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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 41662 ***
+
+                  _THE SPELL OF THE WHITE STURGEON_
+
+                            JIM KJELGAARD
+
+
+    DODD, MEAD & COMPANY
+    NEW YORK
+    1953
+
+    Copyright, 1953
+
+    By Jim Kjelgaard
+
+    All Rights Reserved
+
+    No part of this book may be reproduced in any form
+    without permission in writing from the publisher
+
+    _Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 53-6314_
+
+    Printed in the United States of America
+    by Vail-Ballou Press, Inc., Binghamton, N. Y.
+
+
+                  TO
+    David LeClair and Richard Smith
+
+
+
+
+_CONTENTS_
+
+
+
+      _Chapter One_     Storm                        1
+
+              _Two_     Wreck                       16
+
+            _Three_     On the Beach                34
+
+             _Four_     Trouble for the _Spray_     54
+
+             _Five_     Rescue                      73
+
+              _Six_     New Venture                 89
+
+            _Seven_     Partners                   109
+
+            _Eight_     Action                     125
+
+             _Nine_     Pirates                    144
+
+              _Ten_     The Great Fish             160
+
+           _Eleven_     Fisherman's Luck           171
+
+           _Twelve_     The Pond                   184
+
+
+The characters and situations in this book are wholly fictional and
+imaginative: they do not portray and are not intended to portray any
+actual persons or parties.
+
+
+
+
+_THE SPELL OF THE WHITE STURGEON_
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ONE
+
+_STORM_
+
+
+Ramsay Cartou leaned on the rail of the ponderous side-wheeler, the _H.
+H. Holter_, and watched without interest while a horse-drawn truck
+brought another load of cattle hides on board. The sweating stevedores
+who were loading the _Holter_ and the belaboring mate who supervised
+them began stowing the hides into the hold. The _Holter's_ winch, either
+ruined by an inexpert operator or about to fall apart anyhow, was
+broken. All the work had to be done by hand.
+
+Ramsay turned to breathe the clean air that swept in from Lake Michigan.
+It was impossible, anywhere on the _Holter_, to get away from the smell
+of the hides, but at least he did not have to look at them.
+
+Not since he had left the brawling young city of Chicago two days
+before, to make his way north to the equally lusty young city of
+Milwaukee, had the sun shone. In those two days, while he waited for
+repairs to the engine hauling the train in which he was riding, he had
+seen nothing of the lake. Now, from the mouth of the river where the
+_Holter_ was anchored, he had a clear view, and it was exciting.
+
+The grays of the sky and the grays of the lake were indefinable, with no
+clear separation. Ramsay shivered slightly.
+
+The lake was a cat, he thought, a great sinewy cat, and the whitecaps
+rolling into the harbor were its sheathed and unsheathed claws. It was
+an awesome thing, but at the same time a wonderful one. A trembling
+excitement rose within him. The lake was at once a challenge and a
+promise--a threat and a mighty lure. He stared, fascinated, and tried to
+trace the rolling course of the waves as they surged toward the bank. It
+was impossible to follow just one for, as soon as it swelled, it
+retreated, to lose itself in the immense lake and renew itself in
+endless forward surges. Like recklessly charging soldiers, the waves
+cast themselves up on the bank and, exhausted, fell back.
+
+So absorbed was he in the spectacle and so fascinated by the lake, that
+for a moment he was unaware of the man beside him or of the words he
+spoke. Then a rough hand grasped his shoulder and, reacting instantly,
+Ramsay whirled around.
+
+"Why ain't you at work with the rest, boy?"
+
+"Take your hand off me!"
+
+The man who stood beside him was oddly like a rock, a great granite
+boulder. Two inches taller than Ramsay's six feet, he had a barrel chest
+and long, powerful arms. A leather jacket, with the sleeves cut off,
+hung loosely on his upper body, and beneath it he wore a homespun shirt.
+His black trousers had been fashioned by an exacting tailor but sadly
+misused. They were torn and patched with anything that might have been
+at hand. Black hair straggled from beneath his crushed black hat and the
+hair needed cutting. His eyes, colorless, were oddly inanimate, like two
+glass balls with no special warmth or feeling. A black beard sprouted
+from his cheeks and half-hid his face, but the beard did not hide thick,
+coarse lips. He repeated, "Them hides got to be loaded! Get to work!"
+
+"Load them yourself!"
+
+"I'll give you a lesson you won't forget, boy!"
+
+"Do that!" Ramsay tensed, awaiting the anticipated attack of the bigger,
+heavier man. He felt almost a grim pleasure. He had learned his fighting
+the hard way, as anybody brought up on the New York water-front, and
+with an irresponsible father had to learn it. The man who faced him was
+heavier by a good sixty pounds, but he was a bull of a man and,
+probably, he would fight like a bull. Would he know about matadors?
+
+The man's eyes were narrowed to pinpoints, and they seemed to spark.
+Sheer rage made his face livid, while his lips were distorted in a
+snarl. He drew back, readying himself for the spring that would
+overwhelm this brash youth who had dared dispute him. Ramsay poised on
+lithe feet, prepared to side-step.
+
+Then fat, fussy little Captain Schultz, skipper of the _Holter_, stepped
+between them. He wheezed like an over-fat lap-dog, "Vot you doin'?"
+
+"I want them hides loaded and the ship under way!" the man who faced
+Ramsay snarled.
+
+"Ach! Dis man payin' passenger!"
+
+A deck hand, his eyes downcast, hurried past. The man who had ordered
+Ramsay to get to work stood still for a moment, glaring. Then,
+furiously, soundlessly, he turned on his heel and strode up the
+gangplank to the pier. Ramsay watched him go, and he knew that, even if
+there had not been unpleasantness between them, he could never like this
+man. No matter where they met, or how, they would never get along
+together.
+
+Captain Schultz also turned to watch the man depart. Then he gave his
+attention to Ramsay.
+
+"Ach! You should be careful 'pout startin' fights, poy."
+
+"So should other people!" Ramsay said, still smarting.
+
+"You should, too. Yaah!"
+
+And, as though he had settled that once and for all, Captain Schultz
+waddled away to speak to the mate who was supervising the stevedores. A
+little uncertainty arose in Ramsay.
+
+This--this half-wilderness, half-civilization in which he found himself
+was a land of strong contradictions. Lake Michigan, with all its fear
+and all its terror, and all its inspiration, lapped the Wisconsin
+shores. Yet some man could be so little impressed by the vast lake that
+he could name a boat for himself. Possibly a man capable of building or
+owning a ship like the _Holter_ had a right to think of himself.
+
+Ramsay turned again to look at the lake, and his mind projected him far
+away from the worn, slippery decks of the _Holter_. Almost he was
+unaware of the two silver dollars in his pocket, all the money he had
+left in the world, and of the uncertain future. At the same time, while
+his inmost being feasted on the lake, a part of his mind reviewed the
+events that had brought him here. He had an abrupt, uncomfortable
+revival of a New York memory.
+
+There was a lion, a great, black-maned lion, in the New York zoo. It was
+well fed and well cared for, its every need attended. But most times the
+lion had still seemed restless and unhappy, and sometimes it had been a
+tired thing. Then it was hardly a lion at all but just a weary, living
+thing. Ramsay had wondered often how that lion felt.
+
+He had never decided exactly how it did feel; within himself there were
+a dozen conflicting opinions. The lion paced its cage, and coming to the
+end of the very narrow limits granted to it, it turned and went back the
+other way. Coming to the end of the cage, it turned again. But all it
+ever found was the place it had already left. Once in a great while the
+lion had been very alert and very attentive. It was as though, now and
+again, the great animal could scent a wind of which nothing else was
+aware. That wind brought him memories of freedom, and happiness and the
+unhampered jungle life that had been.
+
+Ramsay had gone often to see the lion, and though he never understood
+why, he always felt as though he had something in common with it, and he
+understood it partially. New York offered an abundance of opportunities,
+but they were well bound and well defined. There had always been a wild
+longing, a reckless yearning, within him, and often he thought that the
+newspapers which carried stories of the undeveloped Midwest were to him
+what the faint jungle scents had been to the lion. He had devoured every
+story eagerly. The Midwest was new, the papers had said. Good farm land,
+if one wanted to be a farmer, could be had for as little as four dollars
+an acre. It was the land of the future.
+
+Again Ramsay jingled the two dollars in his pocket. He had answered the
+call of the Midwest because he could not help answering it. He had to
+try and to go and see for himself, but at the same time a caution,
+inborn in his Scotch mother and transplanted to him, could not be
+ignored. Before he burned his bridges behind him he had wanted to make
+sure that there were some ahead, and correspondence with the manager of
+the Three Points tannery had led to the offer of a job when he came. A
+dollar and twenty-five cents a day the tannery was offering able-bodied
+men, and there were too few men.
+
+Ramsay looked out upon the lake, and a little thrill of excitement swept
+through him. Sometimes he had felt doubts about the wisdom of having
+left New York for the Midwest. He had been sure of a place to sleep and
+enough to eat as long as he stayed in New York, and again he felt the
+two dollars in his pocket.
+
+Troubled, he looked out on the surging lake, and knew an instant peace.
+It was worth seeing. It was something few New Yorkers ever saw. The
+ocean was at their doorstep, and few of them even bothered looking at
+that; but the ocean was not like this. Lake Michigan was fresh and
+clean, different, wild and, as the papers had promised, new. Ramsay
+tasted the wet air, liking it as he did so.
+
+He turned at a sudden squealing and clatter on the pier, and saw four
+men trying to fight a little black horse onto the ship. The horse, not
+trusting this strange craft and certainly not liking it, lashed out with
+striking hooves. Dodging, the men finally fought it into a sort of
+small cage they had prepared. The horse thrust its head over the side
+and bugled shrilly.
+
+Ramsay watched interestedly, distracted for the few minutes the men
+needed to get the horse into its cage. It reared as though it would
+climb over the confining bars, then stood quietly. A sensible horse,
+Ramsay decided, and a good one. Only fools, whether they were animals or
+men, fought when there was no chance of winning or battered their brains
+out against a stone wall. Good animals and good men never considered
+anything hopeless, but they tried to fight with intelligence as well as
+brawn. Ramsay glanced again at the horse.
+
+It was standing quietly but not resignedly. Its head was up. Its ears
+were alert and its eyes bright. It still did not like the ship, but it
+had not just given in. Rather, it was waiting a good chance to get away.
+Ramsay grinned. The next time, he decided, they would have a little more
+trouble getting that horse onto anything that floated. Then he returned
+his attention to the loading of the _Holter_.
+
+A continuous line of horse-drawn trucks loaded with hides was coming
+alongside the ship, and the stevedores were laboring mightily to stow
+the hides away. Obviously whoever owned the _Holter_ intended to load
+her with every last pound she would carry. He wanted a paying cargo that
+would pay off to the last cent. Almost imperceptibly the ship settled
+into the water. The gangplank, that had been almost even with the deck,
+now tilted downward.
+
+Once or twice Ramsay saw the bearded, jacketed man with whom he had
+quarreled. But the man did not venture onto the _Holter_ again. Rather,
+he seemed more interested in getting the hides loaded. Ramsay speculated
+on the scene he was witnessing, and then he found the whys and
+wherefores, the reasons behind it.
+
+This Wisconsin country was still more than half a wilderness. It had its
+full share of wilderness men, but its fertile farm lands were attracting
+many Dutch, Swiss and German farmers. Struggling with a half-tamed
+country, they did anything they could to earn a livelihood, and some of
+them raised beef cattle. The hides were a by-product and the world
+markets needed leather. But the leather could not be processed without
+necessary materials, and the hemlock trees which provided tan bark were
+being cut at Three Points. It was cheaper, and easier, to transport the
+hides to Three Points than it was to carry the cumbersome tan bark to
+Milwaukee or Chicago. From Three Points, harness leather, sole leather
+and almost every other kind, was shipped by boat to Chicago and from
+there it was carried to the eastern markets by rail.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was not until mid-afternoon that the last of the hides were loaded
+and the hatches battened down. The side wheel began to turn and the
+_Holter_ moved cumbersomely down the river into Lake Michigan. Standing
+in his enclosure, the little horse stamped restlessly and neighed again.
+He was nervous, but he was not afraid.
+
+Ramsay approved. The little black horse didn't like his cage, but he
+would meet the situation as it existed rather than lose his head or
+become panic-stricken. Ramsay walked over to the cage and the horse
+thrust his velvet muzzle against the bars. When the boy rubbed his nose,
+the horse twitched his ears and looked at him with friendly eyes.
+
+Thick smoke belched from the _Holter's_ stack and made a long plume over
+the lake, behind the plodding side-wheeler. A strong wind was screaming
+in from the north and lashing the water angrily into leaping waves. The
+ship nosed into the trough created by the waves and rose again on the
+opposite side. Ramsay walked to the bow and leaned over the rail, and a
+mighty excitement rose anew within him.
+
+This, it seemed, was what he had wanted to find when he left New York to
+go roving. The lake, storm-lashed, was a wild and terrible thing. It was
+a beast, but something with a vast appeal lay behind its fury and its
+anger. Lake Michigan was the place for a man. It would never be free of
+challenge if there was anyone who dared to pick up the gauntlet it cast.
+
+There was motion beside Ramsay, and the deck hand who had passed while
+he argued with the bearded man fell in beside him. He glanced at the
+man. The deck hand was about thirty-six, older than Ramsay by eighteen
+years, and there was a seasoned, weather-beaten look about him. It was
+as though he had turned his face to many a raging storm and many a
+fierce wind.
+
+He grinned amiably. "Hi!"
+
+"Hi!" Ramsay said.
+
+The deck hand chuckled. "Boy, I thought you were in trouble sure when
+you were ruckusin' with old Devil Chad."
+
+"Devil Chad?"
+
+"Yeah. The one who told you to help load hides. He'd of cleaned the deck
+with you."
+
+"Maybe he would," Ramsay said. "And then again, maybe he wouldn't."
+
+"He would," the deck hand asserted. "He can lick anybody or anything.
+Owns half the country 'round here, he does, includin' most of the
+_Holter_. What's more, he aims to keep it. One of the richest men in
+Wisconsin."
+
+"Quite a man," Ramsay said drily.
+
+"Yeah, an' quite a fighter. On'y reason he didn't clean your clock was
+on account Captain Schultz told him you was a payin' passenger. Devil
+Chad, he gets half the fare every passenger on the _Holter_ pays, he
+does."
+
+Ramsay knew a rising irritation. "What makes you so sure he can't be cut
+down to size?"
+
+"Never has been, never will be," the deck hand asserted. He regarded the
+surging lake morosely, and then said, "One of these days this old tub is
+goin' to end up right at the bottom of Michigan, it is. Either that or
+on the beach. Wish I was some'res else."
+
+"Why don't you go somewhere else?"
+
+"One of these days I will," the deck hand threatened. "I'll just haul
+off an' go back to the ocean boats, I will. I was on 'em for fourteen
+years, an' quit to come here on account I got scar't of storms at sea.
+Ha! Worstest thing I ever see on the Atlantic ain't nothin' to what this
+lake can throw at you."
+
+"Is it really that bad?" Ramsay asked eagerly.
+
+"Bad?" the deck hand said. "Boy, I've seen waves here taller'n a ship.
+In course nobody ever goes out when it's that bad on account, if they
+did, nobody'd ever get back." He scanned the horizon. "We're goin' to
+hit weather afore we ever gets to Three Points. Goin' to hit it sure.
+Wish this old tub wasn't loaded so heavy, an' with hides at that."
+
+A wave struck the bow, crested and broke in foaming spray that cast
+itself up and over the ship. Ramsay felt it, cool on his face, and he
+licked eager lips. Lake Michigan was fresh water, not salt like the
+ocean, and it was as pure as an ice-cold artesian well. It was also, he
+thought, almost as cold.
+
+He looked into the clouded horizon, studying the storm that battered the
+_Holter_. He smiled to himself.
+
+Suddenly he became all eager interest, peering out into the driving
+waves and focusing his attention on one place. He thought he had seen
+something there, but because of the angry lake he could not be sure. It
+might have been just a drifting shadow, or just one more of the dark
+waves which seemed to fill the lake and to be of all shades. Then, and
+plainly, he saw it again.
+
+It was a boat, a little boat no more than twenty-four feet from bowsprit
+to stern, and it was carrying almost a full load of sail as it tacked
+back and forth into the wind. Ramsay had not seen the sails because,
+when he first spotted the boat, it had been heeled over so far that the
+sails did not show. Now they were showing and full, and the little boat
+sailed like a proud swan with its wings spread.
+
+Ramsay forgot the _Holter_, the man beside him and everything else save
+the little boat. The _Holter_ and nothing on it, with the possible
+exception of the little black horse, was even remotely interesting. But
+this was. Ramsay breathed a sigh of relief.
+
+He should have known. He should have understood from the first that,
+when any water was as mighty and as exciting as Lake Michigan, there
+would be some to meet its challenge with daring, grace and spirit. The
+tiny craft was a mere cockleshell of a boat, a ridiculously small thing
+with which to venture upon such a water, but Ramsay could not help
+feeling that it would be much better to sail on the little boat than on
+the _Holter_.
+
+He kept fascinated eyes on it as it tacked back into the wind. Again it
+heeled over, so far that it was almost hidden in the trough of a vast
+wave. Saucily, jauntily it bobbed up again.
+
+The _Holter_, that workhorse of the water, plodded stolidly on its
+appointed way. Ramsay continued to watch the little boat, and now they
+were near enough so that he could see its crew of four. He gasped
+involuntarily.
+
+Working into the wind, the little boat was coming back, and its course
+took it directly across the _Holter's_ right of way. Ramsay clenched his
+fingers and bit his lip fiercely. A collision seemed inevitable.
+Wide-eyed, he watched the little boat.
+
+Now he saw its name, not painted on with stencils but written in a fine,
+free-flowing script, _Spray_, and the carved Valkyrie maiden that was
+its figurehead. A big gull, obviously its tame one, sat on the very top
+of the mast and flapped its wings. The _Spray_ had a crew of four, but
+Ramsay concentrated on just one of them.
+
+He was huge, fully as tall as the black beard who had accosted Ramsay
+and just as heavy, but he was a different kind of man. He balanced on
+his little boat's swaying deck with all the grace of a dancer, while he
+clung almost carelessly to a line that ran through a pulley.
+
+No inch of the man's shirt and trousers, which were all the clothing he
+wore, for he was bare-footed, remained dry, and the shaggy blond curls
+that carpeted his head were dripping. White teeth gleamed as he looked
+up at the _Holter_ and laughed. Ramsay leaned forward excitedly. He
+warmed to this man, even as he had been repelled by the black beard the
+deck hand called Devil Chad. The man on the boat was gay and spirited,
+and he seemed complete master of everything about him.
+
+The deck hand put cupped hands to his mouth and screamed, "Sheer off!
+Sheer off!"
+
+Captain Schultz's voice was heard. "_Dumkopf!_ Go 'way!"
+
+Then, just as it seemed that collision could not be avoided, more sail
+bloomed on the _Spray's_ mast and she danced lightly out of the way. The
+man with the shaggy curls looked back and waved a taunting hand. Ramsay
+turned to watch, but the _Spray_ disappeared in a curtain of mist that
+had draped itself between the _Holter_ and the shore. His eyes shining,
+the boy turned to the deck hand.
+
+"Who was that?"
+
+"A crazy Dutch fisherman, named Hans Van Doorst," the deck hand growled.
+"He'd sail that peanut shell right in to see Old Nick hisself, an' one
+of these days he will. He ain't even afraid of the White Sturgeon."
+
+"What's the White Sturgeon?"
+
+The deck hand looked at him queerly. "How long you been here, boy?"
+
+"A couple of days."
+
+"Well, that accounts for it. You see the White Sturgeon; you start
+prayin' right after. You'll need to. Nobody except that crazy Van Doorst
+has ever saw him an' lived to tell about it. Well, got to get to work."
+
+The deck hand wandered away. Ramsay turned again to face the storm and
+let spray blow into his face. He thought of all that had happened since
+he had, at last, reached Lake Michigan. This Wisconsin country was
+indeed a land of sharp contrasts.
+
+The _Holter_ and the _Spray_. Captain Schultz and the deck hand. Devil
+Chad and Hans Van Doorst. A tannery and a fisherman. Local superstition
+about a white sturgeon. Ramsay knew a rising satisfaction. This
+semi-wilderness, lapped by a vast inland sea, might be a strange land,
+but nobody could say that it was not an interesting or a strong one. His
+last lingering doubts were set at rest and for the first time he was
+entirely satisfied because he had come. A strong country was always the
+place for strong people.
+
+Ramsay raised his head, puzzled by something which, suddenly, seemed to
+be out of place. For a second he did not know what it was. Then he
+realized that the crying gulls which had been following the _Holter_ in
+the hope that scraps or garbage would be tossed to them or else
+interested in whatever debris the side wheel might churn up, were no
+longer there.
+
+Ramsay knew a second's uneasiness, and he could not explain it. He did
+not know why he missed the gulls. It was just that they and their crying
+had seemed a part of the lake. Now that they were gone, the lake was
+incomplete. The boy braced himself against a sudden, vicious burst of
+wind.
+
+Even a land-lubber could tell that the storm's fury was increasing. A
+sharp patter of rain sliced like a shower of cold knives across the
+_Holter's_ deck, and Ramsay ducked his head. He raised it again,
+grinning sheepishly as he did so, then gripped the rail to steady
+himself. He watched with much interest as the storm raged even more
+strongly.
+
+It was driving directly out of the northwest, and it seemed to be
+perpetually re-born in the dark clouds that had possession of the sky. A
+howling wind accompanied it, and more shrapnel-bursts of rain.
+
+The waves rose to prodigious heights. Dipping into them, the _Holter_
+seemed no more than a leaf on this tossing sea. Turning, Ramsay saw the
+helmsman clinging almost fiercely to his wheel, as though he would
+somehow soften the storm's rage by doing that. In his cage the little
+black horse nickered uncertainly.
+
+Then there came something that was instantly apparent, even above the
+screaming wind. The rough rhythm of the _Holter's_ throbbing engines
+seemed to halt. The ship shivered mightily, as though in pain.
+
+The engines stopped.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWO
+
+_WRECK_
+
+
+Shorn of her power, the _Holter_ still followed her helmsman's course.
+But it became a listless, sluggish course. The ship was like a suddenly
+freed slave that does not know what to do with his own freedom.
+
+For six years she had plodded Lake Michigan, always with the biggest
+possible paying load and always working at top speed. Many times she had
+groaned and protested, but she had been forced to obey the dictates of
+the engine that turned her side wheel. Now the engine, the tyrant, was
+dead from misuse of its own power. But without it the _Holter_ had
+neither mind nor will of her own.
+
+She smashed head-on into a mountainous wave that set her decks awash.
+For another moment or two she held her course, carried by her own
+momentum. Then, slowly and unwillingly, as though afraid to do such a
+thing and not trusting herself to do it, she swung broadside to the
+waves.
