do things, but he +would not tolerate being compelled to do things. And in the +trained-animal world, where turns must go off like clockwork, is little +or no space for persuasion. An animal must do its turn, and do it +promptly. Audiences will not brook the delay of waiting while a trainer +tries to persuade a crusty or roguish beast to do what the audience has +paid to see it do. + +So St. Elias received his first lesson in compulsion. It was also his +last lesson, and it never progressed so far as the training-arena, for it +took place in his own cage. + +Noosed in the customary way, his four legs dragged through the bars, and +his head, by means of a "choke" collar, drawn against the bars, he was +first of all manicured. Each one of his great claws was cut off flush +with his flesh. The men outside did this. Then Mulcachy, on the inside, +punched his nose. Not lightly as it sounds was this operation. The +punch was a perforation. Thrusting the instrument into the huge bear's +nostril, Mulcachy cut a clean round chunk of living meat out of one side +of it. Mulcachy knew the bear business. At all times, to make an +untrained bear obey, one must be fast to some sensitive portion of the +bear. The ears, the nose, and the eyes are the accessible sensitive +parts, and, the eyes being out of the question, remain the nose and the +ears as the parts to which to make fast. + +Through the perforation Mulcachy immediately clamped a metal ring. To +the ring he fastened a long "lunge"-rope, which was well named. Any +unruly lunge, at any time during all the subsequent life of St. Elias, +could thus be checked by the man who held the lunge-rope. His destiny +was patent and ordained. For ever, as long as he lived and breathed, +would he be a prisoner and slave to the rope in the ring in his nostril. + +The nooses were slipped, and St. Elias was at liberty, within the +confines of his cage, to get acquainted with the ring in his nose. With +his powerful forepaws, standing erect and roaring, he proceeded to get +acquainted with the ring. It certainly was not a thing persuasible. It +was living fire. And he tore at it with his paws as he would have torn +at the stings of bees when raiding a honey-tree. He tore the thing out, +ripping the ring clear through the flesh and transforming the round +perforation into a ragged chasm of pain. + +Mulcachy cursed. "Here's where hell coughs," he said. The nooses were +introduced again. Again St. Elias, helpless on his side against and +partly through the bars, had his nose punched. This time it was the +other nostril. And hell coughed. As before, the moment he was released, +he tore the ring out through his flesh. + +Mulcachy was disgusted. "Listen to reason, won't you?" he objurgated, +as, this time, the reason he referred to was the introduction of the ring +clear through both nostrils, higher up, and through the central dividing +wall of cartilage. But St. Elias was unreasonable. Unlike Ben Bolt, +there was nothing inside of him weak enough, or nervous enough, or high- +strung enough, to break. The moment he was free he ripped the ring away +with half of his nose along with it. Mulcachy punched St. Elias's right +ear. St. Elias tore his right ear to shreds. Mulcachy punched his left +ear. He tore his left ear to shreds. And Mulcachy gave in. He had to. +As he said plaintively: + +"We're beaten. There ain't nothing left to make fast to." + +Later, when St. Elias was condemned to be a "cage-animal" all his days, +Mulcachy was wont to grumble: + +"He was the most unreasonable animal! Couldn't do a thing with him. +Couldn't ever get anything to make fast to." + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV + + +It was in the Orpheum Theatre, of Oakland, California; and Harley Kennan +was in the act of reaching under his seat for his hat, when his wife +said: + +"Why, this isn't the interval. There's one more turn yet." + +"A dog turn," he answered, and thereby explained; for it was his practice +to leave a theatre during the period of the performance of an animal-act. + +Villa Kennan glanced hastily at the programme. + +"Of course," she said, then added: "But it's a singing dog. A dog +Caruso. And it points out that there is no one on the stage with the +dog. Let us stay for once, and see how he compares with Jerry." + +"Some poor brute tormented into howling," Harley grumbled. + +"But it has the stage to itself," Villa urged. "Besides, if it is +painful, then we can go out. I'll go out with you. But I just would +like to see how much better Jerry sings than does he. And it says an +Irish terrier, too." + +So Harley Kennan remained. The two burnt-cork comedians finished their +turn and their three encores, and the curtain behind them went up on a +full set of an empty stage. A rough-coated Irish terrier entered at a +sedate walk, sedately walked forward to the centre, nearly to the +footlights, and faced the leader of the orchestra. As the programme had +stated, he had the stage to himself. + +The orchestra played the opening strains of "Sweet Bye and Bye." The dog +yawned and sat down. But the orchestra was thoroughly instructed to play +the opening strains over and over, until the dog responded, and then to +follow on with him. By the third time, the dog opened his mouth and +began. It was not a mere howling. For that matter, it was too mellow to +be classified as a howl at all. Nor was it merely rhythmic. The notes +the dog sang were of the air, and they were correct. + +But Villa Kennan scarcely heard. + +"He has Jerry beaten a mile," Harley muttered to her. + +"Listen," she replied, in tense whispers. "Did you ever see that dog +before?" + +Harley shook his head. + +"You have seen him before," she insisted. "Look at that crinkled ear. +Think! Think back! Remember!" + +Still her husband shook his head. + +"Remember the Solomons," she pressed. "Remember the _Ariel_. Remember +when we came back from Malaita, where we picked Jerry up, to Tulagi, that +he had a brother there, a nigger-chaser on a schooner." + +"And his name was Michael--go on." + +"And he had that self-same crinkled ear," she hurried. "And he was rough- +coated. And he was full brother to Jerry. And their father and mother +were Terrence and Biddy of Meringe. And Jerry is our Sing Song Silly. +And this dog sings. And he has a crinkled ear. And his name is +Michael." + +"Impossible," said Harley. + +"It is when the impossible comes true that life proves worth while," she +retorted. "And this is one of those worth-whiles of impossibles. I know +it." + +Still the man of him said impossible, and still the woman of her insisted +that this was an impossible come true. By this time the dog on the stage +was singing "God Save the King." + +"That shows I am right," Villa contended. "No American, in America, +would teach a dog 'God Save the King.' An Englishman originally owned +that dog and taught it. The Solomons are British." + +"That's a far cry," he smiled. "But what gets me is that ear. I +remember it now. I remember the day when we were on the beach at Tulagi +with Jerry, and when his brother came ashore from the _Eugenie_ in a +whaleboat. And his brother had that self-same, loppy, crinkled ear." + +"And more," Villa argued. "How many singing dogs have we ever known! +Only one--Jerry. Evidently such a type occurs rarely. The same family +would more likely produce similar types than different families. The +family of Terrence and Biddy produced Jerry. And this is Michael." + +"He _was_ rough-coated, along with a crinkly ear," Harley meditated back. +"I see him distinctly as he stood up in the bow of the whaleboat and as +he ran along the beach side by side with Jerry." + +"If Jerry should to-morrow run side by side with him you would be +convinced?" she queried. + +"It was their trick, and the trick of Terrence and Biddy before them," he +agreed. "But it's a far cry from the Solomons to the United States." + +"Jerry is such a far cry," she replied. "And if Jerry won from the +Solomons to California, then is there anything more remarkable in Michael +so winning?