In Search of the Unknown Part 34

"My trunk was there. It contained guarantees of my respectability.

"'Oh no; his wife will keep it open,' replied the girl. 'Look! you can see papa now. He's digging.'

"'Where?' I blurted out.

"I remembered Professor Holroyd as a prim, spectacled gentleman, with close-cut, snowy beard and a clerical allure. The man I saw digging wore green goggles, a jersey, a battered sou'wester, and hip-boots of rubber. He was delving in the muck of the salt meadow, his face streaming with perspiration, his boots and jersey splashed with unpleasant-looking mud. He glanced up as we approached, shading his eyes with a sunburned hand.

"'Papa, dear,' said Miss Holroyd, 'here is Jack's friend, whom you bailed out of Mazas.'

"The introduction was startling. I turned crimson with mortification.

The professor was very decent about it; he called me by name at once.

Then he looked at his spade. It was clear he considered me a nuisance and wished to go on with his digging.

"'I suppose,' he said, 'you are still writing?'

"'A little,' I replied, trying not to speak sarcastically. My output had rivalled that of 'The d.u.c.h.ess'--in quant.i.ty, I mean.

"'I seldom read--fiction,' he said, looking restlessly at the hole in the ground.

"Miss Holroyd came to my rescue.

"'That was a charming story you wrote last,' she said. 'Papa should read it--you should, papa; it's all about a fossil.'

"We both looked narrowly at Miss Holroyd. Her smile was guileless.

"'Fossils!' repeated the professor. 'Do you care for fossils?'

"'Very much,' said I.

"Now I am not perfectly sure what my object was in lying. I looked at Daisy Holroyd's dark-fringed eyes. They were very grave.

"'Fossils,' said I, 'are my hobby.'

"I think Miss Holroyd winced a little at this. I did not care. I went on:

"'I have seldom had the opportunity to study the subject, but, as a boy, I collected flint arrow-heads--"

"'Flint arrow-heads!' said the professor coldly.

"'Yes; they were the nearest things to fossils obtainable,' I replied, marvelling at my own mendacity.

"The professor looked into the hole. I also looked. I could see nothing in it. 'He's digging for fossils,' thought I to myself.

"'Perhaps,' said the professor, cautiously, 'you might wish to aid me in a little research--that is to say, if you have an inclination for fossils.' The double-entendre was not lost upon me.

"'I have read all your books so eagerly,' said I, 'that to join you, to be of service to you in any research, however difficult and trying, would be an honor and a privilege that I never dared to hope for.'

"'That,' thought I to myself, 'will do its own work.'

"But the professor was still suspicious. How could he help it, when he remembered Jack's escapades, in which my name was always blended!

Doubtless he was satisfied that my influence on Jack was evil. The contrary was the case, too.

"'Fossils,' he said, worrying the edge of the excavation with his spade--'fossils are not things to be lightly considered.'

"'No, indeed!' I protested.

"'Fossils are the most interesting as well as puzzling things in the world,' said he.

"'They are!' I cried, enthusiastically.

"'But I am not looking for fossils,' observed the professor, mildly.

"This was a facer. I looked at Daisy Holroyd. She bit her lip and fixed her eyes on the sea. Her eyes were wonderful eyes.

"'Did you think I was digging for fossils in a salt meadow?' queried the professor. 'You can have read very little about the subject. I am digging for something quite different.'

"I was silent. I knew that my face was flushed. I longed to say, 'Well, what the devil are you digging for?' but I only stared into the hole as though hypnotized.

"'Captain McPeek and Frisby ought to be here,' he said, looking first at Daisy and then across the meadows.

"I ached to ask him why he had subpoenaed Captain McPeek and Frisby.

"'They are coming,' said Daisy, shading her eyes. 'Do you see the speck on the meadows?'

"'It may be a mud-hen,' said the professor.

"'Miss Holroyd is right,' I said. 'A wagon and team and two men are coming from the north. There's a dog beside the wagon--it's that miserable yellow dog of Frisby's.'

"'Good gracious!' cried the professor, 'you don't mean to tell me that you see all that at such a distance?'

"'Why not?' I said.

"'I see nothing,' he insisted.

"'You will see that I'm right, presently,' I laughed.

"The professor removed his blue goggles and rubbed them, glancing obliquely at me.

"'Haven't you heard what extraordinary eyesight duck-shooters have?'

said his daughter, looking back at her father. 'Jack says that he can tell exactly what kind of a duck is flying before most people could see anything at all in the sky.'

"'It's true,' I said; 'it comes to anybody, I fancy, who has had practice.'

"The professor regarded me with a new interest. There was inspiration in his eyes. He turned towards the ocean. For a long time he stared at the tossing waves on the beach, then he looked far out to where the horizon met the sea.

"'Are there any ducks out there?' he asked, at last.

"'Yes,' said I, scanning the sea, 'there are.'