+
+A muffled shout floated out of the engine room. Fat little Captain
+Schultz, a slicker covering his round body and anxiety written on his
+face, was peering down an opened hatch. Sluicing rain pelted the slicker
+and bounded off. Ramsay's eyes found the deck hand.
+
+Eyes wide and mouth agape, he was standing near the wheelhouse. Naked
+terror was written on his face as he stared at something out in the
+lake. Ramsay followed his gaze.
+
+To the starboard, the right side of the _Holter_, the lake seemed
+strangely calm. It was as though the wind and the storm did not strike
+with outrageous strength there, and oddly as if that part of the water
+might be commanded by some inexplicable force. Unable to tear his gaze
+away, expecting to see something special, Ramsay kept his eyes riveted
+on the calm water.
+
+He saw a ripple, but not one born of storm and wind. There was something
+here that had nothing to do with the driving wind, or the cold rain, or
+even the tremendous waves. The deck hand covered his eyes with his hand.
+
+At that instant, a great white apparition swam up through the water. It
+was a ghost, a creature of nightmares, a terrible thing seen only in
+terror-ridden moments. Ramsay controlled an impulse to shout or to flee.
+The thing came up to within inches of the surface and wallowed there
+like a greasy fat hog. Whitish-gray, rather than pure white, it flipped
+an enormous tail while it sported near the surface.
+
+The thing, a fish, seemed fully nine feet long and possibly it carried a
+hundred pounds of weight for every foot. It bore no scales but seemed to
+be clothed in an overlapping series of armored plates. Its snout,
+pointed somewhat like a pig's, was tipped with barbels, or feelers. Dull
+eyes showed.
+
+Again Ramsay controlled his fear. The thing, sober judgment told him,
+was nothing more or less than a great sturgeon, the mightiest fish of
+these inland waters. The fact that it was white, rather than the
+conventional gray-green or olive-green, was of no significance whatever.
+All living creatures, from elephants down to mice, occasionally produced
+an albino. It was not beyond reason that there could be an albino
+sturgeon.
+
+Ramsay watched while it swam, and some semblance of cool control
+returned to his fevered imagination. This was no grotesque monster from
+another world. Telling himself again that it was nothing more or less
+than an unusual fish, he watched it sink back into the churning depths
+from which it had arisen. He put a shaking hand on the _Holter's_ rail.
+
+It was a fish and nothing else. None but superstitious people believed
+in superstition. Then the deck hand's terrified shriek rose above the
+keening wind.
+
+"It's him! We seen it! The White Sturgeon! _Gar-hhh!_"
+
+Mouth agape, the deck hand kept his eyes on that place where the White
+Sturgeon had disappeared. A great wave washed across the deck, and when
+it rolled away the deck hand was no longer visible. Ramsay shook his
+head to clear it and looked again at the place where the deck hand had
+been standing. Lake Michigan could swallow a man even easier than a pond
+swallowed a pebble, for there had not been even a ripple to mark the
+place where the deck hand had disappeared. There was not the slightest
+possibility of rescuing him. The deck hand had seen the White Sturgeon!
+
+A battering ram of a wave crashed into the _Holter's_ starboard side,
+and Ramsay felt a cold chill travel up and down his spine. Fear laid its
+icy fingers there, but he shook them off. The fact that the water had
+been calm when the White Sturgeon made its appearance and was angry now
+had nothing whatever to do with the fish. Rather, the calm water could
+be attributed to some quirk, some phenomenon inherent in the storm
+itself. Probably the White Sturgeon appeared because, for the moment,
+the lake had been calm. Knowing that, the big fish had nosed its way to
+the surface. Now that the lake was again storm-deviled, the White
+Sturgeon was gone.
+
+Bracing himself against the wind, Ramsay made his way across the deck to
+the wheelhouse. He shivered, for the first time aware of the fact that
+his clothing was rain-drenched and that he was very cold. It was a
+penetrating, creeping cold that reached the inmost marrow of his bones.
+When another wave smashed the _Holter_, Ramsay caught hold of the little
+horse's cage to steady himself. Within the enclosure, nervous but still
+not terrified, the black horse looked hopefully at him.
+
+Ramsay reached the wheelhouse, and came face to face with Captain
+Schultz. The little captain's slicker had blown open, so that now it was
+of no use whatever in warding off the rain, but he had not seen fit to
+close it again. It would do him no good if he did; his clothing was
+already soaked.
+
+Ramsay shouted to make himself heard above the roar of the wind. "What
+happened?"
+
+"The enchin, she kaput. Like that, she kaput."
+
+Ramsay revised his opinions of the little Captain. At the pier, Captain
+Schultz had been only a fat, fussy little man. Facing this dire
+predicament, he was not terrified and had not given way to panic. He had
+risen to the emergency. Maybe, Ramsay thought, anyone who sailed Lake
+Michigan had to be able to rise to any emergency if he would continue
+to sail. He shouted again, "Will the ship sink?"
+
+"Ach, I don't know! If we can't get the enchin to go, she might."
+
+"What do we do then?"
+
+"Find somet'ing. Find anyt'ing, poy, an' swim. Be sure you find
+somet'ing that does not sink mit you."
+
+"How far are we from land?"
+
+"Ach! That I cannot tell you."
+
+"Did you see the White Sturgeon?"
+
+"Yaah. We still try."
+
+Captain Schultz went all the way into the wheelhouse and disappeared
+into the hold. Dimly, out of the open hatchway, came the sound of
+ringing hammers. There was a desperate tone in them, as though the men
+working in the _Holter's_ hold were fully aware of the grave danger they
+faced. On sudden impulse Ramsay ducked into the wheelhouse and descended
+into the engine-room.
+
+Captain Schultz held an oil lamp to illumine the labors of two men whom,
+so far, Ramsay had not seen. Presumably they were the _Holter's_
+engineer and fireman. Another deck hand and the mate stood by, passing
+tools requested by the workers.
+
+Down here, in the bowels of the _Holter_, the storm seemed a faraway and
+almost an unreal thing. The howling wind was heard faintly, and if the
+ship had not been tossing so violently, they might have been in the
+power-room of any industrial plant.
+
+The sweating engineer, his face grease-streaked, turned from his labors
+to face Ramsay. He spoke with a nasal New England twang. "Was that
+White Sturgeon really off the ship?"
+
+"I--I didn't see anything," Ramsay answered.
+
+Captain Schultz flashed him a grateful smile. The workers went on with
+their toils.
+
+Obviously, among Lake Michigan sailors, or anyhow some of them, there
+was a firm belief in the evil powers of the White Sturgeon. Ramsay
+looked again at the little Captain's face.
+
+It was a concerned, worried face, what one might expect to see in a man
+who was in danger of losing his ship. At the same time, and even though
+Captain Schultz remained completely in command, there was about him a
+certain air that had nothing to do with getting the _Holter's_ engine
+working again. Ramsay sought for the answer, and finally he found it. A
+strong man in his own right, Captain Schultz had seen the White Sturgeon
+and he believed in it.
+
+Ramsay climbed the narrow ladder-way leading back to the deck. The
+_Holter_ was strong, he assured himself. There was little danger that it
+could be pounded to pieces by any sea. Then he looked at the wild and
+angry lake and knew the fallacy of his reasoning.
+
+The _Holter_ was strong, but the lake was stronger. Waves, the color of
+steel and with the strength of steel, smashed into the ship and made her
+shiver. Ramsay heard a shrieking protest as some plank or stay beneath
+the deck tore loose.
+
+The _Holter_ shuddered, like a big horse in pain, and settled so low in
+the water that waves washed continuously across her deck. There was
+another shriek, and she settled deeper into the lake. She was a very
+sluggish craft now, with no control or direction, and Ramsay guessed
+that the hides in the hold were getting soaked. The ship's nose dipped
+to meet a wave, and it did not come up again.
+
+The imprisoned horse bugled his fright. Captain Schultz, the engineer,
+the fireman and the deck hand appeared on deck. There was no sign of the
+mate; perhaps he had already gone over. The engineer and the fireman
+struggled under the weight of a crude raft which they had knocked
+together from such timbers as were available. Ramsay looked uncertainly
+toward them, and the engineer glared back.
+
+"Get your own!" he snarled. "Me an' Pete made this, an' me an' Pete are
+goin' to use it!"
+
+They carried their makeshift raft to the settling nose of the ship, laid
+it down, mounted it, and let the next wave carry them off. Ramsay felt a
+turning nausea in the pit of his stomach. As the raft went over the
+rail, the man called Pete was swept from it. Only the engineer stayed
+on, clinging desperately as he was washed out into the angry lake. In a
+second or two he had disappeared.
+
+Captain Schultz rolled frightened eyes and said to Ramsay, "Get a door,
+or hatch cover, an' ride that."
+
+Suiting his actions to his words, Captain Schultz seized a fire axe that
+was hanging near and pounded the wheelhouse door from its hinges. He
+dragged the door to the rail, threw it into the lake, and jumped after
+it. The deck hand wrestled with a hatch cover, finally pried it loose,
+and rode that away.
+
+Ramsay was left alone on the sinking _Holter_. He tried to keep a clear
+head, but he could not help an overwhelming fear. This was nothing he
+had ever faced before and now, facing it, he did not know what to do.
+Finding anything that would float and riding it away seemed to be the
+answer. Then the little horse bugled and he knew that he was not alone.
+
+Water crept around his feet as he made his way across the deck to the
+cage. He put his hand on the bar, and as soon as he did that the little
+horse thrust a soft, warm nose against it. He muzzled Ramsay's hand with
+almost violent intensity. All his life he had depended upon men for
+everything. Now, in this peril, men would not desert him.
+
+Softly Ramsay stroked the soft muzzle, but only for a second. The
+_Holter_ was going down fast. Soon, as the gloomy deck hand had
+forecast, she would be on the bottom of Lake Michigan. There was no time
+to lose. Ramsay unlatched the door of the cage, opened it, and when he
+did that the horse walked out.
+
+He stayed very near to the boy, fearing to leave, and once or twice
+bumped Ramsay with his shoulder. Ramsay studied the angry lake, and
+looked back at the horse. Again he glanced out on the stormy water.
+There was nothing else in sight. Those who, by one way or another, hoped
+to reach shore were already lost in swirling sheets of rain. Ramsay bit
+his lower lip so hard that he drew blood.
+
+The men had either jumped, or else had merely ridden over the rail on a
+wave that set the decks awash, but the horse could not do that. There
+was real danger of his breaking a leg, or becoming otherwise injured, if
+he tried. Ramsay turned and caught up the axe with which Captain Schultz
+had stricken down the door.
+
+The black horse crowded with him, afraid to be alone, and the boy had to
+go around him to get back to the rail. The horse pushed close to him
+again and Ramsay spoke soothingly, "Easy. Take it easy now."
+
+He raised the axe and swung it, and felt its blade bite deeply into the
+wooden rail. He swung again and again, until he had slashed through it,
+then moved ten feet to one side, toward the rail's supporting post, and
+cut it there. The severed section was whisked into the wave-tormented
+lake as a match stick disappears in a whirlpool. Ramsay threw the axe
+back onto the _Holter's_ sinking deck and stepped aside.
+
+Get something that would float, Captain Schultz had said, and be sure
+that it would keep him above water. But suddenly he could think of
+nothing that would float. Wildly he cast about for a hatch cover or a
+door. There was not one to be seen.
+
+The _Holter_ made a sudden list that carried her starboard deck beneath
+the lake. A wave surged across her. Even the little horse had unsteady
+legs. Ramsay tried hard to overcome the terror within him.
+
+Then, together, he and the little horse were in the lake. He threw wild
+arms about the animal's neck, and a huge wave overwhelmed them. Gasping,
+he arose.
+
+The lake was wilder and fiercer and colder than he had thought it could
+be. Every nerve and muscle in his body seemed chilled, so that he was
+barely able to move. Another wave washed in, over both the little black
+horse and himself, and for a moment they were deep beneath the churning
+waters. They broke onto the surface, Ramsay with both hands entwined in
+the horse's mane, and the horse turned to look at him.
+
+There was uncertainty in the animal's eyes, and fright, but no terror.
+The little horse knew his own power, and the fact that a human being
+stayed with him gave him confidence in that strength.
+
+Ramsay spoke reassuringly. "We're all right. We'll do all right, Black.
+Let's get out of it."
+
+The words were a tonic, the inspiration the horse needed. The next time
+a wave rolled in, he did not try to fight it. Rather, he rose with it,
+swimming strongly. He had adjusted himself to many situations, now he
+met this one without panic. An intelligent beast, he had long ago
+learned that every crisis must be met with intelligence.
+
+Ramsay stayed easily beside him, keeping just enough weight on the
+swimming animal to hold his own head above water and doing nothing that
+would interfere with the furious fight the horse was waging to keep from
+drowning.
+
+The lake was indeed cold, colder than any other water the boy had ever
+known, and he had to exercise every particle of his mind and will just
+to cling to the horse. The wind blew furiously, and sluicing rain poured
+down. Then the rain dwindled away and heavy mist settled in. Ramsay knew
+a moment's panic.
+
+It was impossible to see more than a few feet or to tell which way the
+shore lay. The lake was huge, and should they be heading towards the
+Michigan shore, they would never get there. Ramsay tried to remember all
+he had ever known of wind and drift and currents on Lake Michigan, and
+discovered that he could remember nothing. Any direction at all could be
+north and he was unable to orient himself, but he controlled the rising
+panic. It would do no good at all to lose his head.
+
+The wind seemed to be dying, and the waves lessening. Ramsay kept his
+hold on the little horse's mane. He saw a floating object pass and tried
+to catch it, but when he did so he almost lost his hold on the horse.
+Kicking hard to catch up, he twined both hands in the horse's mane and
+tightened them there.
+
+Then he felt a rebirth of confidence. Already they had been in the lake
+for a long, long time and he had been able to hold his own. It was
+impossible to get much colder, or more numb, than he already was and he
+could still hang on. Besides, the horse seemed to know where he was
+going.
+
+He swam strongly, and apparently he was swimming straight. At any rate,
+there was no evidence that he was traveling in circles or choosing an
+erratic course. Ramsay had been told that animals have an instinct
+compared to which the most sensitive human's is coarse and blunted and
+maybe that was true. Maybe the horse did know where it was going.
+
+Now that the waves were not rising so high, the horse swam faster. The
+wind died almost completely, so that the lake's surface was merely
+ruffled, and Ramsay felt a mounting confidence in his ability to live
+through this. In the overcast a gull cried, and things had started going
+wrong with the _Holter_ when the gulls left it. Now they were back.
+Probably they, too, had known of the approaching storm and had flown to
+safety off the lake.
+
+The swimmers broke out of the mist and Ramsay saw the beach.
+
+It was about a hundred yards away, a sand beach behind which a rocky
+cliff rose. This wore a crest of evergreens, and its face was spotted
+here and there with smaller trees. A cloud of white gulls screamed into
+the air as Ramsay and the horse approached.
+
+They reached the shallows, and the little horse's back emerged from the
+water like that of some suddenly appearing sea monster. Ramsay let go
+his hold on the animal's mane and swam. Then, coming to waist-high water
+in which he could wade, he splashed toward the beach.
+
+The wind had died, but waves still pounded the beach and it was very
+cold. The near borders of this wild lake, Ramsay decided, probably never
+warmed up. With an immense body of cold water lapping them, they were
+perpetually chilled.
+
+While the little horse looked gravely on, Ramsay stripped his clothing
+off, wrung it out, and put the wet garments back on. The horse crowded
+very close, as though he were afraid to go away. He nibbled Ramsay with
+his lips. As soon as the boy moved, he moved with him.
+
+He stayed very near as Ramsay walked up the beach, a stretch of
+driftwood-spotted sand that varied from sixty to two hundred feet in
+width and reached clear back to the rising bluff. A belt of wet sand
+showed where the lake had crawled up onto the beach and fallen back.
+
+The boy stopped suddenly, and the little horse stopped with him. Just
+ahead, in the belt of wet sand which the highest waves had washed, lay
+two tumbled figures. The little horse tossed his head uneasily, not
+liking this at all, and Ramsay felt a cold lump rise in his throat. He
+advanced at a slow walk and, after some hesitation, the horse trotted to
+catch up with him. Ramsay stopped again.
+
+The two drowned people were Captain Schultz of the _Holter_ and the deck
+hand who had wished so fervently that he was somewhere else. Ramsay
+cleared the lump in his throat, and was struck by the notion that at
+last the deck hand had gone somewhere else. Then the black horse raised
+his head and nickered, and the boy looked around to see a man on a
+spotted black-and-white horse riding toward him.
+
+He rode at full trot, the reins hanging loosely around his mount's
+throat, and he wore an outlandish sort of affected cowboy's hat pulled
+low over his eyes. His features were heavy, and would be flabby when he
+had aged a few more years. Blue jeans clung tightly around his legs, and
+straight black hair lay thick on his head. As he rode, he leveled a
+heavy pistol.
+
+"Go on! Beat it!"
+
+"But ..."
+
+"This is my find! I said beat it!"
+
+The pistol roared, and a heavy ball buried itself in the sand at
+Ramsay's feet. The boy felt a quick anger and a disinclination to obey
+the order to leave. He took a step toward the horseman, knowing that he
+would need a few seconds to re-load his pistol. But almost by magic
+another pistol appeared in the man's hand and he leveled it steadily.
+
+"Your last warnin'. Go on!"
+
+Ramsay shrugged, and the black horse followed him as he walked on. This
+was indeed a strange land, where men were willing to fight for the
+possession of corpses. What did the horseman want with them? The loot
+they might have in their pockets? Perhaps, but that seemed very
+unlikely. Captain Schultz was not the type of person who would carry a
+great deal of money in his pockets, and certainly the deck hand wouldn't
+have enough to bother about. But obviously the horseman wanted the two
+bodies.
+
+Ramsay walked on up the sand beach. Gulls rose protestingly as he came
+in sight, and flocks of ducks scudded across the water. A pair of Canada
+Geese hissed at him as he passed. They were guarding a nest and they
+were ready to fight for it. Ramsay gave them a wide berth and the horse
+walked faithfully beside him.
+
+The afternoon was half-spent when Ramsay smelled wood smoke. He
+quickened his pace, but remained cautious. This was a wild land, with no
+part of it wilder than this lonely Lake Michigan Beach, and there was
+never any certainty as to just what anyone would find or how he would be
+received. Nevertheless, if these people were friendly, other humans
+would be welcome. Ramsay was both hungry and tired to the point of
+exhaustion. He fingered the two dollars in his pocket. He could pay his
+way. He rounded a long, forested nose of land where the bluff cut the
+sand beach to a narrow five feet and looked out on a peaceful bay.
+
+The bluff gave way to gently rising, treeless hills. A rail fence hemmed
+part of them in, and black-and-white cattle grazed inside the fence. A
+stone house, of Dutch architecture, stood on a knoll that commanded a
+view of the lake, and a suitable distance from it was a snug wooden
+barn. A small lake, or large pond, separated from Lake Michigan by a
+narrow neck of land, glowed like a blue sapphire. Chickens, ducks and
+geese crowded noisily together in the barnyard, and a man with a wooden
+pail in his hand came out of the barn door.
+
+Ramsay walked forward, as first uncertainly and then very steadily. A
+man might be afraid, but it was always to his advantage not to let the
+enemy, if enemy this might be, know he was afraid. The man at the barn
+door hesitated, and then stood still while the boy approached.
+
+Ramsay greeted him pleasantly, "Hello."
+
+"Hello."
+
+The man was tall and supple, with a frank, open face and intelligent,
+blue eyes. He was perhaps six years older than Ramsay and he spoke with
+a Dutch accent. Ramsay said, "I was sailing up to Three Points on the
+_Holter_. Now she's wrecked and I must walk...."
+
+"The _Holter's_ wrecked?" the other broke in.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Any drowned people on the beach?"
+
+"Two, but a man on a black-and-white horse took them away from me at
+pistol point." Ramsay knew a rising impatience. "Why the dickens should
+he do that?"
+
+The other grinned faintly. "You get money for watching 'em until they
+can be brought in and buried proper, and money is not easy to come by.
+If there's a man already watching these, that would be Joe Mannis. He
+combs the beach night and day after storms, and he's got as much money
+as most people. What can I do for you?"
+
+"I'd like something to eat before I go on to Three Points."
+
+"That we can give you," the farmer said. "Come."
+
+When the horse would have followed them to the house, the Dutch farmer
+looked quizzically at Ramsay. The boy grinned.
+
+"He's not mine. He was on the _Holter_ and we swam ashore together.
+Without him I might not have made it."
+
+"Then he is yours," the farmer said. "By right of salvage he is yours.
+But Marta, she wouldn't like a horse in the house."
+
+"It's hardly the place for a horse," Ramsay agreed. "Can we leave him
+here?"
+
+"Yaah."
+
+The farmer opened the barnyard gate and Ramsay walked in. The horse
+followed willingly. Ramsay stepped out and shut the gate. He saw the
+little horse, its head over the bars, watching him as he walked toward
+the house.
+
+It was a clean house, and a scrubbed and shiny one. Even the big flat
+stone that served as a back doorstep had almost an antiseptic
+cleanliness. The house was filled with the odors of freshly baked bread
+and spice and canned jam and curing hams. Ramsay smiled at the slim,
+pleasant girl who met them at the door.
+
+"Marta," the farmer said, "this man was ship-wrecked and is to be our
+guest for as long as he wants to stay. He is...?"
+
+"Ramsay Cartou," Ramsay supplied.
+
+"Yaah! Ramsay Cartou. I am Pieter Van Hooven and this is my wife,
+Marta."
+
+Ramsay made himself comfortable in the neat kitchen while Marta Van
+Hooven hurried efficiently about, preparing a meal. There was baked
+whitefish, venison, roasted goose, fluffy mashed potatoes, crisp salad,
+billowy fresh rolls, delicious cheese and milk.
+
+Ramsay ate until he could eat no more, then pushed himself away from the
+table and smiled graciously at Marta Van Hooven. "That was good!" he
+said feelingly.
+
+"You ate so little."
+
+Ramsay grinned, "Not more than enough to feed three good-sized horses.
+You can really cook."
+
+Pieter Van Hooven glowed at this compliment extended to his wife. He
+filled and lighted a clay pipe, and puffed contentedly. "What are you
+going to do now?" he asked Ramsay.
+
+"I," Ramsay hesitated, "I'd like to pay for the meal."
+
+Pieter Van Hooven smiled. "Forget that. You were our guest."
+
+"How far is Three Points?"
+
+"Six miles. Just stay on the beach."
+
+"Reckon I'll go up there then. I've got a job waiting for me at the
+tannery. By the way, do you have any use for that horse?"
+
+"A good horse can always be used on a farm. But I won't take him. I'll
+keep him, and you can have him any time you want." Pieter Van Hooven
+looked queerly at Ramsay. "You sure you want to go to Three Points?"
+
+"I've got a job there, and I need it."
+
+"Then go, but remember that nobody starves in Wisconsin. Marta and me,
+we got no money but we got everything else. You don't like it in Three
+Points, you might come back here?"
