David Malcolm. Nelson Lloyd
he drawled.
Inured as I was to his cautious ways, I was not taken aback by this non-committal reply, but pursued my inquiry, hoping that in spite of his vigilance I might elicit some encouraging opinion.
"Am I likely to tumble into the water while I'm fishing, James?"
"That depends, Davy." James looked profoundly at the sky.
"And what's the chance of my being bit by a rattlesnake, James?"
"I wouldn't say they was absolutely none, nor yet would I say they was any chance at all." At every word of this sage opinion James wagged his head.
We rode some distance in silence, and then I came to the real point of my examination. "James, what kind of a man is a professor?"
James looked down at me gravely. "I s'pose, Davy, you have in mind what Stacy Shunk said about him catchin' you."
"Oh, dear, no," I protested. "I was just wondering what kind of a man he was."
"Well, Davy," James said, in a voice of mockery which silenced as well as encouraged me, "if you can fall into the creek, be bit by a rattler, and catched by the Professor all in the one-half hour we will be in the mountains while I loaden this wagon with wood, I'll give you a medal for being the liveliest young un I ever heard tell of. Mind, Davy, I'll give you a medal."
With that he checked further questioning by breaking into a song, and had he once descended from the heights to which he soared and shown any sign that he was aware of my presence, pride would have restrained me from pressing my trembling inquiry.
So, singing as we rode, we crossed the ridge, the mountain's guarding bulwark; we left the open valley behind us and descended into the wooded gut. We passed a few scattered houses with little clearings around them, and then the trees drew in closer to us until the green of their leafy masonry arched over our heads. At last I was in the mountains! This was the mysterious topsy-turvy land, the land of strange light and shadow to which I had so often gazed with wondering eyes. In the excitement of its unfolding, in the interest with which I followed the windings of the narrow road, I forgot the dangers which threatened me in these quiet, friendly woods; and when I cast my line into the tumbling brook I should have laughed at Mr. Pound, at Squire Crumple, and Stacy Shunk, had I given them a thought. But even James's kindly warnings were now uncalled for. That he should admonish me at all I accepted as merely a formal compliance with his promise to my mother that he would keep an eye on me. For him to keep an eye on me was a physical impossibility, as the road plunged deeper into the woods, bending just beyond the little bridge where he had fixed me for my fishing. He was soon out of my sight, and his warning to me to stay in that spot went out of my mind before the rumble of his wagon had died away. Had he turned at the bend he would have seen me lying flat on my back on the bridge, unbalanced by the eagerness with which I had answered the first tug at the hook.
I could have landed a shark with the strength which I put into that wild jerk, but I saw only the worm bait dangling above my astonished face. With my second cast I lifted a trout clear of the water; then caught my line in an overhanging branch and saw my erstwhile prisoner shoot away up-stream. The tangled line led me from my post of safety. Had I returned to it; had I remembered the admonition of the cautious James, and held to the station to which he had assigned me—my life might have run its course in another channel. Now, as I look back, it seems as though my story became entangled with my line in that overhanging branch, as though there I picked up the strong, holding thread of it, and followed its tortuous windings to this day.
My blood was running quick with excitement. I had no fear. A wonderful catch, a game fish six inches long filled me with the pride of achievement, and with pride came self-confidence. The stream lured me on. The rapids snapped up my hook, and with many a deceitful tug enticed me farther and farther into the woods. The brush shut the bridge from my view, but I knew that it was not far away, and that a voice so mighty as James could raise would easily overtake my slow course along the bank. So I went from rock to rock with one hand guiding my precious rod, and the other clutching overhanging limbs and bushes.
What sport this was for a lad of ten who had known only the placid brook in the open meadow and the amiable moods of its people! How many a boyish shout I muffled as I made my cautious way along that boisterous stream and pitted my wits against its wary dwellers! I wormed through an abatis of laurel; I scampered over the bared and tangled roots of a great oak; I reached a shelf of pebbly beach. Around it the water swept over moss-clad rocks into a deep pool; above it the arched limbs broke and let in the warm sunlight, making it a grateful spot to one chilled by the dampness of the thicker woods. Eager to try my luck in that enticing pool, I leaped from the massed roots to the little beach without troubling to see what others might have come here to enjoy with me a bit of open day. My hook touched the stream; my line ran taut; my rod almost snapped from my hands. I clutched it with all my strength. Every muscle of arms, legs, and body was bent to land that gigantic fish. That it was gigantic I was sure, from the power of its rush. I pitted my weight against his and felt him give way. Then, shouting in exultation, I fell over backward. I saw him leave the water, not quite the leviathan I had fancied; I saw him fly over my head and heard him flopping behind me. Getting to my feet, I turned to rush at my prize and capture him. I was checked—first by my ears, for in them rang the sharp whir of a rattle. Cold blood shot from my heart to the tips of my toes and the top of my head. I needed nothing more to hold me back, but there before my eyes was the other visitor to this pleasant sunny spot, his head rising from his coiled body, his tail erect and lashing in fury.
Since that day I have learned that the rattler when disturbed by man will seek refuge in flight, and fights only when cornered. This particular snake, I think, must have been told that a boy will glide away into the bushes if a chance is given him, for he seemed determined to stand his ground and let me flee. But where was I to escape when he held the narrow way to the bank, and behind me roared the stream, grown suddenly to mighty width and depth? How was I to move at all when every nerve was numbed by the icy currents which swept through my veins? Could I escape? Was it not foreordained that I should meet my end in these woods? Had I not spurned the chance of life given me through the prophecies of good Mr. Pound and the warning of the squire?
The snake before me grew to the size of a boa-constrictor. The brook behind me roared in my ears like Niagara. The snake began to drive his head toward me, showing his fangs as though he were making a reconnoissance of the air before his spring. He was so terrible that I knew that when he did hurl himself at me I must go backward and fulfil the prophecy of Mr. Pound. I had forgotten the man who saw through the top of his hat. I awaited helplessly the triumph of Mr. Pound.
From out of the bush, from out of the air, as though impelled by a spirit hand, a long stick swung. It fell upon my enemy's head and drove it to the ground. He lifted his head and turned from me, striking madly, but the rod fell again upon his back. He uncoiled and tried to run; he twisted and turned in his dying agony and lashed the air in futile fury. The merciless rod broke him and stretched him to his full length. But even though dead he was terrible to me, for had I not heard that a snake never dies until sunset; could I not see the body still quivering; might not the bruised head dart at me in dying madness!
I took a step backward, and hurtled into the water. For a long time I groped in the depths of the pool. To me it seemed that I struggled there for hours in the blackness; that serpents drew their slimy lengths across my face; that fishes poked their noses with bold inquisitiveness about me and dared to nibble at my hands; that Mr. Pound looked up at me from the abyss, benignly in his triumph, and that his solemn voice joined with the roaring of the torrent. Knowing well that my end had come and that the prophecy was being fulfilled, I struggled without hope, but my fingers clutching at the water at last met some solid substance and closed on it. I felt myself turn, and suddenly opening my eyes saw the sunlight pouring through the green window in the tree-tops. My legs straightened; my feet touched the stony bottom; my shoulders lifted from the stream, and I looked into a small girl's face, while my hand was tightly clasped in hers.
Since that day the sun's soft brown has faded from her cheeks, uncovering their radiance; since then she has grown to fairest womanhood, and I have seen her adorning the art of Paris and Vienna; but to me she has given no fairer picture