--Oh, listen!" + +For the dog on the stage, now responding to its one encore, was singing +"Home, Sweet Home." This finished, Jacob Henderson, to tumultuous +applause, came on the stage from the wings and joined the dog in bowing. +Villa and Harley sat in silence for a moment. Then Villa said, apropos +of nothing: + +"I have been sitting here and feeling very grateful for one particular +thing." + +He waited. + +"It is that we are so abominably wealthy," she concluded. + +"Which means that you want the dog, must have him, and are going to got +him, just because I can afford to do it for you," he teased. + +"Because you can't afford not to," she answered. "You must know he is +Jerry's brother. At least, you must have a sneaking suspicion . . . ?" + +"I have," he nodded. "The thing that can't sometimes does, and there is +a chance that this may be one of those times. Of course, it isn't +Michael; but, on the other hand, what's to prevent it from being Michael? +Let us go behind and find out." + +* * * * * + +"More agents of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals," +was Jacob Henderson's thought, as the man and woman, accompanied by the +manager of the theatre, were shown into his tiny dressing-room. Michael, +on a chair and half asleep, took no notice of them. While Harley talked +with Henderson, Villa investigated Michael; and Michael scarcely opened +his eyes ere he closed them again. Too sour on the human world, and too +glum in his own soured nature, he was anything save his old courtly self +to chance humans who broke in upon him to pat his head, and say silly +things, and go their way never to be seen by him again. + +Villa Kennan, with a pang of disappointment at such rebuff, forwent her +overtures for the moment, and listened to what tale Jacob Henderson could +tell of his dog. Harry Del Mar, a trained-animal man, had picked the dog +up somewhere on the Pacific Coast, most probably in San Francisco, she +learned; but, having taken the dog east with him, Harry Del Mar had died +by accident in New York before telling anybody anything about the animal. +That was all, except that Henderson had paid two thousand dollars to one +Harris Collins, and had found the investment the finest he had ever made. + +Villa turned back to the dog. + +"Michael," she called, caressingly, almost in a whisper. + +And Michael's eyes partly opened, the base-muscles of his ears stiffened, +and his body quivered. + +"Michael," she repeated. + +This time raising his head, the eyes open and the ears stiffly erect, +Michael looked at her. Not since on the beach at Tulagi had he heard +that name uttered. Across the years and the seas the word came to him +out of the past. Its effect was electrical, for on the instant all the +connotations of "Michael" flooded his consciousness. He saw again +Captain Kellar, of the _Eugenie_, who had last called him it, and +_Mister_ Haggin, and Derby, and Bob of Meringe Plantation, and Biddy and +Terrence, and, not least among these shades of the vanished past, his +brother Jerry. + +But was it the vanished past? The name which had ceased for years, had +come back. It had entered the room along with this man and woman. All +this he did not reason; but indubitably, as if he had so reasoned, he +acted upon it. + +He jumped from the chair and ran to the woman. He smelled her hand, and +smelled her as she patted him. Then, as he recognized her, he went wild. +He sprang away, dashing around and around the room, sniffing under the +washstand and smelling out the corners. As in a frenzy he was back to +the woman, whimpering eagerly as she strove to pet him. The next moment, +stiff in a frenzy, he was away again, scurrying about the room and still +whimpering. + +Jacob Henderson looked on with mild disapproval. + +"He never cuts up that way," he said. "He is a very quiet dog. Maybe it +is a fit he is going to have, though he never has fits." + +No one understood, not even Villa Kennan. But Michael understood. He +was looking for that vanished world which had rushed back upon him at +sound of his old-time name. If this name could come to him out of the +Nothingness, as this woman had whom once he had seen treading the beach +at Tulagi, then could all other things of Tulagi and the Nothingness come +to him. As she was there, before him in the living flesh, uttering his +name, so might Captain Kellar, and _Mister_ Haggin, and Jerry be there, +somewhere in the very room or just outside the door. + +He ran to the door, whimpering as he scratched at it. + +"Maybe he thinks there is something outside," said Jacob Henderson, +opening the door for him. + +And Michael did so think. As a matter of course, through that open door, +he was prepared to have the South-Pacific Ocean flow in, bearing on its +bosom schooners and ships, islands and reefs, and all men and animals and +things he once had known and still remembered. + +But no past flowed in through the door. Outside was the usual present. +He came back dejectedly to the woman, who still called him Michael as she +petted him. She, at any rate, was real. Next he carefully smelled and +identified the man with the beach of Tulagi and the deck of the _Ariel_, +and again his excitement began to mount. + +"Oh, Harley, I know it is he!" Villa cried. "Can't you test him? Can't +you prove him?" + +"But how?" Harley pondered. "He seems to recognize his name. It excites +him. And though he never knew us very well, he seems to remember us and +to be excited by us, too. If only he could talk . . . " + +"Oh, talk! Talk!" Villa pleaded with Michael, catching both sides of his +head and jaws in her hands and swaying him back and forth. + +"Be careful, madam," Jacob Henderson warned. "He is a very sour dog; and +he don't let people take such liberties." + +"He does me," she laughed, half-hysterically. "Because he knows me. . . . +Harley!" She broke off as the great idea dawned on her. "I have a +test. Listen! Remember, Jerry was a nigger-chaser before we got him. +And Michael was a nigger-chaser. You talk in beche-de-mer. Appear angry +with some black boy, and see how it will affect him." + +"I'll have to remember hard to resurrect any beche-de-mer," Harley said, +nodding approval of the suggestion. + +"At the same time I'll distract him," she rushed on. + +Sitting down and bending forward to Michael so that his head was buried +in her arms and breast, she began swaying him and crooning to him as was +her wont with Jerry. Nor did he resent the liberty she took, and, like +Jerry, he yielded to her crooning and softly began to croon with her. She +signalled Harley with her eyes. + +"My word!" he began in tones of wrath. "What name you fella boy stop 'm +along this fella place? You make 'm me cross along you any amount!" + +And at the words Michael bristled, dragged himself clear of the woman's +detaining