+
+"I'll be glad to," Ramsay said, a little puzzled.
+
+"Then do that, my friend."
+
+Well-fed and rested, Ramsay walked alone up the sandy beach. Stay on the
+sand, Pieter Van Hooven had advised him, and he couldn't go wrong. Three
+Points, the tannery town, was right on the lake. Two hours after he left
+the Van Hoovens, Ramsay reached the village.
+
+Three Points nestled snugly in a gap which, only recently, had been
+hacked out of the hemlock forest. Many big trees still stood on the edge
+of town, and some right in the center; and most of the houses were built
+of hemlock logs. There were a few, evidently belonging to Three Points'
+wealthier residents, that were massively built and patterned after the
+New England style of architecture.
+
+There was no mistaking the tannery; the smell would have guided one
+there, even if the mountains of hemlock bark piled all about had not.
+Ramsay entered the long, low, shed-like building, and a man working at a
+steaming vat looked up curiously. Ramsay approached him with "Who's the
+boss man around here?"
+
+"I am," an unseen man said.
+
+Ramsay whirled to look at the man who had spoken, and he came face to
+face with Devil Chad.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THREE
+
+_ON THE BEACH_
+
+
+Ramsay felt an instant tension and a bristling anger, and he knew now
+that he should have connected two incidents. The man who had written to
+him and offered him a job in the Three Points tannery had signed his
+name 'Devlin Chadbourne.' Devlin Chadbourne--Devil Chad--and Ramsay took
+a backward step. Never before had he met a man so capable of arousing in
+him a cordial dislike that was almost an urge to start fighting
+immediately.
+
+"Where's the _Holter_?" Devil Chad demanded.
+
+"I sent her back to Milwaukee after Captain Schultz let me off here,"
+Ramsay said sarcastically.
+
+"Don't get smart with me, boy." Devil Chad glowered. "You was on the
+_Holter_ when she sailed."
+
+"Where were you?" Ramsay demanded.
+
+"I'll ask the questions here!" Devil Chad's thick lips curled in an ugly
+oblong. "Where's the _Holter_?"
+
+"At the bottom of Lake Michigan!" Ramsay flared. "Captain Schultz and
+one of your deck hands are lying drowned on the beach! I don't know
+where the others are."
+
+Devil Chad's glass balls of eyes glinted. His face twisted into a
+horrible glare, and every inch of his big frame seemed to shrink and
+swell with the rage that consumed him. "You mean to tell me," he
+demanded furiously, "that all them hides was lost?"
+
+"Men were lost," Ramsay pointed out.
+
+"You mean to tell me," Devil Chad repeated, as though he had not heard
+Ramsay, "that all them hides was lost?"
+
+"Swim out and get 'em," Ramsay invited. "I'll show you the place where I
+landed, and the _Holter_ can't be more than a couple of miles out in the
+lake."
+
+"What did Schultz do?" Devil Chad demanded.
+
+"Drowned."
+
+"You're pretty flip, boy," Devil Chad warned, "an' I don't put up with
+flip people. You tell me what happened."
+
+"Your greasy tub was carrying one third more than ever should have been
+put on her, her equipment was no good, we ran into a storm and the
+engines quit."
+
+"All them hides lost." Devil Chad was overwhelmed by this personal
+tragedy and could think of nothing else. "Couldn't you of done
+somethin'?"
+
+"It wasn't my ship and they weren't my hides. What are you going to do
+for the families of the men who were lost?"
+
+"Why should I do anything? They knew when they signed on that they was
+runnin' risks." Devil Chad turned his unreadable eyes squarely on
+Ramsay. "What do you want here?"
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"Ain't you the boy who wrote me from New York, an' asked me for a job?"
+
+The man at the vat continued working and others stayed at their tasks,
+but Ramsay was aware of a rippling under-current. There was an
+uneasiness among the men, and a fear; and in spite of the fact that they
+kept busy they turned covert eyes on Ramsay and Devil Chad. The boy felt
+a flashing anger. Who was this man, and what was he, that so many others
+could live in almost craven fear of him?
+
+"If you are," Devil Chad continued, still holding Ramsay in the cage of
+his eyes, "you can have the job but I hold back twenty-five cents a day
+until them hides are paid for."
+
+"Take your job!" Ramsay exploded, "and go plumb to the bottom of the
+lake with it!"
+
+"I warned you, boy," Devil Chad was talking softly now. "I warned you. I
+don't put up with flip people, an' now I'm goin' to teach you the lesson
+that I should of given you on the _Holter_."
+
+"Why didn't you sail on the _Holter_?" Ramsay demanded.
+
+Devil Chad made no answer. He was in a half-crouch, his huge head bent
+to his chest and his fists knotted so tightly that the knuckles were
+whitened. His shaggy hair tumbled forward on his forehead, and his eyes
+still held no expression.
+
+Ramsay raised his voice so all in the building could hear. "You filthy
+pup! You lily-livered slug! You knew the _Holter_ was going to the
+bottom some day! Even your deck hand knew it! You sent other men out to
+die, but didn't risk yourself! You haven't got enough money to hire me
+to work for you!"
+
+Devil Chad was inching forward, his head still bent; and when he had
+advanced a foot, he sprang. It was the rush of a bull, but not a
+cumbersome bull. He flung out both arms, intending to crush Ramsay to
+his chest and break his ribs. It was the only way Devil Chad knew how to
+fight, but the boy knew other tricks.
+
+When the bigger, heavier man launched his charge, Ramsay stood still. He
+saw those massive stretched arms, and knew their purpose, but he did not
+move until Devil Chad flung them out for his crushing embrace. Then, and
+only then, did Ramsay act.
+
+He flitted aside, balancing himself on the balls of his feet and
+whirling even as he evaded the other's lunge. Like a snapping whip his
+clenched right fist flicked in to deliver a stinging blow to the side of
+his enemy's head. But the blow did little except spin Devil Chad around
+and arouse a mighty bellow in the depths of his enormous chest.
+
+Ramsay remained poised, alert for the next charge, and an almost grim
+satisfaction drove other thoughts from his mind. He had not wanted this
+fight and had not forced it, but within him there was a curious feeling
+that it was fore-ordained, and now that it was here, he relished it.
+Devil Chad was not a man. He was an animal who thought as an animal
+thinks. Other men, other human beings, had lost their lives in his
+overloaded, unseaworthy ship, and all this brute could think of was the
+fact that he had lost his cargo.
+
+Devil Chad's eyes, even in the heat of battle, remained opaque and
+strangely without expression. It was only his face, like a rubber mask
+expertly molded to form an expression of rage, that betrayed his fury.
+He swung heavily, running forward even as he launched his blow, and
+Ramsay ducked beneath it. He came up to land a hard left and a right on
+Devil Chad's jaw.
+
+He might as well have struck a granite boulder. Devil Chad did not even
+flinch and the boy knew a moment's uncertainty. His enemy was a bull,
+but bulls were felled with pole-axes, not with fists. Ramsay backed
+lightly away.
+
+All about now, knowing that Devil Chad was engrossed in the fight and
+had no time for them, men had openly stopped work and were staring at
+the battlers. On the faces of some was written incredulity. Some looked
+on with delighted interest, and an expectant smile lighted the swarthy
+features of a little Frenchman who had stopped moving cattle hides to
+watch Ramsay weave away from Devil Chad. There was no man here who, in
+some silent way, did not cheer the boy on, but there were none who
+expected him to win. All knew their master.
+
+Devil Chad rushed again, swinging his fists like pistons as he did so,
+and again Ramsay side-stepped. He landed a fierce blow squarely on the
+other's nose and was gratified to see a crimson stream of blood spout
+forth to mingle darkly with his antagonist's black beard and mustache. A
+cold uncertainty rose within Ramsay.
+
+He had fought before, many times, and he had defeated his opponents and
+had been defeated, but never before had he fought a man just like this
+one. Devil Chad, apparently, was able to absorb an endless amount of
+punishment with no effect whatever on himself. He was as tough as one of
+the trees that grew on the outskirts of Three Points.
+
+Ramsay risked a fleeting backward glance to see where he was going, and
+edged away from the wall. He was breathing hard because of the
+tremendous physical effort he had exerted, but he was far from exhausted
+and he knew that, as long as he could keep the battle in the open, he
+could avoid the other's charges. But the certainty that he could not win
+this battle solidified. It seemed possible to pound Devil Chad all day
+long without hurting him at all.
+
+"Kill him!" an excited man shouted.
+
+Devil Chad paused just long enough to locate and identify this rash
+employee who dared encourage his enemy, and Ramsay felt a nausea in the
+pit of his stomach. When the battle ended, no matter who won, at least
+one man would have some explaining to do and probably a beating to take.
+The boy kept his eyes on Devil Chad, anticipating the other's next move.
+
+Then he tripped over an unseen and unsuspected block of wood and fell
+backward.
+
+Even as he fell he tried to pick himself up and scoot out of the way.
+But a bludgeon, the toe of Devil Chad's heavy boot, collided soddenly
+with his ribs and a sickening pain shot through his entire body. He
+turned, snatching furiously at the boot as it was raised again and still
+trying to wriggle away. His arm flipped convulsively as Devil Chad
+kicked him squarely on the wrist, and he felt a creeping numbness that
+began there and spread to his shoulder.
+
+He rolled to escape his tormentor, rolled again, and struggled to his
+hands and knees. Vaguely, as though he were viewing it in some fantastic
+dream, he saw the big black boot flying at his head. The boot was a huge
+thing and so clearly-outlined that Ramsay saw every tiny wrinkle in it.
+He was aware of the stitching where the ponderous sole joined the upper
+leather, and he knew that he must get away. But that was a vague and
+misty thought, one he seemed unable to carry farther. A mighty rage
+flared within him.
+
+No more than a split second elapsed before the boot struck, but it
+seemed like hours. Ramsay was aware of the fact that his two silver
+dollars, his last money, rolled out of his pockets and across the
+tannery's floor. A thousand colored lights danced in his head, and then
+he was back on the lake.
+
+He had loved the lake, he remembered, and there was something
+wonderfully cool and refreshing about returning to it. A small boat with
+a crazy Dutch fisherman at her tiller danced out of the lake's gray
+stretches and sported gracefully before him. On top of the mast was a
+tame sea gull that clicked his mandibles and fluttered his wings. Ramsay
+even saw the boat's name written in fine script across her bows. She was
+the _Spray_.
+
+The _Spray_ hove to very close to Ramsay, and her skipper looked at him.
+He was a tall man, very powerful, and he was blond and easily laughing.
+There was no grimness about him, only grace and light spirit. Several
+men had gone sailing on a raft made of cattle hides, he told Ramsay, and
+they were in great trouble out on the lake. Did Ramsay care to go with
+him and help bring the unfortunates safely back? The sea gull, of
+course, would help too.
+
+When Ramsay pretended not to hear, the crazy Dutch fisherman obligingly
+repeated his information. Again Ramsay pretended not to hear; whereupon
+the Dutch fisherman caught up a wooden bucket, dipped it into the lake
+and showered him with ice-cold water. He held the bucket waist-high, as
+though wondering whether more water was necessary, and the twinkle
+remained in his eyes and the laugh on his lips. It was impossible to be
+angry with him. Laughing back, Ramsay agreed to go help the foolish men
+who had sailed away on the cattle hides.
+
+Then he awakened, to find a woman bathing his face with cold water.
+
+For a moment she was a distorted picture, a hazy vision that advanced
+toward him and retreated far away. Again Ramsay almost lost himself in
+the dim world into which Devil Chad's boots had kicked him. The cold
+cloth on his face brought him back, and he opened his eyes to see the
+woman very clearly.
+
+She was small, with a worn face, so weary from endless toil that the
+skin was drawn tightly over it. But her eyes were the brownest, the
+softest and the gentlest Ramsay had ever seen. Black hair was combed
+smoothly back on her head and caught in a knot at the base of her neck.
+Again she laid the cold cloth on his face, and the boy closed his eyes
+at the luxury of such a thing. Then he spoke, "Where am I?"
+
+"_Sh-h._ Don't try to talk, M'sieu."
+
+The woman, unmistakably French, rose and went into another room. Ramsay
+looked about him.
+
+The room in which he lay was walled with rough, unplaned boards, and the
+ceiling was made of the same material. Only the floor, scrubbed so
+carefully that it glowed like a polished diamond, was of smooth boards.
+Light was admitted by a single small pane of glass, and the light
+reflected on a crucifix that hung on the far wall. There were a few
+pictures, yellow with age, a table over which a deer skin was gracefully
+draped, and a candle-holder with a half-burned candle. Everything was
+neat and spotlessly clean.
+
+The woman came back bearing a hollowed-out gourd. She passed an arm
+around Ramsay's shoulders--despite her small size she was surprisingly
+strong--and assisted him to a half-sitting position. She held the gourd
+to his lips.
+
+Ramsay drank deeply, and fell back sputtering. The gourd was
+partly-filled with cold water and partly with a whisky, so strong and
+violent that it burned his mouth and lips. He lay blinking, while tears
+welled in his eyes and flowed down his cheeks. The whisky, doubtless
+homemade, was strong enough to choke a horse. But, after a half-minute,
+it made itself felt. A warm glow spread from the roots of Ramsay's hair
+to the tips of his toes. Some of his many aches and pains lessened.
+
+"More?" the woman inquired softly.
+
+"Uh ... No--no thank you."
+
+She put the gourd on the table and came over to lay a hand on his
+forehead. It was a calloused and work-hardened hand, but so gentle was
+she that her caress was scarcely a feather's touch. Ramsay smiled his
+thanks.
+
+"How did I get here?" he asked again.
+
+"My man, Pierre LeDou, he brought you. But now you must rest, M'sieu,
+and try to sleep. Badly have you been hurt."
+
+The woman drew an exquisite, hand-sewn lace curtain, an incongruous
+thing in these rough surroundings, over the window, and semi-gloom
+reigned in the room. She tiptoed out, closing the door behind her, and
+Ramsay was left alone with his thoughts.
+
+That mighty rage mounted within him again. He had been fighting with
+Devil Chad, he remembered, and not doing badly until he fell over some
+unseen object. Then he had been kicked into--into this. Experimentally
+Ramsay tried to move his legs, and found that he could do so. He
+clenched and unclenched his fists, and there in the half-light of an
+unknown room, in a stranger's house, he made a solemn vow. One day, no
+matter what else happened, he and Devil Chad would meet again. Devil
+Chad would pay, in full, for every twinge Ramsay suffered. In that
+moment Ramsay knew that he was not afraid.
+
+His burning anger became tempered with pleasant wonder. This was a harsh
+land, but there was room for tenderness. He was a stranger and had been
+in Three Points only long enough to get himself kicked into
+insensibility, but there were those in Three Points who knew compassion
+and friendship. Otherwise, he would not now be lying in some unknown
+man's house and being ministered to by that man's wife. Pierre--Ramsay
+strove to recall the last name and could not. He fell into a quiet
+slumber.
+
+The next time he awakened, the candle on his table was burning and his
+host--vaguely Ramsay remembered seeing him move hides about the
+tannery--was standing near. Like his wife, he was small and gentle, with
+a manner that belied the fierce little black mustache clinging to his
+upper lip. He was too small and gentle, Ramsay thought, ever to fit
+into a town such as Three Points. But certainly he was kind and good. He
+smiled, revealing flashing white teeth, and when he did Ramsay
+remembered the name, Pierre LeDou.
+
+"How do you feel?" he asked briskly.
+
+"Better." Ramsay grinned.
+
+"He beat you," Pierre LeDou said. "_Sacre!_ But he beat you!" The little
+man's eyes roved about the room, as though seeking the solution to a
+problem which he must solve, and Ramsay knew that he, too, hated Devil
+Chad. "He kicked you!" Pierre LeDou said.
+
+"I know, and some day I'll pay him back for that."
+
+Interest brightened in the little Frenchman's eyes. "You think so,
+M'sieu--M'sieu ..."
+
+"Cartou," Ramsay said. "Ramsay Cartou. And I will not kill anybody
+unless I have to. But one day this Devil Chad will pay, ten times over,
+for everything he did to me."
+
+"He is very hard man." Pierre LeDou sighed.
+
+"So am I!" Ramsay gritted, and again anger rose within him. "Why should
+so many people tremble in their boots when he comes around?"
+
+Pierre LeDou shrugged eloquently. "The job. A man has to have the job."
+
+"I see. And Devil Chad controls 'the job'?"
+
+"Not all," Pierre LeDou explained. "He does not walk so freely where the
+fishermen and farmers are."
+
+"I'm beginning to like these fishermen and farmers more and more."
+
+"They are nice," Pierre agreed, "but wild. Especially the fishermen.
+Oh, so wild! Out in the lake they go, afraid of nothing; but those that
+do not drown return with multitudes of fish."
+
+"Do many drown?"
+
+"Very many, but you cannot kill a fisherman. They say that the lake
+sends back two for every one it takes, and maybe that is so. At any
+rate, when a fisherman drowns, two more always appear. I would go
+fishing myself were it not that I am afraid. Are you hungry, M'sieu?"
+
+"Yes," Ramsay answered frankly.
+
+"Then I will get you something to eat."
+
+Pierre LeDou disappeared. Ramsay lay back on the bed to think. Now this
+half-wild, half-tame country into which he had come was assuming a
+definite pattern. Some, like Pierre LeDou, had been attracted by the
+endless wealth offered, and had found only a back-breaking job with
+Devil Chad or his counterpart. Others, and Ramsay thought of Hans Van
+Doorst and Pieter Van Hooven, were finding wealth.
+
+It was not wealth that could be measured in terms of money; probably the
+crazy Dutch fisherman and Pieter Van Hooven had little money, but just
+the same it was wealth. Rather than toil meekly for someone else and
+obey a master's every wish, they had chosen to discover for themselves
+the true richness of this endlessly rich land and they were discovering
+it. So some were afraid and some were not; and those who were not seemed
+to enjoy life at its fullest. And, as usual, there was the arrogant
+overlord, Devil Chad, who wanted everything for himself and who would
+take it if he could. He did not care what he did or whom he killed, as
+long as he got what he wanted.
+
+Pierre LeDou came back, bearing a bowl on a wooden platter. Ramsay
+sniffed hungrily. The bowl was old and cracked, but like everything else
+in the house it was scrupulously clean, and the odors wafted from it
+would tempt the appetite of a dying man. Pierre put the bowl and a
+wooden spoon down where Ramsay could reach them, and Ramsay saw a meat
+stew in which fluffy dumplings floated.
+
+"It is not much," the little Frenchman apologized. "Venison stew with
+dumplings, and that is all. Would you like some spirits to go with it?"
+
+"Uh!" Ramsay remembered the fiery liquor. "No thanks. I would like some
+water."
+
+"I can offer you milk."
+
+"That will be fine."
+
+Pierre disappeared, and returned with a bowl of milk and a beaker of the
+strong whisky. He gave the bowl to Ramsay and held the whisky aloft.
+
+"Your health, M'sieu," he said.
+
+He drained the beaker without even quivering, and Ramsay suppressed a
+shudder. Dipping the spoon in his venison stew, he tasted it. It was
+rich, with all the expertness of French cuisine behind it, and
+delicious. Ramsay took a chunk of venison in his mouth and chewed it
+with relish. Venison, fish and whatever else they could get out of the
+country doubtless meant much to the people who lived here.
+
+"How long have you worked in the tannery?" he asked Pierre.
+
+"Five years," the little Frenchman said. "Five long years. I shall work
+there much longer if God is kind."
+
+"May He always be kind to you!" Ramsay said feelingly.
+
+"My thanks to you, M'sieu Ramsay. And now, with your permission, I shall
+retire. I suggest that you sleep, for you look very weary. Should you
+want anything you have only to call."
+
+Ramsay fell into a restful slumber from which he was awakened by the
+sound of people stirring. The early morning sun, just rising, caressed
+the curtained window softly and a sleepy bird twittered outside the
+window. There was the sound of lifted stove lids and of people stirring.
+Ramsay dozed off, then sprang guiltily awake and jumped out of bed.
+
+He felt good, with only an occasional twinge of pain here and there.
+Hastily he pulled on his trousers and shirt, laced his shoes and
+smoothed his rumpled hair with his hand. When he had made himself as
+presentable as he could, he went into the other room.
+
+Though the hour was still early and the sun not yet fairly up, Pierre
+LeDou had already left for his work in the tannery. His pleasant wife
+was pouring hot water from a pan on the stove into a big wooden bowl,
+evidently the receptacle in which dishes were washed. She turned around.
+
+"Good morning!" Ramsay said cheerfully.
+
+"Good morning, M'sieu." Then she cautioned him. "Should you be out of
+bed?"
+
+"I feel fine." Ramsay grinned. "Strong as a bull and twice as hungry."
+
+"Then I will prepare you something to eat. If M'sieu cares to do so, he
+may wash just outside the door."
+
+"Thanks."
+
+Ramsay went out the door. To one side, in front of the house, there was
+a big wooden bowl and two wooden pails filled with water. A well-worn
+trail threading away from the door obviously led to a well or spring.
+Hanging on a wooden peg driven into a hole, drilled in the cabin's wall,
+were a clean towel and washcloth. Even the door's hinges, cleverly
+carved pins that turned on holes drilled into wooden blocks attached to
+the cabin's wall, were wood. Evidently, in this country, wood
+substituted for metal.
+
+Ramsay filled the bowl with water, washed himself and went back into the
+cabin. Pierre LeDou's wife was bending over a skillet from which came
+the smell of frying fish. Ramsay sniffed hungrily, and licked his lips.
+She turned the fish, let it cook a little while longer, and put it on
+the table, along with feather-light biscuits, butter and cold milk.
+Ramsay ate hungrily, but tried to curb his appetite so he would also eat
+decently, and as he ate he talked.
+
+"Why," he asked Pierre LeDou's wife, "did your husband bring me here?"
+
+"You were hurt and needed help," she said simply.
+
+In sudden haste Ramsay felt his pocket, and discovered that the two
+silver dollars were gone. He remembered that he had lost them while he
+fought with Devil Chad, and a flood of embarrassment almost overwhelmed
+him.
+
+"I--I have no money to pay you," he said awkwardly.
+
+For the first time she looked reprovingly at him. "We did not ask for
+money, M'sieu. One does not."
+
+Ramsay knew another awkward moment and a little shame. "It is very good
+of you," he said.
+
+She said, "One does not neglect a fellow human."
+
+Ramsay finished eating and pushed his dishes back. Pierre LeDou's wife,
+who had already finished washing the rest of the dishes, put Ramsay's in
+the dish water and left them there. She smiled at him. "It would be well
+if you rested."
+
+"I'm not tired. Really I'm not."
+
+"You should rest. Badly were you hurt."
+
+"Let me sit here a while."
+
+"As long as you sit."
