Forests of Maine Part 6

Marco advanced towards him, and took him by the shoulder, roughly, to wake him up, saying,

"Forester! cousin Forester! wake up! the boat has gone."

Forester opened his eyes--looked wildly at Marco, and then put his hands to his head, pressing his temples with the palms, but he did not speak.

"The boat has gone, cousin Forester," continued Marco.

"Then what good does it do to wake me up so roughly?" asked Forester.

"Why--I--thought you'd want to know it," said Marco; "but why did not you come down?"

"Because," said Forester, "you were to come and tell me, I thought, when they were ready to go."

Marco had no reply to make to this suggestion, and he was silent. He found, afterwards, on farther conversation with Forester, that he was quite unwell. His head ached, and his face was flushed, as if he was feverish. Marco related to Forester an account of his adventures on the raft of logs. Forester thought that he had had a very narrow escape.

Marco expected that Forester would have rebuked him very sharply for his fault in going upon the logs at all. But he did not. After Marco had got through with his account, Forester only said,

"Well, Marco, you evidently did wrong in getting upon the logs at all; but the evil consequences to you will be punishment enough, and, in fact, more than enough."

"Evil consequences?" said Marco--"no; there are no evil consequences, only that we have got left behind."

"I don't regard that," said Forester, "for I am too unwell to travel to-day; but then you have suffered considerable pain and anxiety already, and, besides, there will be some money to pay."

"What for?" said Marco.

"Why, you have got to pay the boy for bringing you home," replied Forester.

"Must I pay him," said Marco, "out of my own money?"

"Who do you think ought to pay him?" said Forester.

"Why, _I_ ought to, I suppose," said Marco. "But it won't be much. I think a quarter of a dollar will be enough."

"Then, did not you say that you sent to the mill to have somebody go down after you in a boat?" asked Forester.

"Yes," said Marco, "but I don't think they went."

"You had better go to the mill and see," said Forester.

So Marco went out and paid the boy a quarter of a dollar, with which he seemed to be satisfied. Then he went to the mill, and he found two men just returning, in a boat, from a long pull down the river in pursuit of him. Marco paid them half a dollar. Thus his loss was three quarters of a dollar.

When he returned to the tavern, he found that Forester had taken some medicine, and had gone to bed. Forester told him that he must amuse himself the best way he could, and that, after the experience that he had had that day, he hoped he would be careful not to put himself any more into dangerous situations.

CHAPTER V.

THE BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT.

Marco took dinner that day at the tavern alone, and, after dinner, he carried a cup of tea to Forester,--but Forester was asleep, and so he did not disturb him.

In the afternoon he went out to play. He amused himself, for half an hour, in rambling about the tavern yards and in the stables. There was a ferocious-looking bull in one of the yards, chained to a post, by means of a ring through his nose. Marco looked at the bull a few minutes with great interest, and then began to look about for a long stick, or a pole, to poke him a little, through the fence, to see if he could not make him roar, when, instead of a pole, his eye fell upon a boy, who was at work, digging in a corner of a field near, behind the barn.

The boy's name was Jeremiah. He was digging for worms for bait. He was going a fis.h.i.+ng. Marco determined to go with him.

Jeremiah furnished Marco with a hook and a piece of sheet lead to make a sinker of, and Marco had some twine in his pocket already; so that he was soon fitted with a line. But he had no pole. Jeremiah said that he could cut one, on his way down to the river, as they would pa.s.s through a piece of woods which had plenty of tall and slender young trees in it.

He succeeded in getting a pole in this manner, which answered very well; and then he and Jeremiah went down to the river. They stood upon a log on the sh.o.r.e, and caught several small fishes, but they got none of much value, for nearly half an hour. At last, Jeremiah, who was standing at a little distance from Marco, suddenly exclaimed:

"Oh, here comes a monstrous great perch. He is coming directly towards my hook."

"Where? where?" exclaimed Marco. And Marco immediately drew out his hook from the place where he had been fis.h.i.+ng, and walked along to the log on which Jeremiah was standing.

"Where is he?" said Marco, looking eagerly into the water.

"Hus.h.!.+" said Jeremiah; "don't say a word. There he is, swimming along towards my hook."

"Yes," said Marco, "I see him. Now he's turning away a little. Let me put my line in, too."

Marco extended his pole and dropped his hook gently into the water. He let it down until it was near the perch. The poor fish, after loitering about a minute, gradually approached Marco's hook and bit at it.

Jeremiah, seeing that he was in danger of losing his fish, now called out to Marco to take his line out. "It is not fair," said he, "for you to come and take my fish, just as he was going to bite at my hook. Go away."

But it was too late. As Jeremiah was saying these words, the fish bit, and Marco, drawing up the line, found the fish upon the end of it. As the line came in, however, Jeremiah reached out his hand to seize the fish, and Marco, to prevent him, dropped the pole and endeavored to seize it too.

"Let go my fish," said Jeremiah.

"Let alone my line," said Marco.

Neither would let go. A struggle ensued, and Marco and Jeremiah, in the midst of it, fell off into the water. The water was not very deep, and they soon clambered up upon the log again, but the fish, which had been pulled off the line in the contention, fell into the water, and swam swiftly away into the deep and dark parts of the water, and was seen no more. He was saved by the quarrels of his enemies.

Marco, who was not so much accustomed to a wetting as Jeremiah was, became very angry, and immediately set off to go home to the tavern.

Jeremiah coolly resumed his position on the log, and went to fis.h.i.+ng again, paying no heed to Marco's expressions of resentment.

Marco walked along, very uncomfortable both in body and mind. His clothes were wet and muddy, and the water in his shoes made a chuckling sound at every step, until he stopped and took his shoes off, and poured the water out. It was nearly sunset when he reached the tavern.

He found Forester better. He had left his bed, and had come down into the parlor. He was reclining on the sofa, reading a book, when Marco came in.

Marco advanced towards him, and began to make bitter complaints against Jeremiah. In giving an account of the affair, he omitted all that part of the transaction which made against himself. He said nothing, for instance, about his coming to put his line in where Jeremiah was fis.h.i.+ng, and while a fish was actually near Jeremiah's hook, but only said that he caught a fish, and that Jeremiah came and took it away.

"But what claim had Jeremiah to the fish?" asked Forester.

"He had no claim at all," said Marco.

"You mean, he had no _right_ at all," said Forester.

"Yes," said Marco.