hands, and, with a snarl, whirled about to get a look at the +black boy who must have just then entered the room and aroused the white +god's ire. But there was no black boy. He looked on, still bristling, +to the door. Harley transferred his own gaze to the door, and Michael +knew, beyond all doubt, that outside the door was standing a Solomons +nigger. + +"Hey! Michael!" Harley shouted. "Chase 'm that black fella boy +overside!" + +With a roaring snarl, Michael flung himself at the door. Such was the +fury and weight of his onslaught that the latch flew loose and the door +swung open. The emptiness of the space which he had expected to see +occupied, was appalling, and he shrank down, sick and dizzy with the +baffling apparitional past that thus vexed his consciousness. + +"And now," said Harley to Jacob Henderson, "we will talk business . . . " + + + + +CHAPTER XXXV + + +When the train arrived at Glen Ellen, in the Valley of the Moon, it was +Harley Kennan himself, at the side-door of the baggage-car, who caught +hold of Michael and swung him to the ground. For the first time Michael +had performed a railroad journey uncrated. Merely with collar and chain +had he travelled up from Oakland. In the waiting automobile he found +Villa Kennan, and, chain removed, sat beside her and between her and +Harley + +As the machine purred along the two miles of road that wound up the side +of Sonoma Mountain, Michael scarcely looked at the forest-trees and +vistas of wandering glades. He had been in the United States three +years, during which time he had been kept a close prisoner. Cage and +crate and chain had been his portion, and narrow rooms, baggage cars, and +station platforms. The nearest he had come to the country was when +chained to benches in the various parks while Jacob Henderson studied +Swedenborg. So that trees and hills and fields had ceased to mean +anything. They were something inaccessible, as inaccessible as the blue +of the sky or the drifting cloud-fleeces. Thus did he regard the trees +and hills and fields, if the negative act of not regarding a thing at all +can be considered a state of mind. + +"Don't seem to be enthusiastic over the ranch, eh, Michael?" Harley +remarked. + +He looked up at sound of his old name, and made acknowledgment by +flattening his ears a quivering trifle and by touching his nose against +Harley's shoulder. + +"Nor does he seem demonstrative," was Villa's judgment. "At least, +nothing like Jerry," + +"Wait till they meet," Harley smiled in anticipation. "Jerry will +furnish enough excitement for both of them." + +"If they remember each other after all this time," said Villa. "I wonder +if they will." + +"They did at Tulagi," he reminded her. "And they were full grown and +hadn't seen each other since they were puppies. Remember how they barked +and scampered all about the beach. Michael was the hurly-burly one. At +least he made twice as much noise." + +"But he seems dreadfully grown-up and subdued now." + +"Three years ought to have subdued him," Harley insisted. + +But Villa shook her head. + +As the machine drew up at the house and Kennan first stepped out, a dog's +whimperingly joyous bark of welcome struck Michael as not altogether +unfamiliar. The joyous bark turned to a suspicious and jealous snarl as +Jerry scented the other dog's presence from Harley's caressing hand. The +next moment he had traced the original source of the scent into the +limousine and sprung in after it. With snarl and forward leap Michael +met the snarling rush less than half-way, and was rolled over on the +bottom of the car. + +The Irish terrier, under all circumstances amenable to the control of the +master as are few breeds of dogs, was instantly manifest in Jerry and +Michael an Harley Kennan's voice rang out. They separated, and, despite +the rumbling of low growling in their throats, refrained from attacking +each other as they plunged out to the ground. The little set-to had +occurred in so few seconds, or fractions of seconds, that they had not +begun to betray recognition of each other until they were out of the +machine. They were still comically stiff-legged and bristly as they +aloofly sniffed noses. + +"They know each other!" Villa cried. "Let's wait and see what they will +do." + +As for Michael, he accepted, without surprise, the indubitable fact that +Jerry had come back out of the Nothingness. Things of this sort had +begun to happen rapidly, but it was not the things themselves, but the +connotations of them, that almost stunned him. If the man and woman, +whom he had last seen at Tulagi, and, likewise, Jerry, had come back from +the Nothingness, then could come, and might come at any moment, the +beloved Steward. + +Instead of responding to Jerry, Michael sniffed and glanced about in +quest of Steward. Jerry's first expression of greeting and friendliness +took the form of a desire to run. He barked invitation to his brother, +scampered away half a dozen jumps, scampered back, and dabbed playfully +at Michael with one forepaw in added emphasis of invitation ere he +scampered away again. + +For so many years had Michael not run with another dog, that at first +Jerry's invitation had little meaning to him. Nevertheless, such running +was an habitual expression of happiness and friendliness in dogdom, and +especially strong had been his inheritance of it from Terrence and Biddy, +the noted love-runners of the Solomons. + +The next time Jerry dabbed at him with a paw, barked, and scurried away +in an enticing semi-circle, Michael started involuntarily though slowly +after him. But Michael did not bark; and, after half a dozen leaps, he +came to a full stop and looked to Villa and Harley for permission. + +"All right, Michael," Harley called heartily, deliberately turning his +shoulder in the non-interest of consent as he extended his hand to help +Villa from the machine. + +Michael sprang away again, and was numbly aware of an ancient joy as he +shouldered Jerry who shouldered against him as they ran side by side. But +most of the joy was Jerry's, as was the wildest of the skurrying and the +racing and the shouldering, of the body-wriggling, and ear-pricking, and +yelping cries. Also, Jerry barked; and Michael did not bark. + +"He used to bark," said Villa. + +"Much more than Jerry," Harley supplemented. + +"Then they have taken the bark out of him," she concluded. "He must have +gone through terrible experiences to have lost his bark." + +* * * * * + +The green California spring merged into tawny summer, as Jerry, ever +running afield, made Michael acquainted with the farthest and highest +reaches of the Kennan ranch in the Valley of the Moon. The pageant of +the wild flowers vanished until all that lingered on the burnt hillsides +were orange poppies faded to palest gold, and Mariposa lilies, wind-blown +on slender stems amidst the desiccated grasses, that smouldered like +ornate spotted moths fluttering in rest for a space between flight and +flight. + +And Michael, a follower always where the exuberant Jerry led, sought +throughout the passing year for what he could not find. + +"Looking for something, looking for something," Harley would say to +Villa. "It is not alive. It is not here. Now just what is it he is +always looking for?" + +Steward it was, and Michael never found him. The Nothingness held him +and would not yield him up, although, could Michael have journeyed a ten- +days' steamer-journey into the South Pacific