+
+She went to a cupboard and took from it a big ball of strong linen
+thread. From the table she caught up a small board. Wrapping the thread
+twice around the board, she knotted it. Slipping the thread from the
+board, she hung the loop she had made on a wooden peg and made a new
+loop. Her hands flew so swiftly that in a few moments she had seventeen
+of the meshes, all joined together.
+
+"What are you doing?" Ramsay inquired interestedly.
+
+"Making a gill net," she explained. "It was ordered by Baptiste LeClair,
+a fisherman, and is to have a four and a half-inch mesh. So we use a
+mesh board that is exactly two and a quarter inches wide and wrap the
+thread twice around. Now I have seventeen. See?"
+
+"I see."
+
+She strung the seventeen meshes on a wooden rod, placed two chairs far
+enough apart so that the meshes stretched, tied the rod to them and
+began knitting on the net she had started. "The net is to be seventeen
+meshes, or seventy-six and one-half inches, wide. Now I lengthen it."
+
+Under the boy's interested eyes the gill net grew swiftly, and as it
+lengthened she wrapped it around the rod. Ramsay watched every move.
+"How long will it be?" he queried.
+
+"One net," she told him, "is about two hundred and fifty feet long. But
+usually several are tied together to form a box of nets. A box is about
+fourteen hundred feet."
+
+"Isn't that a lot?"
+
+She smiled. "A crew of three good men, like Hans Van Doorst or Baptiste
+LeClair, with a good Mackinaw boat can handle two boxes."
+
+"Could you make this net longer if you wished to?"
+
+"Oh, yes. It could be many miles long. Two hundred and fifty feet is a
+good length for one net because, if it is torn by strong water or heavy
+fish, it may be untied and repaired while the rest may still be used."
+
+"What else must you do?"
+
+"After the net is two hundred and fifty feet long, I will use fifteen-
+or sixteen-thread twine through from three to six meshes on the outer
+edge. This, in turn, will be tied to ninety-thread twine which extends
+the full length."
+
+Ramsay was amazed at the way this quiet little woman reeled off these
+figures, as though she were reciting a well-learned lesson. But he
+wanted to know even more. "How do they set such a net?"
+
+"The fishermen gather small, flat stones, about three to the pound, and
+cut a groove around them so that they can be suspended from a rope.
+These are called sinkers, and are tied to the net about nine feet apart.
+For floats they use cedar blocks, about two feet long by one-quarter of
+an inch thick and an inch and a quarter wide. They bore a small hole
+one inch from the end, then split the block to the bored hole. The
+floats--and the number they use depends on the depth to which they sink
+the net--are pushed over the ninety-thread twine."
+
+"Let me try!" Ramsay was beginning to feel the effects of idleness and
+wanted action.
+
+"But of course, M'sieu."
+
+Ramsay took the mesh board in his hand and, as he had seen her do,
+wrapped the thread twice around it. But, though it had looked simple
+when she did it, there was a distinct knack to doing it right. The mesh
+board slipped from his fingers and the twine unwound. Madame LeDou
+laughed. "Let me show you."
+
+Patiently, carefully, she guided his fingers through the knitting of a
+mesh, then another and a third and fourth. Ramsay felt a rising elation.
+He had liked the _Spray_ when he saw her and now he liked this. Fishing,
+from the making of the nets to setting them, seemed more than ever a
+craft that was almost an art. He knitted a row of meshes across the gill
+net, and happily surveyed his work.
+
+At the same time he remained aware of the fact that she could knit three
+times as fast as he. Ramsay thrust his tongue into his cheek and grimly
+continued at his work.
+
+After an hour Madame LeDou said soberly, "You do right well, M'sieu. But
+should you not rest now?"
+
+Ramsay said, "This is fun."
+
+"It is well that you enjoy yourself. Would you consider it uncivil if I
+left you for a while?"
+
+"Please do what you must."
+
+She left, and Ramsay continued to work on the net. As he did, his skill
+improved. Though he was still unable to knit as swiftly as Madame LeDou,
+he could make a good net. And there was a feel, a tension, to the
+thread. Within itself the thread had life and being. It was supple,
+strong and would not fail a fisherman who depended upon it.
+
+Madame LeDou returned, smiled at him and went unobtrusively about the
+task of preparing a lunch. So absorbed was he in his net-making that he
+scarcely tasted the food. All afternoon he worked on the net.
+
+Madame LeDou said approvingly, "You make a good net, M'sieu. You have
+knitted almost four pounds of thread into this one. The most skilled
+net-makers, those who have had years of experience, cannot knit more
+than six or seven pounds in one day."
+
+Twilight shadows were lengthening when Pierre LeDou returned. The little
+man, as always, was courteous. But behind his inherited Gallic grace and
+manners lay a troubled under-current. Pierre spoke in rapid French to
+his wife, and she turned worried eyes on their guest. Ramsay stopped
+knitting the net.
+
+All afternoon there had been growing upon him an awareness that he could
+not continue indefinitely to accept the LeDou's hospitality, and now he
+knew that he must go. The pattern had definite shape, and the reason
+behind Pierre's uneasiness was not hard to fathom. Devil Chad was the
+ruler, and Devil Chad must rule. Who harbored his enemy must be his
+enemy, and Pierre LeDou needed the job in the tannery. Should he lose
+it, the LeDous could not live.
+
+With an air of spontaneity, anxious not to cause his host and hostess
+any embarrassment, Ramsay rose and smiled. "It has been a most enjoyable
+stay at your home," he said. "But of course it cannot continue. I have
+work to find. If you will be kind enough to shelter me again tonight, I
+will go tomorrow, and I shall never forget the LeDous."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FOUR
+
+_TROUBLE FOR THE_ SPRAY
+
+
+Early the next morning, when Pierre departed for work, Ramsay bade
+farewell to Madame LeDou and left their house with his kind host. He did
+so with a little reluctance, now that all his money was gone and the
+future loomed more uncertainly than ever. At the same time there was
+about him a rising eagerness and an unfulfilled expectation.
+
+It seemed to him that, since swimming ashore from the sinking _Holter_,
+he had ceased to be a boy and had become a man. And a man must know that
+all desirable things had their undesirable aspects. This country was
+wonderful. If, to stay in it, he must come to grips with other men--men
+as strong and as cruel as Devil Chad--and with nature too, Ramsay felt
+himself willing to do that.
+
+As soon as the two were fifty yards from the LeDou home he purposely
+dropped behind Pierre and leaned against a huge hemlock until the little
+man was out of sight. Pierre had said nothing and Ramsay had not asked,
+but the latter knew Devil Chad had told the Frenchman that, if he valued
+his job in the tannery, he must no longer shelter Ramsay. The boy had
+no wish to further embarrass his host or to jeopardize his job by being
+seen with him. Therefore he leaned against the tree until Pierre had had
+time to reach and enter the tannery.
+
+Slowly Ramsay left his tree and walked down the same path that Pierre
+had followed. Badly as he needed a job, it was useless to try to get one
+in the tannery. He slowed his pace even more as he walked past the
+building. He had been beaten by Devil Chad, and he might be beaten a
+second time should they fight again; but he was not afraid to try. His
+body had been hurt, but not his courage.
+
+Almost insolently Ramsay stopped where he could be seen from the
+tannery's open door, and waited there. He was aware of curious,
+half-embarrassed glances from men hurrying into the place, and then they
+avoided looking at him. Finally a man stopped. He spoke to a man who
+halted beside him.
+
+"All right, Jules. Get in an' start to work."
+
+He was a straw boss or foreman, Ramsay decided, and his voice betrayed
+his New England forebears. An older man, with hair completely gray, like
+all the rest he was wrinkled and weathered. Physically he was lean and
+tough, but he did not seem belligerent or even unkind. When the last
+worker had entered the tannery, he turned to Ramsay.
+
+"You needn't be afraid, son. Mr. Chadbourne went to Milwaukee last
+night."
+
+"I'm not afraid. I was just wondering if he wouldn't come out for a
+second start."
+
+"Look, son," the other's air was that of an older and wiser person
+trying to reason with an impetuous boy, "you haven't got a chance. The
+best thing you can do is get out of town before Mr. Chadbourne comes
+back."
+
+"Maybe I like this town."
+
+"You can only cause trouble by staying here."
+
+"I've been in trouble before, too."
+
+The older man shrugged, as though he had discharged his full
+responsibility in warning Ramsay, and said, "It's your funeral, my boy.
+Stay away from the tannery."
+
+"You needn't worry."
+
+Ramsay strolled on down the dusty street, and in spite of himself he was
+a little relieved. If Devil Chad had gone to Milwaukee, probably to
+arrange for another shipload of hides, it was unlikely that he would be
+back before night at the earliest. Ramsay would not have to fight again
+today; presumably he was free to do as he pleased without any fear of
+interruption. He thrust his hands into empty pockets and, to cheer
+himself up, started to whistle.
+
+A fat Indian, dressed in ragged trousers, which some white man had
+thrown out, and an equally-tattered black coat which he could not button
+across his immense, naked stomach, grinned at him. Ramsay grinned back
+and winked. His friends in New York had been awe-stricken at the very
+thought of venturing into the wild Midwest where, they thought, scalping
+parties occurred every few hours and no white man was safe from the
+savages. Ramsay had enjoyed himself by elaborating on the part he would
+play when such a war party came along. But he had discovered for
+himself, before he left Chicago, that the Indians in this section of
+Wisconsin were harmless. When they could they sold bead work and
+basketry to the settlers and they were not above stealing. But they were
+not warlike.
+
+Ramsay strode past another building, a big one with two separate floors
+and an attic. Its chimney belched smoke, and from within came the whine
+of saws and other machinery. In front of the building were stacked a
+great number of barrels, made of white pine and with hoops formed from
+the black ash tree. Ramsay hesitated a moment and entered.
+
+Three Points was obviously a raw frontier town, but definitely it was
+not as raw as Ramsay had expected it to be. Obviously there was at least
+one industrial plant in addition to the tannery. It seemed to be a
+cooper's shop, engaged in the production of barrels, and it might hold a
+job for him. He stopped just inside the door, trying to adjust his ears
+to the scream of a big circular saw that was powered by a steam engine.
+Beyond were lathes and various other machines, and a great many wooden
+pails were piled against the far wall. This factory, then, made both
+barrels and pails.
+
+Presently a middle-aged man, with the neatest clothing Ramsay had yet
+seen in Three Points, came out of an office and walked toward him. He
+shouted to make himself heard above the screaming saw, "Yes?"
+
+"Are you the manager here?" Ramsay shouted back.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Need any men?"
+
+"What?"
+
+Ramsay grinned faintly. The factory, if not bedlam, was close to it. It
+was incredible that anyone at all could carry on an intelligent, or
+even an intelligible, conversation inside it. Ramsay shouted, "Let's go
+outside!"
+
+The other followed him out, and far enough from the door so they could
+hear each other. Ramsay turned to his companion, "My name's Ramsay
+Cartou and I'm looking for a job. Do you have any to offer?"
+
+The manager looked soberly at Ramsay's battered face, then with the toe
+of his shoe he began tracing a circle in the dirt. He hesitated. Then,
+"I'm afraid not."
+
+Ramsay felt a stirring anger. Definitely there was more work in Three
+Points than there were men to do it. The town had need of strong
+workers. For a moment he looked steadily at the manager, who looked
+away. Then he swallowed and tried a new tack, "What do you do with all
+the barrels?"
+
+"Most of them go to fishermen who use them to ship their catches to
+Chicago. The pails are shipped by boat to wherever there is a market for
+them."
+
+"And you can't give me a job?"
+
+"That's right."
+
+"Why?" Ramsay challenged.
+
+"We--we have a full crew."
+
+"I see. Now will you answer one question?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Does 'Mister' Chadbourne own this place too?"
+
+"He has a financial interest ..." The other stopped short. "See here,
+young man! I have told you that I cannot offer you a job and that should
+be sufficient!"
+
+"I just wanted to know why," Ramsay said.
+
+He turned and walked away from the cooper's shop. His chin was high,
+and anger seethed within him. Devil Chad, apparently, owned most of
+Three Points and a lot of other things between that and Milwaukee. If
+there was an opportunity to earn a dollar, honest or dishonest, Devil
+Chad was seizing that opportunity. Obviously the manager of the cooper's
+shop had heard of his fight with Ramsay--in a small community like this
+everyone would have heard of it--and was afraid to give him a job.
+Ramsay resumed his tuneless whistling.
+
+Plainly he was going to get nowhere in Three Points. But definitely he
+had no intention of running away with his tail between his legs, like a
+whipped puppy. He liked this lakeshore country and he intended to stay
+in it. If he had to fight to do that, then he would fight.
+
+Between the rugged trunks of tall hemlock trees he caught a glimpse of
+the lake, sparkling blue in the sunshine and gently ruffled by a soft
+south wind. He turned his steps toward it, and now he walked eagerly.
+The lake was magic, a world in itself which never had been tamed and
+never would be tamed. He shivered ecstatically. This was what he had
+come west to find. Devil Chad and his tannery, the town of Three Points,
+and even Milwaukee paled into nothingness when compared to the lake. He
+broke from the last trees and saw Lake Michigan clearly.
+
+A heavy wooden pier extended out onto it, and a sailing vessel was tied
+up at one side. Ramsay read her name. She was the _Brilliant_, from
+Ludington, Michigan, and a line of men were toiling up a gangplank with
+heavy bags which they were stacking on the pier. On the pier's other
+side a steamer, a side-wheeler like the _Holter_, was loading leather
+from Devil Chad's tannery. She was the _Jackson_, a freighter that
+carried assorted cargoes between Three Points, Milwaukee and Chicago.
+
+Ramsay strolled out on the pier and brightened when the cold lake air
+struck his face. It was impossible to be on the lake, or near it, and
+feel stolid or dull. It provided its own freshness, and Ramsay thought
+it also furnished a constant inspiration. He watched the sweating men
+continue to bring loaded bags up from the sailing vessel and approached
+near enough to ask a burly deck hand, "What's this cargo?"
+
+The man looked surlily at him. "What's it look like?"
+
+"Diamonds." Ramsay grinned.
+
+"Well, it ain't. It's salt."
+
+"What the blazes will anyone do with so much salt?"
+
+"Eat it," the deck hand grunted. "People hereabouts like salt." Then he,
+too, grinned. "Naw, it's for fishermen. They got to have somethin' to
+salt their catches in."
+
+"Oh. I see."
+
+Ramsay added this bit of information to the lore he had already
+gathered. Obviously fishing consisted of more than just catching fish.
+Actually taking the fish, of course, was the most exciting and romantic
+part. But the fishermen could not ply their trade at all without women
+like Madame LeDou who made their nets, a shop like the Three Points'
+cooper's shop which provided the barrels into which the fish were
+packed, or vessels like the _Brilliant_ which brought salt that kept the
+fish from spoiling.
+
+Ramsay stayed on the pier until the _Brilliant_ was unloaded, and
+licked his lips while he watched her crew eating thick sandwiches. They
+took a whole loaf of bread, sliced it lengthwise, packed the center with
+meat, cheese, fish and anything else they could lay their hands on, and,
+according to their taste, washed it down with cold lake water or beakers
+of whisky. Ramsay looked away.
+
+Madame LeDou had provided him with a substantial breakfast, but this was
+an invigorating country wherein one soon became hungry again. Ramsay
+patted his empty stomach.
+
+Probably Madame LeDou would give him something to eat should he go back
+there, but he had already posed enough problems for the LeDous. Besides,
+he did not like the idea of asking for food. He left the pier to walk
+past the Lake House, Three Points' only hotel. Savory odors of cooking
+food wafted to his nostrils and made him drool. He walked past the Lake
+House, then turned to walk back. He trotted up the steps and sat down at
+a table spread with a white cloth.
+
+A hard-eyed woman, wearing a brown dress over which she had tied a neat
+white apron, came up to him. Ramsay leaned back. He had decided to make
+his play, and he might as well play it to the end.
+
+"What does the menu offer?" he asked almost haughtily.
+
+"Whitefish at fifteen cents, venison at fifteen cents, a boiled dinner
+at ten cents."
+
+"What? No steak?"
+
+"The steak dinner," the woman said, "costs thirty cents. With it you get
+potatoes, coffee, salad and apple pie."
+
+"Bring it to me," Ramsay said. "And please be prompt. My time is
+valuable."
+
+"As soon as possible," the woman said.
+
+Ramsay relaxed in his chair. A half-hour later the waitress brought him
+a broiled sirloin, so big that it overflowed the platter on which it
+rested. There were crisp fried potatoes, coffee--a rare beverage in this
+country--cream, a salad and a huge wedge of apple pie. Ramsay ate
+hungrily, then the waitress approached him.
+
+"Will you pay now?"
+
+"It is a lot," said Ramsay, who could not have swallowed another crust,
+"to pay for such a puny meal."
+
+"I told you the price before you ordered."
+
+"It doesn't matter," Ramsay waved a languid hand. "Especially since I
+have no money. What do we do now?"
+
+Ramsay stood in the kitchen of the Lake House, and by the light of an
+oil lamp piled the last of what had been a mountain of dishes, into warm
+water. There must, he thought, have been thousands of them, but there
+were only a few more and he dropped one of those. Instantly the woman
+who had served him popped into the kitchen.
+
+"Must you be so clumsy?"
+
+"It is the only dish I have broken out of all I have washed," Ramsay
+said. "Don't you think I have paid off my dinner by this time?"
+
+"You knew the price before you ordered."
+
+"The way you've had me working since, I earned the whole cow. Haven't I
+repaid you, with perhaps a bonus of a sandwich for supper?"
+
+"Sit down, kid," the woman said gruffly.
+
+She brought him a sandwich, huge slices of fluffy homemade bread between
+which thick slices of beef nestled, and a bowl of milk. Ramsay ate
+hungrily, and after he had finished his hostess talked to him. "You're
+the youngster Devil Chad beat up, aren't you?"
+
+"I tripped," Ramsay said grimly.
+
+"Devil Chad trips 'em all. You're crazy if you think you can get away
+with anything. Best thing you can do is leave."
+
+Ramsay said, "I guess I'm just naturally crazy."
+
+The woman shrugged. "I'm tellin' you for your own good, kid. You'll get
+nowhere in Three Points as long as Chad don't like you. Why not be a
+smart little boy and beat it back to wherever you came from?"
+
+Ramsay said, "That isn't a good idea."
+
+"You're a stubborn kid, ain't you?"
+
+"Mule-headed," Ramsay agreed. "Even worse than a mule."
+
+"Well, if you won't take good advice, there's not much I can do. Would
+you like to sleep here tonight?"
+
+"Nope. I'll be going now, and thanks for the steak."
+
+"Well ... Good luck, kid."
+
+"Thanks."
+
+Ramsay walked out into the darkness and drew his jacket tightly about
+him. The lake shore was cold by day, much colder by night when there was
+no sun to warm it. He had brought extra clothing, but all his personal
+belongings had gone down with the _Holter_. He looked dismally at the
+dark town--Three Points seemed to go to bed with the setting sun--and
+wandered forlornly down toward the lake front. Both the sailing vessel
+from Ludington and the _Jackson_ were gone.
+
+A little wind was driving wavelets gently against the shore, and the
+lap-lap of their rising and falling made pleasant music in the night.
+Ramsay wandered out on the pier, where the stacked bags of salt were
+covered with tarpaulins. He looked furtively around.
+
+Nobody else was on or even near the pier, and it seemed unlikely that
+anyone would come. He curled up close to the bags of salt and drew the
+flowing end of a tarpaulin over his body. He pillowed his head on a
+protruding bag and snuggled very near to the stack.
+
+The pier was hard, but he had slept on hard beds before and the barrier
+of salt broke the wind's force. The tarpaulin, of heavy duck, made a
+warm blanket. In spite of the odds he faced, Ramsay felt a wonderful
+sense of well-being and peace. He went quietly to sleep.
+
+When he awakened, soft gray dawn was stealing like a fawn out of the
+summer sky. Three Points, not yet awake, slumbered in the dim morning.
+Ramsay crawled out from beneath the tarpaulin and rose to look at the
+town.
+
+Nobody gave up any battles; but nobody knocked his head against a stone
+wall or strove against hopeless odds. Even the little black horse had
+not done that. He might just as well see things as they were. Devil Chad
+ruled Three Points and, with his present resources, Ramsay could not
+fight Devil Chad. But it was certain that Chad could not rule all of
+Milwaukee, too, and Milwaukee would need workers. He could go back
+there, get a job and plan his future after he had it.
+
+A sudden inspiration seemed to fall right out of the brightening sky.
+
+The Van Hoovens! Pieter Van Hooven had told him to come back should he
+fail to find what he expected in Three Points, and Pierre LeDou had
+assured him that Devil Chad did not walk so freely among the farmers and
+fishermen. Maybe Pieter could give him a job, at least something that
+would offer security until he was able to get himself oriented; and if
+he could, Ramsay wanted to stay in this part of the country. It was
+better than Milwaukee.
+
+Briskly he left the pier and struck down the sand beach. Now that he had
+decided to take this step, he felt lighter and happier. Maybe he would
+and maybe he would not have liked working in the tannery, even if that
+had been ruled by some other man than Devil Chad, but he knew that he
+would like the Van Hoovens and their way of life.
+
+He moved fast, staying far enough up on the beach so he need not step in
+wet sand but near enough the water so he could walk on sun-baked sand
+over which high water had already rolled. That was packed hard, almost
+to the consistency of concrete.
+
+The sun was well up when he came again to the Van Hooven's pleasant
+home. Resolutely he walked up and knocked on the back door.
+
+A second later it opened, and Marta Van Hooven flashed a warm smile of
+welcome. "Oh! Come in."
+
+Pieter, who had already finished his milking and was now seated at the
+breakfast table, said, "Hello."
+
+"Hello," Ramsay said. "I thought I'd stop in and see you on ..." He
+fumbled. "On my way back to Milwaukee."
+
+Pieter looked seriously at him. "You're not going to work in Three
+Points?"
+
+"No," Ramsay said bluntly. "Mr. Chadbourne and I did not see eye to eye.
+In fact, three minutes after we met our fists were flying in each
+other's eyes."
+
+"You fought Devil Chad?"
+
+"I did, and got well-beaten."
+
+Pieter said quietly, "Some day somebody will kill him."
+
+"Some day somebody might."
+
+"Eat," Pieter invited. He pushed a platter of eggs at the boy and forked
+a thick slice of home-cured ham onto his plate. Then he placed the dish
+of yellow butter where Ramsay could help himself and put a plate of
+feather-light fresh-baked rolls where he was able to reach it. Marta
+came softly in from the kitchen with a bowl of cold milk.
+
+Ramsay ate, primly at first, then gave way to his enormous appetite.
+Pieter served him another slice of ham. The boy took two more eggs and
+another roll, which he spread lavishly with butter. Sighing, unable to
+swallow another crumb, he pushed his plate back. Pieter looked gravely
+at him. "Do you have to go to Milwaukee?"
+
+"No, I just thought I might find a job there."
+
+"You can," Pieter assured him. "But if a job is what you want, a job is
+what I can give you. I can't pay you any money, at least until we have
+sold our fall crops, because we haven't any. But I can give you all you
+can eat, a good bed to sleep in, and I have some clothes that will fit
+you."