to the Marquesas, Steward he +would have found, and, along with him, Kwaque and the Ancient Mariner, +all three living like lotus-eaters on the beach-paradise of Taiohae. +Also, in and about their grass-thatched bungalow under the lofty avocado +trees, Michael would have found other pet--cats, and kittens, and pigs, +donkeys and ponies, a pair of love-birds, and a mischievous monkey or +two; but never a dog and never a cockatoo. For Dag Daughtry, with +violence of language, had laid a taboo upon dogs. After Killeny Boy, he +averred, there should be no other dog. And Kwaque, without averring +anything at all, resolutely refrained from possessing himself of the +white cockatoos brought ashore by the sailors off the trading schooners. + +But Michael was long in giving over his search for Steward, and, running +the mountain trails or scrambling and sliding down into the deep canyons, +was ever expectant and ready for Steward to step forth before him, or to +pick up the unmistakable scent that would lead him to him. + +"Looking for something, looking for something," Harley Kennan would chant +curiously, as he rode beside Villa and observed Michael's unending +search. "Now Jerry's after rabbits, and fox-trails; but you'll notice +they don't interest Michael much. They're not what he's after. He +behaves like one who has lost a great treasure and doesn't know where he +lost it nor where to look for it." + +Much Michael learned from Jerry of the varied life of the forest and +fields. To run with Jerry seemed the one pleasure he took, for he never +played. Play had passed out of him. He was not precisely morose or +gloomy from his years on the trained-animal stage and in Harris Collins's +college of pain, but he was sobered, subdued. The spring and the +spontaneity had gone out of him. Just as the leopard had claw-marked his +shoulder so that damp and frosty weather made the pain of the old wound +come back, so was his mind marked by what he had gone through. He liked +Jerry, was glad to be with him and to run with him; but it was Jerry who +was ever in the lead, who ever raised the hue and cry of hunting pursuit, +who barked indignation and eager yearning at a tree'd squirrel in refuge +forty feet above the ground. Michael looked on and listened, but took no +part in such antics of enthusiasm. + +In the same way he looked on when Jerry fought fearful comic battles with +Norman Chief, the great Percheron stallion. It was only play, for Jerry +and Norman Chief were tried friends; and, though the huge horse, ears +laid back, mouth open to bite, pursued Jerry in mad gyrations all about +the paddock, it was with no thought of inflicting hurt, but merely to act +up to his part in the sham battle. Yet no invitation of Jerry's could +induce Michael to join in the fun. He contented himself with sitting +down outside the rails and looking on. + +"Why play?" might Michael have asked, who had had all play taken out of +him. + +But when it came to serious work, he was there even ahead of Jerry. On +account of foot-and-mouth disease and of hog-cholera, strange dogs were +taboo on the Kennan ranch. It did not take Michael long to learn this, +and stray dogs got short shrift from him. With never a warning bark nor +growl, in deadly silence, he rushed them, slashed and bit them, rolled +them over and over in the dust, and drove them from the place. It was +like nigger-chasing, a service to perform for the gods whom he loved and +who willed such chasing. + +No wild passion of love, such as he had had for Steward, did he bear +Villa and Harley, but he did develop for them a great, sober love. He +did not go out of his way to express it with overtures of wrigglings and +squirmings and whimpering yelpings. Jerry could be depended upon for +that. But he was always seriously glad to be with Villa and Harley and +to receive recognition from them next after Jerry. Some of his deepest +moments of content, before the fireplace, were to sit beside Villa or +Harley and lean his head against a knee and have a hand, on occasion, +drop down on his head or gently twist his crinkled ear. + +Jerry was even guilty of playing with children who happened at times to +be under the Kennan aegis. Michael endured children for as long as they +left him alone. If they waxed familiar, he would warn them with a +bristling of his neck-hair and a throaty rumbling and get up and stalk +away. + +"I can't understand it," Villa would say. "He was the fullest of play, +and spirits, and all foolishness. He was much sillier and much more +excitable than Jerry and certainly noisier. He must have some terrible +story to tell, if only he could, of all that happened between Tulagi and +the time we found him on the Orpheum stage." + +"And that may be the least little hint of it," Harley would reply, +pointing to Michael's shoulder where the leopard had scarred it on the +day Jack, the Airedale, and Sara, the little green monkey, had died. + +"He used to bark, I know he used to bark," Villa would continue. "Why +doesn't he bark now?" + +And Harley would point to the scarred shoulder and say, "That may account +for it, and most possibly a hundred other things like it of which we +cannot see the marks." + +But the time was to come when they were to hear him bark again--not once, +but twice. And both times were to be but an earnest of another and +graver time when, without barking at all, he would express in action the +measure of his love and worship of them who had taken him from the crate +and the footlights and given him the freedom of the Valley of the Moon. + +And in the meantime, running endlessly with Jerry over the ranch, he +learned all the ways of it and all the life of it from the chickenyards +and the duck-ponds to the highest pitch of Sonoma Mountain. He learned +where the wild deer, in their season, were to be found; when they raided +the prune-orchard, the vineyards, and the apple-trees; when they sought +the deepest canyons and most secret coverts; and when they stamped out in +open glades and on bare hillsides and crashed and clattered their antlers +together in combat. Under Jerry's leadership, always running second and +after on the narrow trails as a subdued dog should, he learned the ways +and habits of the foxes, the coons, the weasels, and the ring-tail cats +that seemed compounded of cat and coon and weasel. He came to know the +ground-nesting birds and the difference between the customs of the valley +quail, the mountain quail, and the pheasants. The traits and lairs of +the domestic cats gone wild he also learned, as did he learn the wild +loves of mountain farm-dogs with the free-roving coyotes. + +He knew of the presence of the mountain lion, adrift down from Mendocino +County, ere the first shorthorn calf was slain, and came home from the +encounter, torn and bleeding, to attest what he had discovered and to be +the cause of Harley Kennan riding trail next day with a rifle across his +pommel. Likewise Michael came to know what Harley Kennan never did know +and always denied as existing on his ranch--the one rocky outcrop, in the +dense heart of the mountain forest, where a score of rattlesnakes denned +through the winters and warmed themselves in the sun. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVI + + +Winter came on in its delectable way in the Valley of the Moon. The last +Mariposa lily vanished from the burnt grasses as the California Indian +summer dreamed itself out in purple mists on the windless air. Soft rain- +showers first broke the spell. Snow fell on the summit of Sonoma +Mountain. At the ranch house the morning air was crisp and brittle, yet +mid-day made the shade welcome, and in the open, under the winter sun, +roses bloomed and oranges, grape-fruit, and lemons turned to golden +yellow ripeness. Yet, a thousand feet beneath, on the floor of the +valley, the mornings were white with frost. + +And Michael barked twice. The first time was when Harley Kennan, astride +a hot-blooded sorrel colt, tried to make it leap a narrow stream. Villa +reined in her steed at the crest beyond, and, looking back into the +little valley, waited for the colt to receive its lesson. Michael +waited, too, but closer at hand. At first he lay down, panting from his +run, by the stream-edge. But he did not know horses very well, and soon +his anxiety for the welfare of Harley Kennan brought him to his feet. + +Harley was gentle and persuasive and all patience as he strove to make +the colt take the leap. The urge of voice and rein was of the mildest; +but the animal balked the take-off each time, and the hot +thoroughbredness in its veins made it sweat and lather. The velvet of +young grass was torn up by its hoofs, and its terror of the stream was +such, that, when fetched to the edge at a canter, it stiffened and +crouched to an abrupt stop, then reared on its hind-legs. Which was too +much for Michael. + +He sprang at the horse's head as it came down with forefeet to earth, and +as he sprang he barked. In his bark was censure and menace, and, as the +horse reared again, he leaped into the air after it, his teeth clipping +together as he just barely missed its nose. + +Villa rode back down the slope to the opposite bank of the stream. + +"Mercy!" she cried. "Listen to him! He's actually barking." + +"He thinks the colt is trying to do some damage to me," Harley said. +"That's his provocation. He hasn't forgotten how to bark. He's reading +the colt a lecture." + +"If he gets him by the nose it will be more than a lecture," Villa +warned. "Be careful, Harley, or he will." + +"Now, Michael, lie down and be good," Harley commanded. "It's all right, +I tell you. It's an right. Lie down." + +Michael sank down obediently, but protestingly; and he had eyes only for +the horse's antics, while all his muscles were gathered tensely to spring +in case the horse threatened injury to Harley again. + +"I can't give in to him now, or he never will jump anything," Harley said +to his wife, as he whirled about to gallop back to a distance. "Either I +lift him over or I take a cropper." + +He came back at full speed, and the colt, despite himself, unable to +stop, lifted into the leap that would avoid the stream he feared, so that +he cleared it with a good two yards to spare on the other side. + +The next time Michael barked was when Harley, on the same hot-blood +mount, strove to close a poorly hung gate on the steep pitch of a +mountain wood-road. Michael endured the danger to his man-god as long as +he could, then flew at the colt's head in a frenzy of barking. + +"Anyway, his barking helped," Harley conceded, as he managed to close the +gate. "Michael must certainly have told the colt that he'd give him what- +for if he didn't behave." + +"At any rate, he's not tongue-tied," Villa laughed, "even if he isn't +very loquacious." + +And Michael's loquacity never went farther. Only on these two occasions, +when his master-god seemed to be in peril, was he known to bark. He +never barked at the moon, nor at hillside echoes, nor at any prowling +thing. A particular echo, to be heard directly from the ranch-house, was +an unfailing source of exercise for Jerry's lungs. At such times that +Jerry barked, Michael, with a bored expression, would lie down and wait +until the duet was over. Nor did he bark when he attacked strange dogs +that strayed upon the ranch. + +"He fights like a veteran," Harley remarked, after witnessing one such +encounter. "He's cold-blooded. There's no excitement in him." + +"He's old before his time," Villa said. "There is no heart of play left +in him, and no desire for speech. Just the same I know he loves me, and +you--" + +"Without having to be voluble about it," her husband completed for her. + +"You can see it shining in those quiet eyes of his," she supplemented. + +"Reminds me of one of the survivors of Lieutenant Greeley's Expedition I +used to know," he agreed. "He was an enlisted soldier and one of the +handful of survivors. He had been through so much that he was just as +subdued as Michael and just as taciturn. He bored most people, who could +not understand him. Of course, the truth was the other way around. They +bored him. They knew so little of life that he knew the last word of. +And one could scarcely get any word out of him. It was not that he had +forgotten how to speak, but that he could not see any reason for speaking +when nobody could understand. He was really crusty from too-bitter wise +experience. But all you had to do was look at him in his tremendous +repose and know that he had been through the thousand hells, including +all the frozen ones. His eyes had the same quietness of Michael's. And +they had the same wisdom. I'd give almost anything to know how he got +his shoulder scarred. It must have been a tiger or a lion." + +* * * * * + +The man, like the mountain lion whom Michael had encountered up the +mountain, had strayed down from the wilds of Mendocino County, following +the ruggedest mountain stretches, and, at night, crossing the farmed +valley spaces where the presence of man was a danger to him. Like the +mountain lion, the man was an enemy to man, and all men were his enemies, +seeking his life which he had forfeited in ways more terrible than the +lion which had merely killed calves for food. + +Like the mountain lion, the man was a killer. But, unlike the lion, his +vague description and the narrative of his deeds was in all the +newspapers, and mankind was a vast deal more interested in him than in +the lion. The lion had slain calves in upland pastures. But the man, +for purposes of robbery, had slain an entire family--the postmaster, his +wife, and their three children, in the upstairs over the post office in +the mountain village of Chisholm. + +For two weeks the man had eluded and exceeded pursuit. His last crossing +had been from the mountains of the Russian River, across wide-farmed +Santa Rosa Valley, to Sonoma Mountain. For two days he had laired and +rested, sleeping much, in the wildest and most inaccessible precincts of +the Kennan Ranch. With him he had carried coffee stolen from the last +house he had raided. One of Harley Kennan's angora goats had furnished +him with meat. Four times he had slept the clock around from exhaustion, +rousing on occasion, like any animal, to eat voraciously of the +goat-meat, to drink large quantities of the coffee hot or cold, and to +sink down into heavy but nightmare-ridden sleep. + +And in the meantime civilization, with its efficient organization and +intricate inventions, including electricity, had closed in on him. +Electricity had surrounded him. The spoken word had located him in the +wild canyons of Sonoma Mountain and fringed the mountain with posses of +peace-officers and detachments of armed farmers. More terrible to them +than any mountain lion was a man-killing man astray in their landscape. +The telephone on the Kennan Ranch, and the