+
+Ramsay said deliberately, "Devil Chad won't like you for that."
+
+"Around here," and there was no air of braggadocio in Pieter's words,
+"we don't much care what Devil Chad likes."
+
+Ramsay looked hard at his host, and then the two young men grinned at
+each other.
+
+"You've got yourself a man," Ramsay said. "What do we do first?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hidden from the house by a jutting shoulder of land, Ramsay stood beside
+the small lake on Pieter Van Hooven's property and peeled off his
+clothes. All day long, interrupted in mid-morning by Marta, who brought
+him a substantial lunch, at noon by a huge and delicious dinner and
+again in mid-afternoon with a lunch, he had toiled in Pieter Van
+Hooven's sprouting corn.
+
+All day long the sun had beaten down and, though the lake shore was cool
+enough, a man doing hard physical labor could easily work up a sweat.
+But it was good. Ramsay had felt the sun's rays penetrate to and warm
+the very marrow of his bones. In spite of the hard labor he had been
+doing, few times in his life had he felt as agile and supple and wholly
+alive as this.
+
+He plunged headlong into the lake and came up gasping. The water was
+cold, though not nearly as cold as the big lake; and after Ramsay's body
+was adjusted to it, a delicious glow ran through his whole physical
+being. He dived again, then climbed up on the soft grass to let the
+lowering sun dry him before he put his clothes on.
+
+He dressed slowly, happily, and now all his cares were behind him. This
+was the place for him, and no longer did he have the slightest doubt
+that he was going to like everything about it. Fresh and vigorous, the
+day's toil washed away, he walked slowly down to Lake Michigan and
+stared across it. Supper in half an hour, Pieter had said when he had
+advised Ramsay to stop work and have a swim, and no more than half that
+time had elapsed. The rest could profitably be spent in just looking at
+this endlessly fascinating water.
+
+Ramsay stared across the lake. More than ever it seemed a live creature
+and one of many moods. Ramsay had seen it roaring-mad, and now he saw it
+gentle as a lamb. There was scarcely a ripple anywhere. Absorbed in the
+lake, Ramsay was aware of nothing else until a horse snorted very close
+to him. When he whirled, he knew that he had seen the same horse and
+rider before.
+
+It was the body-watcher, Joe Mannis, and he was riding the
+black-and-white horse which he had ridden when he had warned Ramsay away
+from the drowned Captain Schultz and the deck hand. The huge cowboy hat
+tilted precariously on his head and the blue jeans, apparently unwashed
+in a good many months, clung tightly to his legs. Thick black hair
+escaped from beneath the hat, and he looked Ramsay up and down. "What
+are you doin' here?"
+
+"What's it to you?"
+
+"Well, nothin' I expect. Nothin' at all. But just don't bother me again
+when I'm workin' at my trade."
+
+"I won't," Ramsay promised, "unless I have a couple of pistols, too."
+
+"Just don't bother me when I'm workin' at my trade," the other repeated,
+"an' we'll get along fine."
+
+"You think so?" Ramsay snapped.
+
+Missing the challenge implied in Ramsay's words, Joe Mannis trotted his
+horse up the sand beach toward Three Points. Ramsay looked without
+interest at his retreating back. Joe Mannis was an unsavory man, he
+decided, but unlike Devil Chad, he was a stupid man. Only when backed by
+his pistols would Joe be much of a threat.
+
+Ramsay pushed his drying hair back with his hands and went around to the
+rear of the Van Hooven house. That was also a custom, it seemed. Formal
+visitors, if there were any, might enter by the front door; but everyone
+else went around to the rear. Obviously the visitor who had arrived
+while Ramsay bathed and stood on the shore, was not formal.
+
+He was a tall, gaunt man with a thin face and a hooked nose. Except for
+a white shirt, the collar of which was adorned by a bright ribbon that
+could hardly be called a tie, from his stovepipe hat to his shoes he was
+dressed entirely in black. An outlandish rig, a four-wheeled cart with a
+fringed top supported on four posts, stood in the yard. Its curtains
+were rolled up, and the cart seemed to contain everything from wash tubs
+to pins. Pieter and the stranger were unhitching a gray horse that stood
+patiently between the cart's shafts.
+
+Pieter called the boy over, "Ramsay, this is Mr. Hammersly."
+
+Mr. Hammersly, so-called, turned and thrust forth a huge hand. "Tradin'
+Jack," he amended. "Tradin' Jack Hammersly. You need anythin', I got
+it. Fairer prices as you'll find in Three Points, Chicago, or Milwaukee.
+Need a box of candy for that girl of yours, Ramsay?"
+
+"I haven't any girl," Ramsay said.
+
+"You'll have one," Tradin' Jack declared. "Every young buck like you
+needs a pert doe. Can't get along without 'em, I always say. Yup, you'll
+have one. When you get one, remember Tradin' Jack."
+
+"I will," Ramsay promised.
+
+While Tradin' Jack washed up at the stand beside the back door, Pieter
+led the gray horse to the barn, stripped it of its harness and loosed it
+with the little black horse. The two animals touched friendly noses.
+
+Pieter returned, and all three went in to the groaning table which Marta
+had ready. It seemed a natural thing here, Ramsay observed, to expect
+all passing wayfarers to share whatever there was to be had. Gracefully
+Tradin' Jack lifted the tails of his long black coat and sat down.
+
+"Left Milwaukee day before yesterday," he said. "Stopped off to see the
+Blounts, down at Blounts' Landin'...."
+
+Marta and Pieter Van Hooven gave rapt attention, and even Ramsay found
+himself interested. Aside from being a trader, it appeared that Tradin'
+Jack Hammersly was also a walking newspaper. He knew everything about
+everybody between Three Points and Milwaukee, and between Milwaukee and
+Kenosha. Endlessly he related tales of new babies, new weddings and new
+engagements. Tradin' Jack knew that Wilhelm Schmidt's horse had the
+colic but probably would recover, and that Mrs. Darmstedt, that would
+be the wife of Pete Darmstedt, had shot a black bear right in her own
+front yard.
+
+There was nothing about the people he did not know and not much that he
+was unwilling to tell. Finished, he got down to business. "Any eggs for
+me, Marta?"
+
+"Twenty dozen," she said, "all fresh."
+
+"Fourteen cents a dozen," Tradin' Jack said promptly.
+
+"Yaah," Marta, too, was bargaining now, "I can get that in Three
+Points."
+
+"Take it in trade an' I'll allow you fifteen," Tradin' Jack said. "Got
+to keep my customers sweet."
+
+Before he went to bed Tradin' Jack arranged with Pieter to have a
+butchered pig ready for him when he returned from Three Points the day
+after tomorrow. Two and a half cents a pound he would pay, or two and
+three-quarters if Pieter would take it in trade. He left with the Van
+Hoovens a tempting array of calico, ribbons, needles, pins, a new axe
+and hammer, a box of nails and other things which were always useful and
+always needed.
+
+The next morning Ramsay roused himself out of bed at dawn to find
+Tradin' Jack already gone. He had sensed the storm that was approaching,
+Pieter said, and, if possible, he wanted to get into Three Points before
+it struck. Ramsay felt a strange uneasiness and an unrest. Going
+outside, he saw that yesterday's blue skies had given way to ominous
+masses of gray clouds. His uneasiness mounted.
+
+Something terrible was being brewed within the giant lake, and shortly
+it would erupt. A strong wind sent high waves leaping up onto the
+shore. They fell back, only to be replaced with more waves. Ramsay
+shuddered.
+
+If there was terror in this, there was also grandeur. The lake, angered,
+was a fearful and wonderful spectacle. It was a gargantuan thing which
+seemed to writhe in an agony which, somehow, was created by itself. A
+few drops of rain pattered down. The wind blew harder.
+
+Pieter and Ramsay went to the barn to repair tools, and neither spoke as
+they stared through the barn's open door. The waves were raging now,
+launching endless attacks on the shore and always rolling back.
+
+Suddenly Ramsay leaped to his feet and stifled a cry. Far out in the
+lake's surging gray masses he thought that he had seen something pure
+white. But he could not be sure. A moment later he saw it again. A sail!
+Then he was able clearly to identify a little peanut shell of a boat.
+
+She was the _Spray_, and she was in serious trouble.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FIVE
+
+_RESCUE_
+
+
+A fresh gust of wind sent the waves leaping higher, and for a moment
+only the furious lake could be seen. Ramsay rose, and Pieter rose beside
+him; and both went to the barn door. They stood alert, still not
+speaking and not even certain of what they had seen. Then they saw it
+again.
+
+Beyond any possible doubt it was the _Spray_, and she was working
+valiantly to get into shore. Ramsay swallowed a lump in his throat. He
+had first seen the _Spray_ as a dancing bit of gaiety on a lake as
+stormy as this one, and then she had seemed so sure of herself and so
+capable. Now she was like a shot-wounded duck which, no longer able to
+rise in graceful flight, must lie on the water and flutter desperate
+wings. For another tense moment Ramsay and Pieter stood side by side.
+
+By inches the _Spray_ was fighting her way toward shore, but a glance
+was sufficient to reveal the tremendous odds against her ever making
+safety. Still, even in this terrible dilemma, there was a spirit about
+her which the _Holter_ never had and never could have. The two men on
+the _Spray_--and did not the crazy Dutch fisherman usually carry a crew
+of four?--seemed to be working calmly and easily. There was, from this
+distance, no trace of the near-panic that had reigned when the _Holter_
+went down.
+
+Ramsay knew a moment's intense gratification. This was part of the
+dream, part of the picture he had engraved in his heart when he first
+saw the _Spray_ and her skipper. When they challenged the lake, they
+accepted it in all its aspects. Now they were behaving as all fishermen
+should behave. Before they could even begin to follow their trade they
+must make an unbreakable pact with their fortune on the water, be it
+good or bad.
+
+Then the trance was broken. Out on the lake, within sight of Pieter and
+Ramsay, men were about to die. They must not die if there was any way to
+help them. As though their eyes were guided by one common impulse, both
+men looked toward Pieter's small boat.
+
+It was a clumsy craft, strongly-built of heavy timbers which Pieter
+himself had hand-sawed in his spare time. Usually, when Pieter wasn't
+using the boat, it was pulled high enough on the beach so storm-driven
+battering rams of waves could not touch it, and so it was now. Side by
+side, with no need to speak, Pieter and Ramsay left the barn and raced
+toward the boat.
+
+Wind-driven rain soaked their clothing before they had gone ten feet,
+but they paid no attention to it. Kneeling, one on either side of the
+fourteen-foot boat, they strove to push it back into the lake. Pieter
+shouted to make himself heard above the roar of the wind and the
+smashing waves. "Wait!"
+
+Ramsay stopped pushing while Pieter took the long oars out of their
+locks and laid them lengthwise in the boat. The boy nodded approvingly.
+As things were, it seemed all but impossible to launch the boat. If they
+launched it and lost an oar in the high seas, they were doomed to
+disaster, anyhow.
+
+"Now!" Pieter shouted.
+
+The boat scraped a deep furrow in the wet sand as, with a concerted
+effort, they pushed it backwards. Not looking at the savage combers,
+Ramsay gave all his attention to the boat. They would have to work with
+all possible speed to get it into the lake and the oars in place,
+because the waves were rising to enormous heights now. He felt the
+boat's square stern touch water.
+
+Then an irresistible giant, a force that would bear no interference,
+took hold and shoved the little craft almost as far up on the beach as
+it had been when they tried to launch it. Leaving the boat half-filled
+with water, the smashing wave washed away from the wet sand.
+
+Ramsay stood erect to catch his breath. They had given all their
+strength to backing the boat into the lake, and as they were about to
+succeed it had been plucked from their hands as easily as a strong man
+might snatch a flower from the hands of a baby. He glanced out across
+the water to assure himself that the _Spray_ was still floating, then
+looked desperately at Pieter.
+
+"Nose first!" Pieter said. "Turn it around!"
+
+He shouted to make himself heard, but there was about him an almost
+maddening calmness as he worked. Ramsay restrained his impatience. They
+must not lose a second's time; but if they were going to do this at all,
+it must be done exactly right. Both on one side of the boat, they
+raised it to let the water spill out.
+
+In spite of his drenched clothing and the cold air that blew in from the
+lake, Ramsay was sweating. Pieter's boat had been built by a farmer, not
+a fisherman. It was all right on a calm day when Pieter wanted to go
+fishing, but certainly it had never been built to weather storms. So
+heavy was the craft that the combined strength of two men was needed to
+tip the water from it.
+
+They let the boat drop heavily back on its side, and the oars fell out.
+Still calmly, refusing to become excited, Pieter picked them up and
+placed them in the oar locks. Again Ramsay understood. Both men knew
+this for a furious storm but both had underestimated its fury. At the
+best, should they be able to get the boat into the lake, they would have
+a split second to float her and the oars had to be ready. It was better
+to take a chance on losing an oar than to have the boat driven back onto
+the beach.
+
+Kneeling, Ramsay felt his muscles stand out like stretched cords as he
+gave every ounce of strength to turning the boat around. He was sweating
+again--and short of breath. Only the pressing urgency and the great need
+for immediate action gave him the strength to continue.
+
+Then the craft seemed to move a little easier, and Ramsay glanced around
+to see Marta working beside them. Noting them from the house, and
+understanding their mission, she had thrown a shawl about her shoulders
+and raced out to help. With almost maddening slowness the boat turned
+until its curved nose faced the lake.
+
+Ramsay on one side and Pieter on the other slid it down the wet sand
+toward the water. The boy bit his lip fiercely to help keep control of
+himself. Nothing must go amiss here, and a wrong or panic-stricken move
+could mean disaster. Because this launching demanded machine-like
+precision, Ramsay fought to control the fire in his brain. Carefully he
+thought out each exact step.
+
+Get the boat into the lake until it floated. Then leap in beside Pieter,
+grab an oar and time his strokes to Pieter's. Fight their way out to the
+stricken _Spray_ and rescue those aboard her.
+
+It seemed a simple matter, but never before in his whole life had Ramsay
+faced anything more complex. It couldn't be done, his mind said, while
+at the same time something else told him that it could and must be done.
+He glanced around and curiously, as though the picture were registering
+somewhere other than in his own eyes, he saw Marta Van Hooven.
+
+She was standing at the edge of the lake, her dress and shawl sodden-wet
+and her rain-soaked blond hair clinging like a seal's fur to her head
+and shoulders. One hand covered her mouth, as though to stifle a cry
+that was half-born there, and in her eyes were a great pleading and a
+great prayer as she watched her husband. But the cry did not find life.
+She uttered no sound. While she did not want Pieter to go, at the same
+time she knew that he must. Only if help came did anyone left alive on
+the _Spray_ have even a faint chance of staying alive.
+
+Then they were in the lake, and a mighty wave burst like a water-filled
+bomb about them. It staggered Ramsay and sent him reeling, but it did
+not unnerve him. Because he had practised in his own imagination what he
+must do from here on in, he could do it.
+
+He felt cold water creeping about his shoes and then up around his
+knees. The boat which they had been dragging steadied itself as they
+reached water in which it could float. Through the blinding spray that
+lashed at them Ramsay looked across at Pieter. He saw him only
+indistinctly, but it was as though they read each other's thoughts. At
+exactly the same moment they flung themselves into opposite sides of the
+rower's seat and each grabbed an oar. The boy bent his back to the
+man-killing job of rowing.
+
+The boat was sluggish, and again half-filled with water. But it floated,
+and as soon as they were free of the mighty waves that smashed against
+the beach it floated a little more easily. Ramsay looked back across the
+steel-gray turmoil to see the Van Hooven farm, and Marta still on the
+shore. Then he returned all his attention to the task at hand.
+
+The lake was an insane thing, bent on destruction. They went into the
+trough of a wave and rose on the next one. Ramsay risked a fleeting
+backward glance to see the _Spray_, much nearer the shore and still
+afloat.
+
+Suddenly they were in an almost-calm stretch of water. Ramsay felt cold
+fear run up and down his spine. He had met this on the sinking _Holter_,
+and now here it was again. Almost fearfully he glanced sidewise at
+Pieter, but he could not speak because the screaming wind would have
+drowned his words as soon as he uttered them. His eyes grew big.
+
+Just behind, and again on the right side, an apparition drifted out of
+the depths. It was a ghost figure, a thing born of nightmares. Ramsay
+gasped. The White Sturgeon nosed to the surface, drifted lazily for a
+moment and disappeared back into the watery depths out of which it had
+come.
+
+Ramsay risked a sidewise glance at Pieter, whose face remained
+undisturbed, and he swallowed the lump in his own throat. Sailors might
+fear the White Sturgeon, but if Pieter did, he was not showing his fear.
+The boy told himself again that the sturgeon was a fish, nothing more or
+less than a great fish which, through some freak of nature, was colored
+white. But it did seem to appear only when death and destruction stalked
+the lake. He forced such thoughts from his mind.
+
+They were again in storm-lashed water, striving to keep their boat
+straight and headed toward the _Spray_. Vast waves bore down upon them,
+plunging the little craft into their cold troughs and then shooting it
+up as though it were a plaything. From the crest of the waves Ramsay
+could still see the _Spray_. He worried. Now there seemed to be only one
+man aboard her.
+
+There was a sharp, sickening crack and the sound of splintering wood,
+that rose above the roar of the wind and the surge of the waves. The
+boat slewed sideways, and for the first time Pieter Van Hooven's face
+betrayed emotion. He brought in the stump of oar remaining in his hand
+and, at the risk of upsetting the little boat, leaned across the seat to
+snatch Ramsay's oar from its lock. With that in his hand, he made a
+precarious way to the stern. He thrust the oar over the rear seat,
+trying to use it as a rudder, and the boy strove to overcome the fear he
+felt.
+
+The White Sturgeon, the sailors' superstition said, always brought
+disaster. If you see it, the little deck hand had told Ramsay, you can
+start praying right afterwards. For one terror-filled moment their
+predictions seemed correct. Twice Ramsay had seen the White Sturgeon;
+each time he had been in immediate danger of death. Then superstition
+subsided and reason came back to his aid.
+
+Crouching in the back seat, with only one oar, Pieter Van Hooven was
+doing his best to fight the angry lake. Though he was a farmer,
+obviously he knew something of seamanship.
+
+For a brief moment, just long enough to keep from capsizing, he kept the
+little boat headed into the onrushing waves. When he turned it, he did
+so skilfully. Working the oar only with the strength in his hard-muscled
+arms, he headed back towards shore. A mighty wave smashed the stern,
+throwing cold water over them and across the tiny craft. Ramsay moved
+from side to side, doing all he could to help Pieter by shifting his
+weight to where it was needed most. The boat was three-quarters filled
+with water. Never made for a heavy sea, now it was an almost dead thing.
+But so strong were the waves and so powerful the wind, that they were
+driven at almost motor speed back into the beach. Ramsay had one glimpse
+of Marta.
+
+Pieter lost the little control he had. Turning sidewise, the boat lifted
+like a matchstick on the crest of a giant wave and spun dizzily down
+into the trough. It was lifted again, and just before it turned over
+Ramsay flung himself clear. As he did, he saw Pieter go over with him.
+
+He dived as deeply as he could, knowing that the boat would come
+crashing down and knowing also that it would kill him if it struck him
+on the head. Far into the lake he went, swimming under water and groping
+his way. He surfaced to see the craft to one side and a bobbing object,
+which he thought was the head of Pieter Van Hooven. A second later a
+tremendous wave deposited him on the sandy beach.
+
+He lay gasping, all the breath knocked out of him, and he wished
+desperately to get out of the path of the waves that were breaking over
+him. But it seemed impossible to move. His mind urged him to go, but he
+lacked the physical strength to obey. Then he felt a pair of hands in
+his armpits, and his body was dragged over the scraping sand. Ramsay
+looked up to see the frightened face of Marta Van Hooven.
+
+"Can you move?" she pleaded.
+
+"Gi--give me a minute!"
+
+For what seemed an interminable time, but could not have been more than
+twenty seconds, Ramsay lay still. He turned over so that he lay face
+down, and lifted himself with his arms. His legs and feet were made of
+jelly. Vaguely he was aware of Marta and Pieter Van Hooven, one on each
+side, lifting him to his feet. A second later his strength returned.
+
+Keening in from the lake, the wind made him stagger backwards. Reaching
+mountainous heights, the breaking waves shattered themselves far up on
+the beach. Ramsay looked across them. About two hundred yards out, the
+_Spray_ was completely crippled. Trailing from her broken mast, the
+sail bled water into the angry lake. Down at the bows, the fisherman's
+boat seemed hung up on a rock or reef. Every second wave that washed in
+broke completely over her and hid her from view. But the single man
+remaining on board still worked calmly with the broken half of an oar,
+to free the _Spray_ from her prison.
+
+Ramsay allowed himself another split second. The entire dream was coming
+true. There were some men who, to the last, could meet the challenge of
+the lake with grace and spirit. The man on the _Spray_, identified even
+at this distance as Hans Van Doorst, had not given up.
+
+The boy whirled on Pieter Van Hooven. "A coil of rope!" he ejaculated.
+
+Without waiting to see whether or not Pieter followed his instructions,
+he raced for the barn. Snatching a bridle from its wooden peg, he went
+more slowly toward the corral where the little black horse was confined.
+
+This had happened once before and it might happen again. A man's
+strength was as nothing in the raging lake, but a horse was many times
+as strong as a man. The black horse had brought him safely in when all
+the others had drowned.
+
+The little horse arched his neck and flicked his ears when his young
+friend approached and patted him.
+
+"Easy," Ramsay said reassuringly. "Take it easy, Black."
+
+The little horse rested his head over the boy's shoulder for a moment,
+then the latter stepped back to slip the bit into Black's mouth, put the
+bridle over his ears and buckle the throat latch. The horse followed
+willingly behind him as he pushed the corral's gate aside.
+
+He mounted, and Black reared and pranced, just to prove that he could.
+Ramsay tried not to look at the lake, but he couldn't help looking. When
+he did, very lonely in the gray waves, he saw the reef- or rock-bound
+_Spray_. The lone fisherman still could be seen, working to free his
+craft.
+
+Ramsay leaned forward to pat the little horse on the neck. "We can do
+it," he murmured. "Let's prove it."
+
+He took the bridle reins in his hand and trotted Black toward the
+foaming lake. Pieter, his eyes grave, tossed him a coil of half-inch
+rope. Ramsay had one glimpse of Marta's anguished face. He slipped the
+coil of rope over his shoulder and did not look back.
+
+As they approached the lake, the horse hesitated, to paw the sand with a
+front hoof. He looked around to eye the rider on his back, and again
+Ramsay leaned forward. "All right," he said. "Go on."
+
+The horse accepted his words but, more than that, his confidence. Guided
+by the bridle's touch, he walked willingly into the pounding lake.
+Another water bomb exploded about them. They submerged, but Black came
+up swimming strongly. Ramsay kept soft fingers on the bridle reins, not
+wanting to exert any pressure or do anything else that might divert the
+horse from the job at hand.