telephones on all other +ranches abutting on Sonoma Mountain, had rung often and transmitted +purposeful conversations and arrangements. + +So it happened, when the posses had begun to penetrate the mountain, and +when the man was compelled to make a daylight dash down into the Valley +of the Moon to cross over to the mountain fastnesses that lay between it +and Napa Valley, that Harley Kennan rode out on the hot-blooded colt he +was training. He was not in pursuit of the man who had slain the +postmaster of Chisholm and his family. The mountain was alive with man- +hunters, as he well knew, for a score had bedded and eaten at the ranch +house the night before. So the meeting of Harley Kennan with the man was +unplanned and eventful. + +It was not the first meeting with men the man had had that day. During +the preceding night he had noted the campfires of several posses. At +dawn, attempting to break forth down the south-western slopes of the +mountain toward Petaluma, he had encountered not less than five separate +detachments of dairy-ranchers all armed with Winchesters and shotguns. +Breaking back to cover, the chase hot on his heels, he had run full tilt +into a party of village youths from Glen Ellen and Caliente. Their +squirrel and deer rifles had missed him, but his back had been peppered +with birdshot in a score of places, the leaden pellets penetrating +maddeningly in a score of places just under the skin. + +In the rush of his retreat down the canyon slope, he had plunged into a +bunch of shorthorn steers, who, far more startled than he, had rolled him +on the forest floor, trampled over him in their panic, and smashed his +rifle under their hoofs. Weaponless, desperate, stinging and aching from +his superficial wounds and bruises, he had circled the forest slopes +along deer-paths, crossed two canyons, and begun to descend the horse- +trail he found in the third canyon. + +It was on this trail, going down, that he met the reporter coming up. The +reporter was--well, just a reporter, from the city, knowing only city +ways, who had never before engaged in a man-hunt. The livery horse he +had rented down in the valley was a broken-kneed, jaded, and spiritless +creature, that stood calmly while its rider was dragged from its back by +the wild-looking and violently impetuous man who sprang out around a +sharp turn of the trail. The reporter struck at his assailant once with +his riding-whip. Then he received a beating, such as he had often +written up about sailor-rows and saloon-frequenters in his cub-reporter +days, but which for the first time it was his lot to experience. + +To the man's disgust he found the reporter unarmed save for a pencil and +a wad of copy paper. Out of his disappointment in not securing a weapon, +he beat the reporter up some more, left him wailing among the ferns, and, +astride the reporter's horse, urging it on with the reporter's whip, +continued down the trail. + +Jerry, ever keenest on the hunting, had ranged farther afield than +Michael as the pair of them accompanied Harley Kennan on his early +morning ride. Even so, Michael, at the heels of his master's horse, did +not see nor understand the beginning of the catastrophe. For that +matter, neither did Harley. Where a steep, eight-foot bank came down to +the edge of the road along which he was riding, Harley and the hot-blood +colt were startled by an eruption through the screen of manzanita bushes +above. Looking up, he saw a reluctant horse and a forceful rider +plunging in mid-air down upon him. In that flashing glimpse, even as he +reined and spurred to make his own horse leap sidewise out from under, +Harley Kennan observed the scratched skin and torn clothing, the wild- +burning eyes, and the haggardness under the scraggly growth of beard, of +the man-hunted man. + +The livery horse was justifiably reluctant to make that leap out and down +the bank. Too painfully aware of the penalty its broken knees and +rheumatic joints must pay, it dug its hoofs into the steep slope of moss +and only sprang out and clear in the air in order to avoid a fall. Even +so, its shoulder impacted against the shoulder of the whirling colt below +it, overthrowing the latter. Harley Kennan's leg, caught under against +the earth, snapped, and the colt, twisted and twisting as it struck the +ground, snapped its backbone. + +To his utter disgust, the man, pursued by an armed countryside, found +Harley Kennan, his latest victim, like the reporter, to be weaponless. +Dismounted, he snarled in his rage and disappointment and deliberately +kicked the helpless man in the side. He had drawn back his foot for the +second kick, when Michael took a hand--or a leg, rather, sinking his +teeth into the calf of the back-drawn leg about to administer the kick. + +With a curse the man jerked his leg clear, Michael's teeth ribboning +flesh and trousers. + +"Good boy, Michael!" Harley applauded from where he lay helplessly +pinioned under his horse. "Hey! Michael!" he continued, lapsing back +into beche-de-mer, "chase 'm that white fella marster to hell outa here +along bush!" + +"I'll kick your head off for that," the man gritted at Harley through his +teeth. + +Savage as were his acts and utterance, the man was nearly ready to cry. +The long pursuit, his hand against all mankind and all mankind against +him, had begun to break his stamina. He was surrounded by enemies. Even +youths had risen up and peppered his back with birdshot, and beef cattle +had trod him underfoot and smashed his rifle. Everything conspired +against him. And now it was a dog that had slashed down his leg. He was +on the death-road. Never before had this impressed him with such clear +certainty. Everything was against him. His desire to cry was +hysterical, and hysteria, in a desperate man, is prone to express itself +in terrible savage ways. Without rhyme or reason he was prepared to +carry out his threat to kick Harley Kennan to death. Not that Kennan had +done anything to him. On the contrary, it was he who had attacked +Kennan, hurling him down on the road and breaking his leg under his +horse. But Harley Kennan was a man, and all mankind was his enemy; and, +in killing Kennan, in some vague way it appeared to him that he was +avenging himself, at least in part, on mankind in general. Going down +himself in death, he would drag what he could with him into the red ruin. + +But ere he could kick the man on the ground, Michael was back upon him. +His other calf and trousers' leg were ribboned as he tore clear. Then, +catching Michael in mid-leap with a kick that reached him under the +chest, he sent him flying through the air off the road and down the +slope. As mischance would have it, Michael did not reach the ground. +Crashing through a scrub manzanita bush, his body was caught and pinched +in an acute fork a yard above the ground. + +"Now," the man announced grimly to Harley, "I'm going to do what I said. +I'm just going to kick your head clean off." + +"And I haven't done a thing to you," Harley parleyed. "I don't so much +mind being murdered, but I'd like to know what I'm being murdered for." + +"Chasing me for my life," the man snarled, as he advanced. "I know your +kind. You've all got it in for me, and I ain't got a chance except to +give you yours. I'll take a whole lot of it out on you." + +Kennan was thoroughly aware of the gravity of his peril. Helpless +himself, a man-killing lunatic was about to kill him and to kill him most +horribly. Michael, a prisoner in the bush, hanging head-downward in the +manzanita from his loins squeezed in the fork, and struggling vainly, +could not come to his defence. + +The man's first kick, aimed at Harley's face, he blocked with his +forearm; and, before the man could make a second kick, Jerry erupted on +the scene. Nor did he need encouragement or direction from his +love-master. He flashed at the man, sinking his teeth harmlessly into +the slack of the man's trousers at the waist-band above the hip, but by +his weight dragging him half down to the ground. + +And upon Jerry the man turned with an increase of madness. In truth all +the world was against him. The very landscape rained dogs upon him. But +from above, from the slopes of Sonoma Mountain, the cries and calls of +the trailing poses caught his ear, and deflected his intention. They +were the pursuing death, and it was from them he must escape. With +another kick at Jerry, hurling him clear, he leaped astride the +reporter's horse which had continued to stand, without movement or +excitement, in utter apathy, where he had dismounted from it. + +The horse went into a reluctant and stiff-legged gallop, while Jerry +followed, snarling and growling wrath at so high a pitch that almost he +squalled. + +"It's all right, Michael," Harley soothed. "Take it easy. Don't hurt +yourself. The trouble's over. Anybody'll happen along any time now and +get us out of this fix." + +But the smaller branch of the two composing the fork broke, and Michael +fell to the ground, landing in momentary confusion on his head and +shoulders. The next moment he was on his feet and tearing down the road +in the direction of Jerry's noisy pursuit. Jerry's noise broke in a +sharp cry of pain that added wings to Michael's feet. Michael passed him +rolling helplessly on the road. What had happened was that the livery +horse, in its stiff-jointed, broken-kneed gallop, had stumbled, nearly +fallen, and, in its sprawling recovery, had accidentally stepped on +Jerry, bruising and breaking his foreleg. + +And the man, looking back and seeing Michael close upon him, decided that +it was still another dog attacking him. But he had no fear of dogs. It +was men, with their rifles and shotguns, that might bring him to ultimate +grief. Nevertheless, the pain of his bleeding legs, lacerated by Jerry +and Michael, maintained his rage against dogs. + +"More dogs," was his bitter thought, as he leaned out and brought his +whip down across Michael's face. + +To his surprise, the dog did not wince under the blow. Nor for that +matter did he yelp or cry out from the pain. Nor did he bark or growl or +snarl. He closed in as though he had not received the blow, and as +though the whip was not brandished above him. As Michael leaped for his +right leg he swung the whip down, striking him squarely on the muzzle +midway between nose and eyes. Deflected by the blow, Michael dropped +back to earth and ran on with his longest leaps to catch up and make his +next spring. + +But the man had noticed another thing. At such close range, bringing his +whip down, he could not help noting that Michael had kept his eyes open +under the blow. Neither had he winced nor blinked as the whip slashed +down on him. The thing was uncanny. It was something new in the way of +dogs. Michael sprang again, the man timed him again with the whip, and +he saw the uncanny thing repeated. By neither wince nor blink had the +dog acknowledged the blow. + +And then an entirely new kind of fear came upon the man. Was this the +end for him, after all he had gone through? Was this deadly silent, +rough-coated terrier the thing destined to destroy him where men had +failed? He did not even know that the dog was real. Might it not be +some terrible avenger, out of the mystery beyond life, placed to beset +him and finish him finally on this road that he was convinced was surely +the death-road? The dog was not real. It could not be real. The dog +did not live that could take a full-arm whip-slash without wince or +flinch. + +Twice again, as the dog sprang, he deflected it with accurately delivered +blows. And the dog came on with the same surety and silence. The man +surrendered to his terror, clapping heels to his horse's old ribs, +beating it over the head and under the belly with the whip until it +galloped as it had not galloped in years. Even on that apathetic steed +the terror descended. It was not terror of the dog, which it knew to be +only a dog, but terror of the rider. In the past its knees had been +broken and its joints stiffened for ever, by drunken-mad riders who had +hired him from the stables. And here was another such drunken-mad +rider--for the horse sensed the man's terror--who ached his ribs with the +weight of his heels and beat him cruelly over face and nose and ears. + +The best speed of the horse was not very great, not great enough to out- +distance Michael, although it was fast enough to give the latter only +infrequent opportunities to spring for the man's leg. But each spring +was met by the unvarying whip-blow that by its very weight deflected him +in the air. Though his teeth each time clipped together perilously close +to the man's leg, each time he fell back to earth he had to gather +himself together and run at his own top speed in order to overtake the +terror-stricken man on the crazy-galloping horse. + +Enrico Piccolomini saw the chase and was himself in at the finish; and +the affair, his one great adventure in the world, gave him wealth as well +as material for conversation to the end of his days. Enrico Piccolomini +was a wood-chopper on the Kennan Ranch. On a rounded knoll, overlooking +the road, he had first heard the galloping hoofs of the horse and the +crack of the whip-blows on its body. Next, he had seen the running +battle of the man, the horse, and the dog. When directly beneath him, +not twenty feet distant, he saw the dog leap, in its queer silent way, +straight up and in to the down-smash of the whip, and sink its teeth in +the rider's leg. He saw the dog, with its weight, as it fell back to +earth, drag the man half out of the saddle. He saw the man, in an effort +to recover his balance, put his own weight on the bridle-reins. And he +saw the horse, half-rearing, half-tottering and stumbling, overthrow the +last shred of the man's balance so that he followed the dog to the +ground. + +"And then they are like two dogs, like two beasts," Piccolomini was wont +to tell in after-years over a glass of wine in his little hotel in Glen +Ellen. "The dog lets go the man's leg and jumps for the man's throat. +And the man, rolling over, is at the dog's throat. Both his hands--so--he +fastens about the throat of this dog. And the dog makes no sound. He +never makes sound, before or after. After the two hands of the man stop +his breath he can not make sound. But he is not that kind of a dog. He +will not make sound anyway. And the horse stands and looks on, and the +horse coughs. It is very strange all that I see. + +"And the man is mad. Only a madman will do what I see him do. I see the +man show his teeth like any dog, and bite the dog on the paw, on the +nose, on the body. And when he bites the dog on the nose, the dog bites +him on the check. And the man and the dog fight like hell, and the dog +gets his hind legs up like a cat. And like a cat he tears the man's +shirt away from his chest, and tears the skin of the chest