+
+Tossing his head, Black sneezed to empty his nose of water that had
+washed into it. He was timing himself capably and almost perfectly to
+meet the waves at their place of least resistance, and he rose and fell
+with them. From the crests Ramsay could see the _Spray_. From the
+troughs he could see nothing. A lump rose in his throat.
+
+The _Spray_ was indeed sadly wounded. Only part of her stern showed
+above water. Hans Van Doorst still worked with a broken oar to free his
+boat, and as soon as he came near enough Ramsay knew that he had been
+right.
+
+The Dutch fisherman had been one with the lake when Ramsay first saw
+him, and he was one with it now. Unafraid, he fought the lake as
+gracefully as a swordsman. Perched on the broken stump of mast, the sea
+gull fluttered his wings and clicked his mandibles.
+
+Ramsay gauged the situation as precisely as he could. If he could throw
+his rope over the stranded _Spray_, the little horse might be able to
+pull it from its anchor and back to shore. Ramsay saw Hans Van Doorst
+turn to watch him. The fisherman waved a friendly hand.
+
+Still guiding Black lightly, imposing no undue strain on the reins or
+bit, Ramsay steered him across the _Spray's_ sunken prow. He let the
+reins hang slackly on the horse's neck and took the coil of rope from
+his shoulder. As precisely as he could, he cast and watched the rope
+snake through the air.
+
+A sick feeling arose in the pit of his stomach and he moaned audibly. He
+had calculated the distance correctly but he had not allowed for the
+strength of the wind. The rope missed Hans Van Doorst's outstretched
+hands by two feet and fell into the angry lake. Of his own volition,
+Black turned back toward shore. Ramsay saw the squawking sea gull bounce
+a couple of feet into the air and spread his long wings. Grasping the
+reins, for the first time the boy used strength as he strove to turn the
+horse back. He glanced over his shoulder to see what might be done next,
+and gasped.
+
+Hans Van Doorst had gone to the raised stern of his wrecked boat to give
+himself a running start, and as Ramsay looked, he dived. Leaping as far
+as possible from the _Spray_ to avoid striking the rock, he hurled
+himself into the storm-lashed lake, straight at his would-be rescuers.
+For a few seconds that seemed like hours, he disappeared into the
+churning depths, but when he surfaced he was squarely behind Ramsay and
+he used both hands to grasp the horse's tail.
+
+Black turned back toward shore. He swam more strongly now because he was
+going with the wind instead of against it, and his double burden did not
+seem unduly heavy. Ramsay saw Pieter and Marta Van Hooven, Pieter's hand
+protectingly over his wife's shoulder, as they waited to see what would
+happen.
+
+The last wave burst around them and they were back on shore. Instantly
+Ramsay slid from the little horse's back and looked around. A nausea
+seized him. Hans Van Doorst was no longer in sight. Ramsay had tried and
+failed. He glanced toward the _Spray_, as though he expected to see the
+crazy Dutch fisherman still there, and knew only that waves were
+smashing the boat into kindling wood.
+
+Then, as though he had literally risen from the lake, Hans Van Doorst
+picked himself up from the wreckage of a breaking wave and walked
+ashore. His tame sea gull fluttered out of the sky to alight on its
+master's shoulder. The Dutchman reached up to stroke his pet as he
+looked at Pieter and Ramsay. "None but me and Captain Klaus?" he asked.
+
+"None, Hans," Pieter said.
+
+For a moment an infinite sadness, a melancholy born thousands of years
+ago in the first fisherman who had seen his mates lost, pervaded the
+Dutchman. But it was only for a moment. Pieter and Ramsay walked to his
+side and offered their assistance. He declined it.
+
+"I'll walk," he said.
+
+Ramsay felt a great warmth for and a vast sympathy with this man who,
+while daring all and losing all, could remain so very human. Marta
+hovered solicitously near as they all went up to the house and wore
+their dripping clothes into her immaculate kitchen. Hans Van Doorst sat
+down, tried to fold his arms across his chest, and winced.
+
+"You're hurt!" Marta cried.
+
+"It is nothing." The Dutch fisherman looked at the three. "It happened
+out on the lake. We struck something, I do not know what. Perhaps the
+half-submerged hull of a sunken ship. Then we were in trouble."
+
+Marta was stooping beside him, gently unbuttoning his soaking-wet shirt.
+Hans Van Doorst looked fondly down at her wet and bedraggled hair, and
+he offered no protest as his upper body was bared. There was a vast,
+ugly scar on the right side of his chest, and when Marta touched him
+there his ribs moved. The Dutchman sat very straight in his chair.
+Though he must have felt pain, he showed none.
+
+Ramsay and Pieter stood aside while Marta worked expertly. Ripping one
+of her snow-white sheets into strips, she wound a bandage tightly around
+Hans Van Doorst's broken ribs. Ramsay and Pieter looked significantly at
+each other. Such an injury _might_ have resulted when wind or a heavy
+wave flung the fisherman against something. Probably it had happened
+when Hans flung himself forward in an effort to rescue a shipmate.
+
+Marta finished her bandaging and stepped back. "You rest now."
+
+He grinned at her. "Fishermen have no time for rest."
+
+"Do as she says, Hans," Pieter urged.
+
+"Come," said Marta. She went to a bedroom, opened the door and waited
+expectantly.
+
+Hans Van Doorst spread eloquent hands. "Who can argue with a woman?" he
+asked. "Especially a Dutch woman?"
+
+He rose, went into the room, and closed the door behind him. Ten minutes
+later, Marta opened the door a crack and peeked in. She entered, and
+came out with Hans Van Doorst's clothing.
+
+"He sleeps," she announced. "Like a man worn out he sleeps."
+
+Ramsay changed his wet clothes for some dry ones Pieter had given him
+and went out to catch Black. From the house's ridge pole, Captain Klaus,
+Hans Van Doorst's tame sea gull, squawked at him. Ramsay grinned back,
+walked up to the little horse, rubbed him down, and put him back in the
+corral. He did the rest of his chores, and when he went into the house
+for dinner Hans Van Doorst was seated at the table.
+
+"I told him!" Marta scolded. "I told him to stay in bed and I would
+bring him his food. But can I talk reason to a Dutchman?"
+
+"Marta," Hans Van Doorst said softly, "there is fishing to be done."
+
+Eager interest glowed in Pieter's eyes. "Are you going again, Hans?"
+
+"I am a fisherman."
+
+"You are crazy," Marta corrected. "One day you will kill yourself on
+that lake."
+
+Again the sadness, the inborn melancholy, sat like a mask on the Dutch
+fisherman. But only for a moment.
+
+"Marta," he said, "fishermen do not die in bed."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SIX
+
+_NEW VENTURE_
+
+
+Ramsay stirred sleepily and raised a restless hand to shield his eyes
+from the morning sun. Almost the whole night through, until the first
+waking birds had begun to chatter just outside his window, he had lain
+restlessly awake. Just thinking of Hans Van Doorst, and fishing, had not
+permitted him to sleep.
+
+Now, with the sun high, he was at last deep in slumber. Ramsay could not
+know that Pieter had arisen shortly after the first birds and had the
+milking all finished, or that Hans Van Doorst sat in the kitchen, eating
+the hearty breakfast which Marta had prepared for him. He knew only that
+he seemed to be hearing strange sounds.
+
+There were throaty chucklings and gurglings and low-pitched laughter,
+and all of it was punctuated by raucous squawks. Troubled, Ramsay rolled
+over in bed and covered his head with the quilt. Even that did not shut
+out the sounds, and finally he came fully awake. Sleepy-eyed,
+tousle-haired, he sat up in bed.
+
+For a moment he could not define the sounds, which seemed to originate
+very near the roof of the house, and he was puzzled. Then he identified
+the various noises a sea gull makes. Ramsay slipped out of bed, pushed
+the double windows open, and looked into a calm morning.
+
+There was a rustle of wings overhead and a flutter of feathers. Captain
+Klaus took strong wing to circle the house. He swung back to alight on
+the window ledge, and tilted his head sidewise while he regarded Ramsay
+with bright, intelligent eyes. "_Qu-uark!_" he chattered.
+
+Ramsay grinned, but when he put out a hand to touch him Captain Klaus
+again took flight and sailed down to the now-calm lake. He alighted on
+the shore, folded his wings across his back, and walked down the beach
+until he found a storm-killed perch. With the fish in his bill, he flew
+back to the house's ridge-pole to eat his breakfast while he awaited the
+reappearance of Hans Van Doorst.
+
+A little bit embarrassed, Ramsay dressed hurriedly. The working day in
+this country began with dawn and ended with dark. Everything that needed
+doing--and there was much to be done--had to be crowded into such
+daylight as there was, and there was never enough. Hurrying down the
+steps leading to the kitchen, he saw Hans Van Doorst at the table. Marta
+greeted him pleasantly, "Good morning."
+
+"Good morning," Ramsay replied. "I overslept! I didn't mean to. Why
+didn't somebody call me?"
+
+"Yaah!" Marta laughed. "Pieter said not to. You earned your sleep,
+Pieter said. Sit down with Hans and have some breakfast."
+
+Hans said, "Men who are not hungry are sick. Sit down."
+
+Ramsay sat, and felt a free and easy sense of comradeship, as though he
+and the Dutch fisherman had something in common. They felt alike and
+thought alike. Hans Van Doorst had thanked Ramsay with his eyes for
+rescuing him, but not once had he spoken of it and not once had he
+mentioned the wreck of the _Spray_. The boy was grateful for that; he
+knew that he would be embarrassed if his part in yesterday's incident
+were brought into the limelight.
+
+Marta busied herself at the big wood-burning stove, and Ramsay
+speculated on the difficulties involved in just getting such a stove
+into this country. Marta laughed. "While I make you the breakfast, you
+listen to the crazy tales the crazy fisherman tells you."
+
+Hans turned his twinkling eyes on Ramsay. "Marta is a good girl," he
+said. "A good Dutch girl. She thinks all men are crazy."
+
+"They all are," Marta said. "Especially you. What you need is a good
+farm and stay away from that wild lake."
+
+"Farms and me wouldn't get along, Marta." Hans laughed. "I told you I'm
+a fisherman."
+
+"Yaah? You lost everything with the _Spray_. How are you going to go
+fishing again?"
+
+Hans spread his two powerful hands. "These are what I had when I
+started. These are what I have now."
+
+"You need money, too. Money for nets, money for ..."
+
+The door opened and Pieter came in for breakfast. Hanging his light
+jacket on a wooden peg in the hallway, he took his seat at the table.
+"Why does Hans need so much money?" he asked.
+
+"He says he's going fishing again." Marta sniffed. "I've been telling
+him that he should get a farm, and we can put him up until he gets one,
+and ..."
+
+"Are you really going fishing?" Pieter broke in.
+
+"That I am. I'm a fisherman. Now look, Pieter, you get up at dawn to
+milk your cows. No? To be sure, you get all the milk you can drink; but
+if you're lucky, Tradin' Jack Hammersly gives you maybe half of what
+your butter's worth. All winter long and all summer long you work for
+those cows. A fisherman, now, he works for four months, just
+four. . . ."
+
+Pieter said, "It sounds good!"
+
+"Pieter!" Marta broke in sharply. "You are _not_ going fishing!"
+
+Pieter wriggled uncomfortably. "Well," he said, "I can at least listen
+to what the man says, can't I?"
+
+"One haul of the nets," Hans continued, "and maybe one thousand, maybe
+two thousand pounds of whitefish. Never less than five hundred. For that
+you get six cents a pound in the Chicago market. You don't earn that on
+your farm, and besides, fishing is a lot more fun. A smart Dutchman
+don't have to tend cows."
+
+"_Uaah!_" Pieter breathed.
+
+"Pieter!" Marta said.
+
+Ramsay listened, dazzled by the prospects of a fisherman's life as
+compared to any future a farmer might have. Determinedly Marta brought a
+huge dish of wheat cakes and sausage over and thumped it firmly down on
+the table.
+
+"Eat!" she commanded.
+
+The three gave all their attention to the food, and they did not speak
+while eating. Then Hans pushed his chair back.
+
+"If I am going to fish again, I must start," he announced. "First I
+will go down and see if there is any salvage."
+
+"We'll help you!" Pieter exclaimed. "My boat was not badly smashed. A
+little work and it will be good as new."
+
+"Pieter!" Marta said. "You are not going fishing!"
+
+"Now I ask you," Pieter said plaintively, "is helping a man pick up his
+own property, his very own property, is that fishing? Could anyone even
+think it was fishing? No. Come on."
+
+The three left the kitchen and walked down to the lake. Calm after the
+storm that had raged across it, only little waves were washing in.
+Ramsay looked out at the rock, as though half expecting to see the
+_Spray_ still there, and saw nothing. Pieter gave a triumphant little
+exclamation and waded into shallow water to pick up something that
+bobbed back and forth.
+
+It was the carved Valkyrie maiden that had been the _Spray's_
+figurehead. Exquisitely and almost perfectly hand-carved, the wooden
+statue leaned forward, as though she would embrace the whole lake to her
+bosom.
+
+Hans Van Doorst's eyes were soft as he took it from Pieter. "My
+sweetheart!" he murmured.
+
+Captain Klaus winged down from the ridge pole of the house to alight
+near them. Clucking softly to himself, happy because Hans was once more
+with him, he followed the three men down the beach. Ramsay found a coil
+of rope, then another, and farther on was the _Spray's_ torn sail.
+Ramsay pointed out onto the lake.
+
+"About there is where we saw the White Sturgeon," he said.
+
+"I know," Hans Van Doorst murmured. "We saw him a half-dozen times."
+
+Ramsay looked at him, puzzled. Then, "The sailors told me he always
+brings bad luck."
+
+"The sailors!" Hans scoffed. "They know nothing about anything except
+maybe how to stuff themselves with good whitefish that the fishermen
+bring them! The White Sturgeon noses his way to the top when a storm
+comes, so he is bad luck? Do not believe it! He is good luck! He comes
+to the top so that he may show fishermen the way back to shore!"
+
+Ramsay grinned appreciatively. This, in spite of the fact that the Dutch
+fisherman's idea of the White Sturgeon bringing good luck was as
+superstitious as the sailors' notion that he always brought bad, fitted
+in. It was what Hans should have said.
+
+"How big is that sturgeon?" Ramsay asked.
+
+"The Grandfather of all lake fish," Hans Van Doorst asserted solemnly.
+"Have you not noticed that, like all grandfathers, he is white? In
+truth, I have never seen a bigger fish anywhere."
+
+"Another coil of rope!" Pieter said, pouncing on it.
+
+Hans, who had grinned happily with each new find, did not even look
+around. Ramsay looked at him questioningly. Anything but stolid, the
+Dutch fisherman had been bubbling over at the prospect of going fishing
+again. Now he seemed melancholy, immersed within himself, and his whole
+attention was given to the lake.
+
+Ramsay followed his gaze, but saw little. True, a vast number of small
+aquatic worms had been washed ashore by the pounding waves. There must
+have been countless millions of them, so many that they formed a living
+carpet as far up the beach as the waves had washed. The wriggling,
+writhing mass was now disentangling itself, and the worms that could
+were crawling back into the lake. A number of sea gulls and a number of
+land birds were gorging themselves, and new birds arrived by the flock.
+They scarcely made a dent in the multitude of worms. Ramsay looked again
+at Hans Van Doorst.
+
+"Never, never!" the fisherman breathed.
+
+Pieter, too, swung to look curiously at him. "What's the matter, Hans?"
+
+"I went on the lake when I was a boy of thirteen," Hans Van Doorst said.
+"That was fourteen years ago, in 1852. I thought I had seen much, but
+never have I seen this!"
+
+"What?" Ramsay asked impatiently.
+
+"Look around you," Hans said. "What do you see?"
+
+"Worms."
+
+"Not worms! Food for whitefish! With these millions washed up, can you
+not imagine the vast amount remaining in the water? We are all rich
+men!"
+
+"You think so?" Pieter queried.
+
+"There is no doubt of it! The whitefish go where their food is! There
+must be countless tons of whitefish here at your very door step, and
+here is where we shall fish!"
+
+"Do whitefish eat only worms?" Ramsay asked.
+
+"No. They feed on other things, too, notably their own spawn or that of
+other fish. But enough of this idle talk! I must have a net so we can
+start fishing at once! Pieter, I would borrow your horse and cart!"
+
+"The cart you may have," Pieter said. "The horse belongs to Ramsay."
+
+"Go ahead and take him," Ramsay urged.
+
+Hans tripped like a dancer to the barn, caught the little horse, and
+backed him between the shafts of Pieter's two-wheeled cart. Bubbling
+like a boiling kettle, entirely happy, he started at a fast trot up the
+sand beach to Three Points. With a startled squawk, Captain Klaus
+hurried to catch up. The tame sea gull settled affectionately on the rim
+of the cart's seat.
+
+As Ramsay watched him go, he felt a vast envy of the light-hearted
+fisherman. If ever he could go away like that, he thought, he would have
+lived life at its fullest. Not until he looked around did he discover
+that Pieter was watching too, and his eyes were wistful.
+
+"There is work to be done!" Marta called.
+
+They flushed and walked towards the barnyard, where Marta was tending
+her poultry. Geese, chickens and ducks swarmed around her and pigeons
+alighted on her shoulders. She kept her eyes on the men.
+
+As Ramsay and Pieter cleaned the cowbarn, both remained strangely
+silent. Both thought of the Dutch fisherman. Then Pieter, who had
+promised to have a dressed pig ready for Tradin' Jack Hammersly, started
+honing a razor edge on his butchering tools. Ramsay picked up a hoe,
+preparatory to returning to the corn-patch.
+
+"You think he'll get a net?" Pieter asked.
+
+"I hope so!"
+
+Moodily, scarcely seeing or knowing what he was doing, Ramsay chopped at
+weeds that had stolen a home in the growing corn. The work suddenly
+lacked any flavor whatever. Millions of worms, whitefish food, washed up
+on the beach and the bay in front of Pieter's swarming with whitefish!
+That's what the Dutch fisherman had said. Marta brought his mid-morning
+lunch, and her eyes were troubled.
+
+"Do you think Hans will get what he wants?" she asked.
+
+"I don't know. Marta, why don't you want Pieter to go fishing?"
+
+"You heard what he said. Last night he said it. Fishermen do not die in
+bed. Those were his words."
+
+"Just talk. The lake's safe enough."
+
+"Yaah? Is that why Joe Mannis can make more money than anybody else
+around here, just watchin' bodies? Aah! I worry about my man!"
+
+Ramsay said gently, "Don't worry, Marta."
+
+Marta returned to the house and Ramsay continued working. In back of the
+barn Pieter had his butchered pig strung up on a block and tackle, and
+the two men looked at each other. Both were waiting for Hans Van Doorst
+to return.
+
+About a half-hour before noon Captain Klaus soared back to his
+accustomed place on the house's ridge pole. A moment later the little
+black horse appeared on the beach, and Hans drove to the barn.
+
+Ramsay and Pieter, meeting him, stifled their astonishment. When Hans
+left them, to all outward appearances he had been a normal person. Now
+blood had dried on his nose and his right eye was puffy and streaked
+with color. Anger seethed within him.
+
+"There is no honor any more!" he said bitterly. "And men are not men!"
+
+"What happened?" Ramsay inquired.
+
+"What happened? I went to Three Points to get us a pound net! Carefully
+did I explain to that frog-mouthed Fontan, whose wife knits the best
+pound nets on Lake Michigan, what I wanted. I know pound nets cost five
+hundred dollars, but I was very careful to prove that we have untold
+riches just waiting to be caught! As soon as we made some catches, I
+said, we would pay him his money, plus a bonus for his trouble. Fontan
+became abusive."
+
+"Then what?" Pieter said.
+
+"He hit me twice. Because of these thrice-cursed broken ribs I cannot
+move as swiftly as I should. Then I hit him once, and the last I saw of
+him he was lying on one of his wife's pound nets. After that came the
+constable who, as everybody knows, is merely another one of Devil Chad's
+playthings, and said he would put me in jail. It was necessary to hit
+the constable, too."
+
+Hans Van Doorst leaned against the side of the barn, glumly lost in his
+own bitter thoughts. Coming from the house to meet Hans and sensing the
+men's moodiness, Marta fell silent beside her husband. Ramsay unhitched
+the little black horse, put him back into the corral, and hung the
+harness on its wooden pegs.
+
+After five minutes, Pieter Van Hooven broke the thick silence. "I do not
+know whether or not it will be any good, perhaps not. But last year a
+fisherman came here in a very small boat. He was going to Three Points,
+he said, to get himself a larger boat and he had to make time. I do not
+know what happened to him, for he never came back and I have not seen
+him since. Probably Joe Mannis got him. But before he took his leave he
+asked me to store for him a box of nets and ..."
+
+"A box of nets!" Hans Van Doorst's melancholy left him like a wind-blown
+puff of feathers. He put an almost passionate arm about Pieter's
+shoulders. "All is lost! All is gone! Then this--this miracle worker! He
+talks of a box of nets! Tell me, Pieter! Tell me it is still there!"
+
+"It must be, for it was never taken away," Pieter said.
+
+"Then let us get it! Let us get and look at it before I faint with
+excitement!"
+
+Pieter and Hans disappeared in the barn, and a moment later they
+reappeared with a long, deep wooden box between them. Having lain in the
+barn for a year, the box and its contents were thick with dust and
+spiders had woven their own gossamer nets everywhere. Hans Van Doorst
+patted the dust away. He looked with ecstatic eyes, and he unfolded a
+few feet of the net. Ramsay saw that it was similar to the gill net
+insofar as it had stones--sinkers--on one side and a place for floats on
+the other. Made of sixteen-thread twine, the net had a three-inch mesh.
+
+"A seine," Hans Van Doorst pronounced, "and a well-made seine, though it
+was not made in Two Rivers. It was brought here by one of the Ohio
+fishermen, for that is the way they tie their meshes. Let us see some
+more. I would say that it is about eight hundred feet long. That is not
+ample; we still need good pound nets, but with it we may again go
+fishing. Help me, Pieter."
+
+Pieter and Hans dragged the box to a small tree, tied one end of the
+seine to the tree's trunk, and began to unwind the net toward another
+little tree. Ramsay saw how shrewdly the Dutch fisherman had guessed.
+The trees, within a few feet one way or the other, were just about eight
+hundred feet apart and Hans Van Doorst tied the other end of the seine
+to the far tree. He stood still, a small happy grin lighting his face,
+and looked at their discovery.
+
+Slowly, with Ramsay, Marta and Pieter trailing him, he started to walk
+the length of the seine as it lay on the ground. He kept his eyes
+downward, and as he walked along he talked almost to himself. "A good
+seine, yes, a good seine, but it has received hard use. Here is almost
+five feet where it scraped among sharp rocks, and the mesh is worn.
+Under a heavy load of fish, it will break. That hole was made by a
+sunken log or other object, for you can see that it is a clean tear.
+This one was made by a huge fish, probably a sturgeon, for just see how
+the mesh is mangled where he lunged time after time against it. Now this
+. . ."
+
+Slowly, missing no inch of the seine, he traveled the length of it, and
+as he traveled he marked every hole and weak spot by telling himself
+about it. Reaching the end, he stood nervously tapping a finger against
+his forehead. "My hands are more accustomed to pulling seines than
+mending them," he told the three. "Still, if we are to make the catch we
+can make, this seine must be mended. I will try to mend it."
+
+"I worked on a net in Three Points!" Ramsay said eagerly. "I stayed for
+a while with Pierre LeDou, and because there was nothing else to kill
+time, I helped Madame LeDou knit a gill net! This cannot be too
+different!"
+
+"You!" For a moment Ramsay thought Hans was going to kiss him. "So!
+Everything works our way! Yaah? You fix the seine!" His face fell. "No.
+We must have new twine. Now where will I get it?"
+
+"I have some," Marta spoke up. "Good linen twine, easily a match for
+anything in this seine."
+
+"And you would give it?" Pieter asked incredulously.
+
+Marta shrugged. "You're going fishing, anyway, and I'm going with you.
+Men always want all the fun."
+
+The smile Hans turned on her was rare. "A good Dutch girl," he said.
+"Thank you, Marta."
+
+Pieter and Hans cut tripods--three poles strung together at the top to
+form a standard--and at necessary intervals raised the seine to them so
+that it was completely off the ground. Like a huge tennis net, broken
+only by the tripods, it stretched between the two trees. Ramsay stood
+beside it with a one and one-half inch meshboard--this mesh was three
+inches--and a ball of the fine linen twine which Marta had given him.
+
+He worked as fast as he could, while at the same time he did not
+sacrifice efficiency. More than ever fishing seemed to be an art within
+itself, and if the seine were not perfectly made, then it was better
+left alone. A slipshod or hasty knot could cost them a hundred pounds of
+fish, or even the seine itself. As Ramsay went along, he judged for
+himself which parts needed repairing. Any mesh that seemed to be worn
+must be replaced; a whole school of fish might follow each other through
+a single hole.
+
+For half an hour Hans stood watching him. Then, satisfied that Ramsay
+knew what he was about, he went off to cut new floats and place them on
+top of the seine. A dozen times he went down to study the bay, looking
+carefully and judging for himself the depth at which they would find the
+largest schools of whitefish. Coming back, he adjusted the stone sinkers
+accordingly.
+
+Absorbed in his work, Ramsay gave no thought to the passage of time
+until Marta called him for supper. As soon as he had finished eating, he
+returned to the net. Darkness deepened and still he worked on.
+
+"Ach!" Marta said. "You'll kill yourself working! Can you not come in
+now?"
+
+"Just a little while. Bring me a lantern."
+
+Ramsay heard Hans Van Doorst murmur, "A fisherman, that one," and a
+yellow lantern glowed behind him. It was nothing more than a tallow
+candle set in a glass case but, Ramsay thought, he really didn't need a
+stronger light. So sensitive had his fingers become to the feel of the
+net, and so expert was he in knitting new meshes, that, almost, he would
+have been able to do it with his eyes closed. He worked on while, held
+alternately by Hans and Pieter, the lantern moved with him. He forgot
+the ache in his fingers and the weariness in his body. He knew only that
+the sooner the net was in good working order, the sooner they could go
+fishing.
+
+The pre-dawn birds were again singing when Ramsay finally bumped against
+something and, so absorbed had he been in his work, it took him a moment
+to realize that it was the other tree. He held the mesh board in fingers
+which, strangely and suddenly, seemed to lack all nerve or feeling. He
+blinked almost stupidly and stepped back.
+
+When he spoke, his words sounded almost silly. "Well," he said, "there
+it is."
+
+"There indeed it is!" Hans chuckled. "And there it will be until, as
+soon as possible, we get it into the water. Come now and sleep, for with
+the morning's sun I would have you go with me."
+
+Ramsay stumbled to his bedroom, took his shoes off, and without removing
+any of his other clothing, fell across the bed. Instantly he was
+submerged in exhausted slumber from which he was awakened by a gentle
+hand on his shoulder.
+
+"Come now," a voice said.
+
+Ramsay sat up with a start, to see Hans Van Doorst looking down at him.
+Again with a guilty feeling, he knew that he had slept far beyond the
+time when any worker in this country should sleep. Hastily he sprang out
+of bed. "I'll be right with you!"
+
+"Compose yourself," said Hans Van Doorst, who had awakened him. "There
+is no need for any mad rush. I thought you might wish to help me."
+
+"Oh, sure!"
+
+Ramsay grinned faintly when he discovered that, except for his shoes, he
+was fully dressed. He put his shoes on and tied them, went outside to
+wash at the wash stand, and came in to eat the breakfast Marta had
+ready. Scarcely noticing what he ate, he gulped it down.
+
+"Easy," Marta cautioned. "The stomach complaint you will be giving
+yourself!"
+
+"I must hurry! Hans is waiting for me!"
+
+"With men it is always hurry, especially when they go to do what they
+wish to do anyway. Aah! Only a man would give up a good farm to go
+fishing!"
+
+"Pieter has not given up his farm," Ramsay pointed out.
+
+"He will," Marta prophesied. "He will, and he will go fishing with you
+and that crazy Hans."
+
+"Oh, Marta, don't be so sad about things! It ..."
+
+She was sunny again. "Go along now. Hans is waiting."
+
+Hans had Black hitched to the cart and was waiting outside the door. His
+wings calmly folded, Captain Klaus sat on the back of the seat. Ramsay
+climbed up, and Hans slapped the reins over the horse's back. They
+started up the sand beach--there was a corduroy road but the sand was
+smoother--toward Three Points.
+
+Ramsay grinned impishly as they drove through the town, because he felt
+the questioning glances of the towns people. Devil Chad controlled all
+this, and Devil Chad had made it very clear that Ramsay was not wanted
+in Three Points. Maybe Hans wasn't wanted either but, as Pierre LeDou
+had pointed out, the fishermen and farmers cared little what anyone else
+thought. Ramsay looked about, hoping to see Devil Chad, but he was
+nowhere in sight. A little disappointed, he relaxed beside Hans.
+
+They drove through the village and up a rutted little road that wound
+among gloomy hemlocks. Ramsay saw a doe with a fawn at her side, staring
+at them. As they drew near the doe raised her white tail over her back
+and disappeared. Hans grinned at her.
+
+"They shoot the mammas with the babies," he said, "just like they do the
+papas with the horns. There is no more right in that than there is in
+netting a spawning fish."
+
+"You mean because the babies will die?"
+
+"Yaah. Then, after there aren't any more deer, people just do not
+understand it. Some awful disease, they say, carried them off. They do
+not know that their own lack of sense carried them off. It is the same
+with fish. Those who seine in the spawning season kill maybe two hundred
+for every one they take. When there are not any more fish, they will
+invent a terrible disease that carried them off."
+
+Ramsay felt a little alarm. "Do you think there won't be any more?"
+
+"The whitefish," Hans pronounced, "cannot last in numbers such as you
+find them in now. That is because so many of them are being caught. For
+maybe ten thousand years they are filling the lake until now no fish is
+more numerous. Yaah, for many years they were a food staple of the
+Indians. I myself have seen Indians spearing them, or shooting them with
+bows and arrows. Tribes came from as far as the Mississippi River to
+fish here. But a net fisherman takes more in one season than a whole
+tribe of Indians used to, and often the fishermen cannot even take care
+of what they catch. I have seen whitefish, good eating whitefish,
+stacked like cordwood along the beach and left to rot there. I have seen
+them fed to pigs. The best fishing along Lake Erie is already gone, due
+to such excesses. That is why fishermen from Ohio come here."
+
+"Will fishing end?" Ramsay inquired.
+
+"That I do not think. Considering it from all angles. Now a fisherman
+will catch perhaps a thousand whitefish, and maybe a hundred sturgeon,
+for every trout. Why? Because the whitefish and sturgeon eat trout spawn
+is part of the reason. When the whitefish and sturgeon are gone, the
+trout will multiply until they are the big catch. If the trout are taken
+or die out, there will be something else. No. There will always be
+fishing here, but it will be better when men learn to fish wisely and
+not to take anything in the spawning season."
+
+"When is that?" Ramsay inquired.
+
+"Whitefish and trout both spawn in the fall, from the fifteenth of
+October until the fifteenth of December. The sturgeon, I think they are
+a river fish and that they go up the rivers to spawn. If ever the rivers
+are closed, there will be many fewer sturgeon."
+
+The gloomy little road swerved back toward the lake. They broke out of
+the trees, and Ramsay saw the water again. Built into it, at this point,
+was a rambling wooden pier. There was a house and a fishing shanty. Tied
+to a stake in a patch of green grass, a sad-eyed brown cow munched
+placidly on a five-pound whitefish. Tied to the pier, a saucy
+twenty-six-foot Mackinaw boat, much like the _Spray_, bobbed up and
+down. Nearer the beach was another boat, evidently a sadly worn one.
+Nets of various kinds were strung on reels close to the lake.
+
+The house's door opened, and a ferocious little black dog snarled
+toward them. Showing white teeth, foaming at the mouth, he hurled
+himself straight at the visitors. Hans laughed and swung down from the
+cart, and as soon as he did the little black dog leaped about him to wag
+an almost furious welcome. Hans grinned and knelt to tickle the dog's
+ears.
+
+"Like most Frenchmen, you can do nothing unless you do it violently," he
+soothed. "Where is your master?"
+
+The house's door opened and a man, whom at first Ramsay thought was a
+boy, flung himself out. Barely five feet tall, he was dressed in
+breeches, leather leggings with colored fringes and a shirt that seemed
+to sport every color in the rainbow. He threw himself at Hans.
+
+"_Mon ami!_" he screamed. "My friend! It has been so long, so very long
+since you honored us with a visit! Tell me what has kept you away for so
+very long?"
+
+"Baptiste," Hans said, "meet one of my new partners, Ramsay Cartou.
+Ramsay, Baptiste LeClaire."
+
+Baptiste wrung Ramsay's arm as though it were a pump handle and in spite
+of his small size, he was very strong. He looked frankly at the boy.
+
+"You have," he asked, "bought an interest in the _Spray_?"
+
+"The _Spray_ is no more," Hans informed him. "She went back to the
+lake."
+
+"Oh."
+
+For a moment Baptiste was very sober. Then both men laughed, as though
+they shared some huge secret which nobody else could ever understand.
+Baptiste exploded.
+
+"What is it you need, my friend? My boats, my nets, my pier, my life?
+Name it and it is yours!"
+
+"No," Hans said. "What we need is barrels. Good oaken barrels with
+pliant black ash hoops. We also need salt. We have a net and we have a
+boat."
+
+"That is all you need?" Baptiste seemed disappointed.
+
+"That is all."
+
+Baptiste turned and in rapid-fire French directed orders at three men
+who were lingering near. At once they began to take barrels built to
+hold two hundred pounds of fish from a huge pile near the fishing shanty
+and to stack them on Baptiste's boat. Ramsay read her name, _Bon Homme_.
+Baptiste LeClaire turned to his visitors.
+
+"Now that you are here," he said, "share the hospitality of my poor
+home."
+
+"With pleasure," Hans agreed.
+
+They went into the house to meet Baptiste's wife, a sparkling little
+black-eyed French woman. Producing the inevitable jug, Baptiste filled
+three gourds with fiery whisky. Hans and Baptiste drained theirs with
+one gulp. Ramsay nursed his, both men laughed at him. But the boy could
+partake of the delicious fish stew which Baptiste's wife prepared.
+
+A half-hour after Ramsay and Hans returned to the Van Hooven farm, a
+white sail bloomed out in the bay. She was the _Bon Homme_, loaded
+halfway up the mast with barrels and salt. Hans Van Doorst rubbed his
+hands in undisguised glee.
+
+"Now," he chuckled, "we go fishing!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SEVEN
+
+_PARTNERS_
+
+
+Ramsay was puzzled. Hans Van Doorst had arisen even before the first
+faint streaks of dawn cracked the night sky and without waiting for
+anyone else to get up, or for breakfast, he had gone out to work. He was
+not fishing, for he had assured Ramsay that there would be no fishing
+until all could take part. Furthermore, Hans had said, the fishing would
+need all of them. One man alone could not take enough fish to make it
+worthwhile.
+
+Still, Hans had gone out before it was properly light enough to see.
+Ramsay had heard Captain Klaus greet his master from the top of the
+house. What anyone would be doing out of bed at such an early hour
+remained a mystery. In the dim morning light, descending the steps to
+the kitchen, Ramsay continued to wonder why Hans had gone out when he
+did. He greeted the Van Hoovens, who were already washed up for
+breakfast, and Marta went to the back door to call, "Hans!"
+
+Captain Klaus' hoarse squawk broke the morning stillness, and a second
+later there was an answering call from Hans. He was down at the beach,
+doing something there, and presently he came in.
+
+Ramsay grinned appreciatively at his appearance, for the Dutch
+fisherman's cheeks glowed like the rising sun. His eyes sparkled, and a
+perpetual chuckle seemed to gurgle in his throat. Plainly Hans had been
+doing some invigorating work, but it was work in which he took a vast
+pleasure. Anything onerous could not possibly put such a shine upon
+anyone at all. Hans washed at the basin outside the door.
+
+"Ah!" he breathed as he sat down to the huge breakfast Marta had
+readied. "This looks good!"
+
+"I should think a stale crust would look good to anyone who puts in a
+half-day's work before anyone else stirs," Marta said.
+
+"It would!" Hans agreed, helping himself to half a dozen eggs and an
+equal number of bacon slices. "It would, and many a time I have dined on
+only a crust! But fare such as this! Fit for the angels! I'm the
+luckiest fisherman alive, I think!"
+
+"Also the most oily-tongued," Marta added. Nonetheless she was pleased.
+"I suppose, when we are all wealthy from fishing, you will hire a cook
+for me?"
+
+"Not I!" Hans said. "Never I! Hiring anyone but you to do our cooking
+would be as out of place as hiring Joe Mannis instead of a preacher to
+do our praying! No, Marta! Not elsewhere in Wisconsin is there one who
+equals your skill with cookery!"
+
+Pieter, who often tried to beguile his wife but seldom succeeded,
+laughed. Marta blushed. While Hans devoured what he had already taken,
+then served himself to three more eggs, Ramsay ate almost feverishly.
+Today was the big day, the time all of them had been waiting for,
+because today they went fishing. Ramsay finished and waited with
+ill-concealed impatience while Pieter and Hans mopped their plates with
+crusts of bread. All three went outside.
+
+Squawking and chuckling, as though at some huge joke, Captain Klaus
+winged down from the rooftop to alight on his master's shoulder. He
+tilted, flapping his wings to balance himself, and caressed Hans' cheek
+with his hard, cold bill, even while he kept up a running fire of sea
+gull chatter. Hans reached up to stroke his pet.
+
+Ramsay looked down at the beach, and saw two structures which had not
+been there yesterday. Hans must have built them this morning. They were
+windlasses, made of peeled logs, and about eight hundred feet apart. One
+was the conventional windlass--a drum mounted on two uprights and with a
+crank that could be turned by hand. The spindle of the other--all these
+lake men could work miracles with logs or anything else at their
+command--was set vertically in a stone and log foundation and it had a
+long, stout shaft protruding from its center. Ramsay looked
+questioningly at Hans.
+
+The Dutch fisherman shrugged. "It is simple," he explained. "We have but
+one horse. Therefore, we men work the one while the horse turns the
+other. Marta can lead it."
+
+Ramsay was incredulous. "You mean we'll take so many fish that a horse
+will be needed to drag them in?"
+
+Hans' throaty chuckle sounded. "If we do not," he said, "from now on
+forever you may say that Hans Van Doorst is not a fisherman. Say that he
+is just a little boy who plays at fishing."
+
+With a fisherman's skill, Hans was coiling a rope. He settled it
+carefully in the bottom of the boat, so that it wouldn't kink or snarl
+when paid out, and was alert to avoid stepping on or tangling it in
+anyway. Folded exactly as Hans wanted it, with all the floats on one
+side and all the sinkers on the other, the net was overhauled on the
+stern of the boat. Another coil of rope lay on the net, and Hans tied
+one end of that to the spindle of the horse-powered windlass.
+
+Then he looked happily at Pieter and Ramsay. "Now," he said, "I need an
+oarsman."
+
+"I'll row!" Ramsay offered eagerly.
+
+"Go ahead." Pieter grinned.
+
+So expertly that he scarcely ruffled the water and did not even disturb
+his net or rope, Hans launched the boat. He waded in up to his knees,
+paying out more rope as he did so, and held the boat steady until Ramsay
+waded out beside him and climbed into the rower's seat.
+
+Ramsay tried to board cautiously, skilfully, as he had seen Hans do.
+Obviously a great deal of careful work had gone into folding the net and
+coiling the rope. Everything had to be done exactly right, and one
+clumsy or ill-timed move could make a hopeless snarl out of all. Still,
+Hans seemed confident and sure of himself. Probably, Ramsay thought, he
+had done this so many times that doing it was almost second nature. The
+boy looked expectantly at Hans.
+
+"Straight into the lake," the Dutch fisherman directed. "Keep a straight
+right-angle course to the windlass; you can do that by sighting yourself
+from it. Row as swiftly as you wish."
+
+With strong, surging strokes of the oars, Ramsay sent the ponderous boat
+out into the quiet lake. He watched Hans carefully, trying to note
+everything he did, and his respect for fishermen grew. The Dutchman sat
+almost carelessly in the stern, to all outward appearances not even
+interested in what he was doing. But, as they continued out into the
+lake, the rope continued to slip smoothly over the stern. There was
+never a tangle or even a kink. It looked easy, but net-weaving had
+looked easy too before Ramsay tried it. Beyond any doubt, it took skill
+and long familiarity with the job to handle six or eight hundred feet of
+rope in such a fashion and do it perfectly.
+
+They came near the end of the rope and Ramsay slowed his strokes a
+little. The laughing Dutch fisherman turned to him.
+
+"Sharp left," he directed. "Stay about this far out in the lake and row
+a bit more slowly. Now we set the seine."
+
+Ramsay followed instructions, watching the beach line to make sure that
+he stayed the proper distance out, and Hans began sliding the seine over
+the stern. He did it smoothly, gracefully, as he did everything
+connected with fishing. Ramsay nodded approvingly to see how well Hans
+laid his net and how expertly he had guaged the place in which it was to
+be laid. Instead of curling toward the beach, the seine, obviously
+controlled by a current that swept into the lake, billowed outward.
+
+"Does the lake have different currents?" Ramsay asked interestedly.
+
+"That it does. When the wind blows toward shore, of course waves wash up
+on the shore. But the lake, she moves in a thousand different ways, and
+the currents that appear on the surface are not always like those that
+surge beneath the surface. Ah, yes! Many moods has Lake Michigan and,"
+Hans grinned, "not many of them are placid moods."
+
+"How could you tell that a current to hold the seine was right here?"
+
+"I felt it when I had hold of your horse's tail."
+
+Ramsay pondered that information. The current holding the net certainly
+was not perceptible from the surface. It would not be evident at all,
+except to one who had a thorough understanding of such things and was
+able to sense the most minute change in the water that lay about him. Of
+course, the stones, the sinkers, probably helped hold the seine in place
+too.
+
+Foot by foot, the seine slipped into the lake and a long line of it
+stretched at an angle toward the boat. Ramsay tried to judge for himself
+how far the net was going down. He could not because he had had too
+little experience in fishing, but he was sure the seine rested exactly
+where Hans wanted it to rest.
+
+Without seeming to move, Hans leaned over to pick up the other coil of
+rope. Smoothly he tied it, and the last few feet of seine slid over the
+boat's stern to disappear in the lake. Ramsay waited expectantly for
+directions. They came.
+
+"Straight as you can towards the other windlass," Hans said. "Then we
+are all ready."
+
+Again Ramsay turned at a right angle toward the other windlass. Now he
+began to understand the setting of a seine. There were the two
+windlasses, the two six-hundred-foot ropes and the seine running
+parallel to the beach. Now, Ramsay supposed, they would beach the boat,
+tie this rope to the other windlass, and be ready to haul in the seine.
+If they did not make a good catch, they could lengthen the ropes and put
+the seine farther out in the lake. Also, by adding more sinkers or
+subtracting some, they could raise or lower the seine. Ramsay tried to
+make some observations about the water in which they were fishing.
+
+It was comparatively shallow, though at all places except very near the
+shore it would float a fair-sized ship. Also, it seemed to have a rather
+smooth bottom. In addition, though the bay could at times be angry, it
+was more sheltered than some places. Storms here probably would at no
+time reach the heights of fury that they reached on the open lake.
+Because he was anxious to learn as much as he could about fishing,
+Ramsay asked some questions. "Are whitefish usually found in shallow
+water?"
+
+"Almost always," Hans said. "Though they need not necessarily always be
+found close to shore. I myself know of reefs where we will be sure of
+wonderful catches as soon as we get some pound nets, and some of them
+are a mile or more out."
+
+"Then the lake bottom varies?"
+
+"Oh, yes! To get an idea of what the bottom of the lake is like, take a
+look at the land about you. Here you find a hill, or a succession of
+rolling hills. Here is a stretch of flat prairie. There are deep gulches
+and bluffs. You will find clay, sand, loam, small stones, boulders. As
+I've already said, the lake's bottom is almost exactly like the land
+about it."
+
+"What's the deepest part?"
+
+"Baptiste LeClaire and I once sounded a place off the Wisconsin
+peninsula. We touched bottom with a thousand feet of line, and I think
+that may be the deepest place in Lake Michigan, though I cannot be sure.
+I have not sounded every place in the lake and, for that matter, neither
+has anyone else."
+
+"Are there deep-water fish?"
+
+"The trout ordinarily seeks deep water, though they may be found in
+shallows in the spring. However, there are not enough trout to be worth
+a fisherman's while. Some day this may change."
+
+"Is there any way to set a net so a fisherman may be sure of a good
+catch?"
+
+"Not once in ten times, if he is just beginning, can a fisherman be
+certain of a good catch, or of any catch. The tenth time is the
+exception. I am sure, for instance, that there must be a vast number of
+whitefish in this bay, because the food for them is here. Otherwise, the
+fisherman must be taught by experience, or by another fisherman, where
+to set his nets so that he will make a good catch. Watch it now. We are
+about to land."
+
+The nose of the little boat bumped gently against the sand beach, and
+Hans stepped out into knee-deep water. Paying no attention to his
+soaking-wet shoes and trousers, he uncoiled the rope as he walked up the
+beach and tied it through a hole which he had drilled in the spindle of
+the hand windlass. More gingerly, not afraid of getting wet but not
+anxious to do so, Ramsay stepped to the nose of the boat and leaped
+onto the dry beach.