with his claws +till it is all red with bleeding. And the man yow-yowls, and makes +noises like a wild mountain lion. And always he chokes the dog. It is a +hell of a fight. + +"And the dog is Mister Kennan's dog, a fine man, and I have worked for +him two years. So I will not stand there and see Mister Kennan's dog all +killed to pieces by the man who fights like a mountain lion. I run down +the hill, but I am excited and forget my axe. I run down the hill, maybe +from this door to that door, twenty feet or maybe thirty feet. And it is +nearly all finished for the dog. His tongue is a long ways out, and his +eyes like covered with cobwebs; but still he scratches the man's chest +with his hind-feet and the man yow-yowls like a hen of the mountains. + +"What can I do? I have forgotten the axe. The man will kill the dog. I +look for a big rock. There are no rocks. I look for a club. I cannot +find a club. And the man is killing the dog. I tell you what I do. I +am no fool. I kick the man. My shoes are very heavy--not like shoes I +wear now. They are the shoes of the wood-chopper, very thick on the sole +with hard leather, with many iron nails. I kick the man on the side of +the face, on the neck, right under the ear. I kick once. It is a good +kick. It is enough. I know the place--right under the ear. + +"And the man lets go of the dog. He shuts his eyes, and opens his mouth, +and lies very still. And the dog begins once more to breathe. And with +the breath comes the life, and right away he wants to kill the man. But +I say 'No,' though I am very much afraid of the dog. And the man begins +to become alive. He opens his eyes and he looks at me like a mountain +lion. And his mouth makes a noise like a mountain lion. And I am afraid +of him like I am afraid of the dog. What am I to do? I have forgotten +the axe. I tell you what I do. I kick the man once again under the ear. +Then I take my belt, and my bandana handkerchief, and I tie him. I tie +his hands. I tie his legs, too. And all the time I am saying 'No,' to +the dog, and that he must leave the man alone. And the dog looks. He +knows I am his friend and am tying the man. And he does not bite me, +though I am very much afraid. The dog is a terrible dog. Do I not know? +Have I not seen him take a strong man out of the saddle?--a man that is +like a mountain lion? + +"And then the men come. They all have guns-rifles, shotguns, revolvers, +pistols. And I think, first, that justice is very quick in the United +States. Only just now have I kicked a man in the head, and, +one-two-three, just like that, men come with guns to take me to jail for +kicking a man in the head. At first I do not understand. The many men +are angry with me. They call me names, and say bad things; but they do +not arrest me. Ah! I begin to understand! I hear them talk about three +thousand dollars. I have robbed them of three thousand dollars. It is +not true. I say so. I say never have I robbed a man of one cent. Then +they laugh. And I feel better and I understand better. The three +thousand dollars is the reward of the Government for this man I have tied +up with my belt and my bandana. And the three thousand dollars is mine +because I kicked the man in the head and tied his hands and his feet. + +"So I do not work for Mister Kennan any more. I am a rich man. Three +thousand dollars, all mine, from the Government, and Mister Kennan sees +that it is paid to me by the Government and not robbed from me by the men +with the guns. Just because I kicked the man in the head who was like a +mountain lion! It is fortune. It is America. And I am glad that I have +left Italy and come to chop wood on Mister Kennan's ranch. And I start +this hotel in Glen Ellen with the three thousand dollars. I know there +is large money in the hotel business. When I was a little boy, did not +my father have a hotel in Napoli? I have now two daughters in high +school. Also I own an automobile." + +* * * * * + +"Mercy me, the whole ranch is a hospital!" cried Villa Kennan, two days +later, as she came out on the broad sleeping-porch and regarded Harley +and Jerry stretched out, the one with his leg in splints, the other with +his leg in a plaster cast. "Look at Michael," she continued. "You're +not the only ones with broken bones. I've only just discovered that if +his nose isn't broken, it ought to be, from the blow he must have +received on it. I've had hot compresses on it for the last hour. Look +at it!" + +Michael, who had followed in at her invitation, betrayed a ridiculously +swollen nose as he sniffed noses with Jerry, wagged his bobtail to Harley +in greeting, and was greeted in turn with a blissful hand laid on his +head. + +"Must have got it in the fight," Harley said. "The fellow struck him +with the whip many times, so Piccolomini says, and, naturally, it would +be right across the nose when he jumped for him." + +"And Piccolomini says he never cried out when he was struck, but went on +running and jumping," Villa took up enthusiastically. "Think of it! A +dog no bigger than Michael dragging out of the saddle a man-killing +outlaw whom scores of officers could not catch!" + +"So far as we are concerned, he did better than that," Harley commented +quietly. "If it hadn't been for Michael, and for Jerry, too--if it +hadn't been for the pair of them, I do verily believe that that lunatic +would have kicked my head off as he promised." + +"The blessed pair of them!" Villa cried, with shining eyes, as her hand +flashed out to her husband's in a quick press of heart-thankfulness. "The +last word has not been said upon the wonder of dogs," she added, as, with +a quick winking of her eyelashes to overcome the impending moistness, she +controlled her emotion. + +"The last word of the wonder of dogs will never be said," Harley spoke, +returning the pressure of her hand and releasing it in order to help her. + +"And just for that were going to say something right now," she smiled. +"Jerry, and Michael, and I. We've been practising it in secret for a +surprise for you. You just lie there and listen. It's the Doxology. +Don't Laugh. No pun intended." + +She bent forward from the stool on which she sat, and drew Michael to her +so that he sat between her knees, her two hands holding his head and +jowls, his nose half-buried in her hair. + +"Now Jerry!" she called sharply, as a singing teacher might call, so that +Jerry turned his head in attention, looked at her, smiled understanding +with his eyes, and waited. + +It was Villa who started and pitched the Doxology, but quickly the two +dogs joined with their own soft, mellow howling, if howling it may be +called when it was so soft and mellow and true. And all that had +vanished into the Nothingness was in the minds of the two dogs as they +sang, and they sang back through the Nothingness to the land of +Otherwhere, and ran once again with the Lost Pack, and yet were not +entirely unaware of the present and of the indubitable two-legged god who +was called Villa and who sang with them and loved them. + +"No reason we shouldn't make a quartette of it," remarked Harley Kennan, +as with his own voice he joined in. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MICHAEL, BROTHER OF JERRY*** + + +******* This file should be named 1730.txt or 1730.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/7/3/1730 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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