+
+Pieter and Marta joined them, and all turned puzzled glances on Hans;
+they knew almost nothing about the technique of fishing and must look to
+him. Ramsay watched the fisherman test the taut rope with his hand, and
+a little smile of satisfaction flitted across his face.
+
+Excited himself, Hans looked at the even more excited people about him.
+"Relax." He grinned. "The seine is not going anywhere, and we will soon
+see what we have caught. Ramsay, do you want to harness the horse and
+bring him down?"
+
+"Sure."
+
+Ramsay trotted to the barn, anxious to be doing anything that would help
+relieve the seething tension within him. Everything he had done this
+morning--indeed, everything he had done since meeting Hans Van
+Doorst--had been fascination itself. Now, if Hans' predictions were
+right, and the Dutch fisherman seemed so absolutely sure of himself,
+they would soon be in the fishing business. Ramsay laid a friendly hand
+on Black's mane, and the little horse followed willingly into the barn.
+He stood quietly to be harnessed. Ramsay fastened a singletree to the
+harness tugs and hooked a strong chain onto it.
+
+Partaking of the humans' excitement, Captain Klaus winged low over the
+beach, crying and squawking as he wheeled and dipped in graceful
+circles. Ramsay grinned at him. Of all the pets a fisherman might have,
+surely a sea gull was the most fitting.
+
+Ramsay led Black toward the far windlass, the one the horse was to work,
+because Hans, Pieter and Marta had gathered about it. Captain Klaus
+came out of the sky to alight on top of the windlass, and the horse
+scraped a restless front hoof across the sand beach. Ramsay looked
+inquiringly at Hans, who frowned and stepped back, then turned to the
+boy. "We need a longer chain," he decided. "Will you get one?"
+
+"Sure."
+
+Ramsay ran back to the barn and returned with the longest chain Pieter
+had. Hans hooked it to the windlass shaft, laid it out flat, and then
+connected it to the chain Ramsay had already brought. The boy nodded
+understandingly. The rope dipped into the lake, then rose to the
+windlass spindle. The chain had to be long enough so that the horse, in
+walking around and around, could step over the rope.
+
+Hans turned to Marta. "When I give the word," he said, "lead the horse
+in a circle around the windlass. Lead him slowly; we do not want the
+seine to come in too fast. Try to maintain a steady pace, and we will do
+our best to suit ours to yours. Both ends of the seine must come in
+evenly."
+
+"Yaah!" In spite of her dire forebodings about fishermen, Marta's eyes
+were shining like stars. "Yaah! I can do it."
+
+"Good," Hans said gently. "I know you can. Ramsay, you and Pieter come
+with me."
+
+The three men took their places by the other windlass, and Ramsay tried
+to suppress a growing excitement. He waited tensely, both hands on the
+crank; Pieter was on the other side of the windlass.
+
+Looking once more at the taut rope stretching into the lake, Hans Van
+Doorst raised his voice, "All right, Marta!"
+
+Grasping the cheek strap of the little horse's bridle, Marta began to
+lead him slowly around and around. Tense, sweating a little, Ramsay took
+a fierce grip on the windlass crank and looked at Hans. The Dutch
+fisherman, his eyes on Marta, timed the turning of the windlass. "Now!"
+he said.
+
+Ramsay strained with every muscle and nerve, and great beads of sweat
+dripped from his forehead. Hans had built well and with a full
+appreciation of leverage and tension; nevertheless, the windlass was
+hard to turn. The seine itself would be responsible for part of that.
+Dry, one man could carry it. But when lake water penetrated every one of
+its hundreds of meshes, the seine would surely weigh much more. However,
+no net of any description could within itself weigh this much. Hans must
+have guessed correctly. There were endless fish in the bay and the
+incoming seine must be loaded with them.
+
+"Faster!" Hans exclaimed.
+
+Ramsay gritted his teeth and turned the windlass faster. He shot a
+fleeting glance at Marta, who was still leading the horse slowly. Even
+so, Black was going too fast. The combined strength of three men was no
+match for the strength of a horse. Hans' bellow split the air, "Marta,
+stop!"
+
+Marta halted the little horse and Ramsay leaned his weight against the
+windlass' crank so that they would not lose what they had already
+gained. He gulped in great, refreshing breaths. Hans asked, "Can you
+hold it?"
+
+Ramsay and Pieter nodded, and Hans walked down to talk with Marta. She
+must lead the horse even more slowly, for the men could not keep up with
+him. If both ends of the seine were not pulled in evenly, if the net was
+tilted or bent, the catch could well be lost.
+
+Ramsay straightened as Hans came back to take hold of the crank. "All
+right," he said.
+
+Ramsay turned, setting his shoulder to the windlass while his breath
+came in excited little gasps. The rope, tight as a stretched wire,
+sloped into the lake. Though it was stoutly built of heavy logs, the
+windlass trembled on its frame. The crank became harder to turn and the
+wet rope wrapped like a clinging hair about the spindle. Ramsay gasped.
+
+Out in the lake, just beyond the shallow water at the edge of the beach,
+the seine's floats showed. The seine itself was bent like a bow, its two
+ends straining toward the windlasses while the center arched into the
+lake.
+
+The gleam of silver in the seine seemed to cast a soft radiance over the
+lake and the beach, and even a powerful current could not have bowed the
+seine in such a fashion. Ramsay set his shoulder to the windlass and
+helped give it two more turns. Down at the other windlass, Marta was
+watching them. She, too, had learned. The men could not keep up with the
+horse, so she was adjusting the horse's speed to them.
+
+Farther up the seine came, so that some of the sinkers were dragging in
+the shallows. The floats were bowed over, forming a sort of half-sack,
+and the center of the seine still arched back into deep water. Ramsay
+saw a tight little grin appear on Hans Van Doorst's face. Pieter was
+looking incredulously at the loaded net.
+
+"A little more!" Hans pleaded. "Just a little more! Get the center up!"
+
+They took two more turns, brought the center of the seine into shallow
+water, and Hans latched the windlass. With a wild whoop, the Dutch
+fisherman raced down to the lake and stooped to grasp a
+hundred-and-fifty-pound sturgeon caught in the net. Hans dragged it up
+onto the beach, left it there, and returned to get a bigger one.
+
+"Nets unload!" he sang out.
+
+Ramsay ran forward, heedless of water that surged about his knees. He
+stumbled, fell headlong, and arose sputtering. But, now that he was
+soaking-wet anyway, it no longer made any difference. He grabbed a
+six-pound whitefish in each hand and threw the pair far up the beach. He
+grinned as he watched Pieter drag another big sturgeon out of the seine,
+and grabbed two more whitefish.
+
+"Yaah! For once men work with a real will!"
+
+Ramsay turned around to see Marta, her spray-wet hair plastered close to
+her head. Her feet were spread almost defiantly apart, and the smile on
+her lips and the laugh in her eyes were proof of the fact that she was
+now whole-heartedly with them. Fishermen risked a lot. But who didn't
+risk when they played for big stakes? Lake Michigan was there, until now
+an almost untapped source of wealth; and if nobody dared to get this
+hoard, it would remain forever in the lake. Somebody had to try. In that
+moment, as never before, Ramsay knew that they were in the fishing
+business.
+
+Only vaguely was he aware of Pieter and Hans working beside him, and he
+did not know how long it took to get all the fish out of the seine. He
+knew only that suddenly the net sagged emptily. He took two small
+whitefish out of it, threw them back into the lake, and watched them
+swim away; then he looked at Hans Van Doorst.
+
+"Let us bring the net up to dry," Hans said.
+
+They reeled in the windlasses and stretched the soaking seine between
+them. Ramsay turned for a look at the beach, and he could not see it
+because the sand was covered with fish. Hans had been right. The bay in
+front of the Van Hooven home was a very paradise for fish. Countless
+sturgeon and whitefish lay on the beach. Ramsay heard Hans say, "Now we
+go to work."
+
+Hans hitched the little horse, brought the cart down to the beach, and
+began throwing whitefish into it. The bigger, heavier sturgeon, of
+course, Hans had to lift into the wagon box. When they had a load, he
+drove to the stacked barrels left by Baptiste LeClaire. Ramsay watched
+interestedly.
+
+A little trickle of water wound into the lake at this point, and Hans
+had dammed it in such a fashion that a miniature cataract fell over the
+stones and mud which he had placed in the water course. Beside this were
+a big, flat wooden dish, evidently also made by Hans, and several sacks
+of salt. The Dutchman produced three razor-sharp fish knives, more
+salvage from the _Spray_, and turned to Pieter. "Do you want to bring
+the rest of the fish up?"
+
+"Yaah. I'll do that."
+
+Hans caught up a six-pound whitefish and, seeming to use his knife very
+little, he cut its head off. Leaving the fish unscaled, he sliced it
+down the backbone to the end of the tail and spilled the viscera out. He
+washed his fish in the dam's tiny spillway and, filling the wooden dish
+with salt, he rolled the split whitefish in dry salt. Then he placed it
+carefully in a two-hundred-pound barrel.
+
+Ramsay caught up a fish and a knife and tried to imitate exactly Hans'
+procedure. But, though he thought he was doing everything precisely as
+the Dutchman had done it, he was much slower. Hans had two more fish
+ready and in the barrel before Ramsay was finished with one. Grimly
+Ramsay worked on. If this was a part of fishing, it was a part he must
+and would learn. He picked up another fish and, as he worked, he gained
+skill.
+
+As soon as one barrel was filled, Hans threw a couple of hands full of
+salt on top, fitted a head to it and clamped it down with a black ash
+hoop. Again Ramsay nodded understandingly. He had supposed that a brine
+solution in which to pack the fish must be prepared, but evidently none
+was necessary. Enough water remained on the fish to form their own
+brine. Packed in such a fashion, they would keep for many months.
+
+Pieter brought another load of fish and another, and then set to work
+with a fish knife to help clean the catch and pack it. The big sturgeon,
+of course, had to be cut into suitable strips and salted before they
+were packed. Some of them were filled with roe--caviar--and Pieter
+carted pails full of that to feed Marta's poultry. The remainder of the
+waste was loaded into the cart and hauled far away from the scene of the
+packing. Then Hans scrubbed everything carefully. Fishermen who packed
+food for human consumption must be very clean.
+
+The sun was down and the moon up before they finished, but when they
+were done they had packed seven barrels--fourteen hundred pounds--of
+whitefish and three barrels of sturgeon. It was a rich haul. Though they
+had worked for almost seventeen hours, each of them had earned more
+money than the average worker in Devil Chad's tannery received in a full
+month.
+
+Ramsay sighed as he cleaned and honed his fish knife, and Hans said,
+"The moon is bright and right for working, and we need a pier."
+
+"A pier?"
+
+"Yaah. Else how will a boat put in to pick our catch up? I work for an
+hour or so."
+
+Ramsay, thinking of his comfortable bed, stumbled down to the lake to
+help Hans put in an hour or two on the pier.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER EIGHT
+
+_ACTION_
+
+
+Restlessly Ramsay picked up a big whitefish and cleaned it. Salting it,
+he threw the fish into a barrel and picked up another. A freckle-faced
+urchin about ten years old stood near, watching him. The youngster was
+Johnny O'Toole, son of Shamus O'Toole. In the summer Shamus did odd
+jobs. In winter, when boats could not run, he drove one of the sleds
+that carried leather from Three Points to Milwaukee and cattle hides
+from Milwaukee to Three Points.
+
+"You goin' to fix a sturgeon?" Johnny demanded.
+
+"Sure," Ramsay said absently. "Pretty soon."
+
+Ramsay's eyes kept straying out on the lake, past the solid wooden pier
+which Hans, Pieter and Ramsay, had erected. The past days, it seemed,
+had been nothing but work. Up with the dawn and out to make another
+catch of fish. Pack the catch, and spend any time that remained working
+on the pier. Weeds were sprouting as high as the corn, oats were heading
+untended and unheeded on their stalks, and the farm was getting only the
+skimpiest attention. All this because they had decided to gamble on
+fishing.
+
+When the _Jackson_, summoned by Hans, had nosed into their pier, she had
+taken on board a hundred and twenty barrels--twenty-four thousand
+pounds of whitefish--and forty thousand pounds of sturgeon. The
+whitefish, Hans had assured them, would bring not less than five cents a
+pound in the Chicago market and the sturgeon were worth three cents a
+pound. When they had their money they would be able to buy a pound net,
+a pound boat, more salt and barrels, and be ready for fishing on a
+really big scale.
+
+Ramsay's eyes kept darting toward the lake. The _Jackson's_ skipper had
+said that, depending on how much cargo he had to take on in Chicago and
+the number of stops between Chicago and Three Points, the ship would be
+back Tuesday or Wednesday. This was Tuesday, and Ramsay could not
+control his impatience.
+
+"Fix a sturgeon," Johnny pleaded. "Fix a sturgeon now."
+
+"I ... All right, Johnny."
+
+Ramsay began to dismember a hundred-pound sturgeon, and Johnny O'Toole's
+eyes danced. He stood anxiously near, trying to remember his manners,
+but his impatience triumphed. "Gimme his nose, will ya? Can I have his
+nose?"
+
+"Sure, Johnny."
+
+Ramsay, who had learned a lot about dressing fish since his first
+halting attempts, sliced the sturgeon's nose off with one clean stroke
+of his knife. The nose was round as a ball, and as rubbery, and every
+one of the numberless freckles on Johnny O'Toole's face danced with
+delight when Ramsay tossed it to him.
+
+Immediately, Johnny began bouncing the sturgeon's nose up and down on
+the hard-packed ground. He had only to drop it, and the nose bounded
+higher than his head. This was the rubber ball, and sometimes the only
+plaything, of children who lived among the commercial fishermen of Lake
+Michigan. Johnny began throwing the nose against a tree, catching it in
+his hand as it rebounded to him.
+
+Ramsay--Hans and Pieter were down at the lake, strengthening the
+pier--picked up another sturgeon and filled a barrel. He sprinkled the
+usual two handfuls of salt on top of the filled barrel, fitted a head to
+it, and bound it tightly with a black ash hoop. Ramsay looked at the two
+sturgeon remaining from this morning's catch, and decided that they
+would just about fill a barrel. He rolled one of their dwindling supply
+over.
+
+"Can I have their noses, too?" Johnny begged. "Can I? Huh?"
+
+"Sure, Johnny."
+
+"Gee! Thanks!"
+
+Johnny O'Toole began to play with his four sturgeon noses, sometimes
+bouncing all of them at once and sometimes juggling them. Ramsay
+continued to steal glances at the lake. If everything worked out the way
+Hans said it would, they would have ... Ramsay dared not think of it,
+but, even after they paid the skipper of the _Jackson_ for hauling their
+catch to Chicago, there would be a great deal.
+
+"I'd better be goin'," Johnny O'Toole said. "My Pa, he whales me if I
+stay out after dark. Thanks for the sturgeon noses. I can trade two of
+'em to my brother for a knife he's got."
+
+"You're welcome, Johnny. Come back when we have some more sturgeon."
+
+"I'll do that!"
+
+Bouncing one of the sturgeon noses ahead of him, Johnny O'Toole started
+up the beach toward Three Points. Ramsay watched him go, then cleaned
+the last of the sturgeon, put them in a barrel and sealed it. As the
+evening shadows lengthened, he looked again at the bay. The _Jackson_
+still had not put in, and he gave up. The ship would not be here until
+tomorrow. He left the barrels where they were and went toward the house.
+
+Tradin' Jack Hammersly's four-wheeled cart was again in the yard, its
+curtains rolled up to reveal the trader's tempting array of wares. His
+gray horse was in the corral with the little black, and Tradin' Jack
+Hammersly's stovepipe hat was decorously placed on the bench outside the
+door. Ramsay grinned faintly as he washed up. The Trader was an
+eccentric character, and Ramsay suspected that his eccentricities were
+planned; they made good advertising. But he was likeable, and now they
+would get more news. Ramsay went into the house.
+
+"Hi, Ramsay," Tradin' Jack greeted him. "How about a pretty ribbon for
+that girl of yours?"
+
+"I still haven't any girl."
+
+"Slow," Tradin' Jack asserted. "So much time you have spent around here
+an' still no girl. Too slow."
+
+"I'll get one," Ramsay promised, "but I've been too busy fishing to look
+the field over."
+
+Tradin' Jack nodded sadly. "Yes. I heard it. That's what I did, heard
+it. So you go fishin'. So what happens? Can a trader trade fish? No. He
+can't. Fish you sell in Chicago. Fishermen are the ruination of
+traders."
+
+"Not everybody will go fishing," Pieter pointed out. "Enough will stay
+at farming to keep you supplied. Besides, with all the money the
+fishermen are going to earn, they can buy a lot more of your goods."
+
+"That's so," Tradin' Jack agreed. "That's so, too, but a man's got to
+take everything into account. If he wants to stay in business, he has
+to. Got any eggs for me, Marta?"
+
+"Yaah! Crate after crate."
+
+"I'll take 'em. Take 'em all. Fourteen cents a dozen. Fourteen and a
+half if you'll take it in trade."
+
+His mind on the _Jackson_, which even now should be churning its way
+toward them, Ramsay only half-listened as Tradin' Jack rattled on about
+the various events which, combined, went to make up life on the west
+shore of Lake Michigan. Remembering little of what he had heard, Ramsay
+went upstairs to bed. Snuggling down into the soft, feather-filled
+mattress, he tried to stay awake and could not. The work was always too
+hard and the days too long to forego even one minute's slumber.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The sun was only half-awake when Ramsay got up, breakfasted and went
+back to the place where they cleaned their fish. Everything that could
+be was packed and the grounds were clean, but yesterday they had ripped
+a ragged gash in the seine and now that needed repair. Ramsay, assisted
+by Hans, set to work with a ball of linen twine. He lost himself in what
+he was doing. The important thing, if they wanted fish, was to get the
+net into the water and use it. Even one half-hour must not be wasted.
+
+Ramsay was jerked out of his absorption in the net by two shrill blasts.
+He sat up, and sprang to his feet as the blasts were repeated. Looking
+in the direction of the pier, he saw the _Jackson_, her wheel churning
+up a path of foam, nosing toward the mooring place. Pieter appeared, and
+Marta. All four raced to the pier, and they reached it before the
+approaching steamer did. Ramsay and Hans secured mooring lines which a
+deck hand threw to them, and Captain Williamson of the _Jackson_ came
+down a short ladder.
+
+He was a bustling little man who wore a blue-and-gold uniform which,
+Ramsay thought, would have graced an admiral in any navy. But he was
+efficient and he knew the lake. For eleven years he had been running the
+_Jackson_ between Three Points and Chicago without getting her into or
+even near trouble.
+
+Captain Williamson took a white sheet and a wallet from an inner pocket,
+and he read from the sheet, "Twenty-four thousand pounds of whitefish
+you gave me. It brought five cents a pound, or twelve hundred dollars,
+less a cent a pound for the hauling. Here you are, nine hundred and
+twenty dollars."
+
+From the wallet he extracted a sheaf of bills and handed them to Hans.
+Ramsay looked questioningly at him. "The sturgeon?" he asked.
+
+"Ha!" Captain Williamson snorted. "There's enough sturgeon layin' on the
+Chicago pier to run the whole city for the next six weeks. Nobody's
+buying it but, since I hauled, I have to be paid. See you later,
+gentlemen."
+
+Captain Williamson scrambled back up his ladder, which was hauled in
+after him. Snorting like an overworked draft horse, the _Jackson_ backed
+away from her mooring, made a wide circle into the lake, and puffed on
+toward Three Points. Ramsay looked incredulously at the money in Hans'
+fist, slow to realize that, even if they split it among the four of
+them, it would be more than half a year's wages for each and they had
+earned it in less than two weeks. Then he looked at Marta's face and
+burst out laughing.
+
+From the first, Marta had been with them only half-heartedly and only
+because Pieter could not be swayed from fishing. Now, seeing enough
+money to buy a farm, and with tangible evidence that fishing paid well,
+she had swung completely to their side. Pieter and Hans joined in
+Ramsay's laughter while Marta looked puzzled. She was, as Hans had
+declared, a good Dutch girl. Definitely she was not avaricious, but no
+good Dutch girl could fail to be impressed by the sight of so much
+money. Hans clasped the bills firmly and looked at his partners. "What
+do you say?" he asked.
+
+"What do you mean?" Ramsay inquired.
+
+"Pound nets we need, pound boats. Men to help us set them. More salt and
+more barrels. We owe Baptiste. Or shall we divide what we have and keep
+on fishing with the seine?"
+
+"Will it take so much to buy those things of which you speak?" Marta
+inquired.
+
+"This and more, if we really want to take fish."
+
+"Then let's do it!" Marta declared.
+
+"Pieter?" Hans inquired.
+
+"Fishing beats farming."
+
+"Ramsay?"
+
+"I came here to fish."
+
+"Come with me."
+
+Hans hitched the little black horse, and Ramsay climbed up on the cart
+beside him. Captain Klaus, hurrying frantically from his perch atop the
+house, alighted on the cart and caressed Hans with his bill. The Dutch
+fisherman whistled happily as he drove along, and Ramsay grinned. This
+was the way to get things done; work every second of every day to catch
+fish and then, without even thinking twice about it, invest everything
+they had earned in more equipment so they could catch even more fish.
+Captain Klaus winged off the cart to go and see what some of his wild
+relatives along the lake shore were doing.
+
+Ramsay turned to Hans, "How big is this pound net?"
+
+"Ha! You have never seen one?"
+
+"Never."
+
+"Soon you will. Very soon you will. There are a lot of pieces in each
+net and, all together, they weigh about six hundred and fifty pounds. It
+will cost, I think, about thirty cents a pound, or perhaps two hundred
+dollars for each net. Then we shall need at least one pound boat, and
+that will cost an additional two hundred dollars. We shall need more
+rope, perhaps two hundred and fifty pounds, at a cost of about nine
+cents a pound. Then we shall have to hire men to help us drive spiles
+for the net. We need more barrels, more salt. The money we have here
+will provide us with no more than one net."
+
+"How many should we have?"
+
+"I think that you, I and Pieter could handle three on part time. We
+could very well use seven or eight if we gave full time to pound nets.
+However, as soon as we get three in working order--and meanwhile we will
+continue to seine--we will build a good Mackinaw boat, like the _Spray_,
+and use gill nets, too."
+
+Ramsay whistled. "We're really getting in deep!"
+
+"Ah, yes!" Hans said gleefully. "But the fishing, it is a business! It
+is the only business for a man!"
+
+Ramsay pondered thoughtfully. Devil Chad, who lately had seemed remote,
+was now near and his presence could be felt. Probably, to anyone who
+knew Devil Chad, it would be impossible to go into Three Points without
+sensing his nearness. If Devil Chad had set out to control everything,
+then why hadn't he made an attempt to control fishing? Certainly it was
+profitable. Ramsay dismissed the thought. Maybe Devil Chad had his hands
+full and lacked the time to intrude on the fisheries. It still seemed
+strange that he would lack time to intrude on anything that offered an
+honest, or even a dishonest, dollar.
+
+Captain Klaus came winging back to the cart and perched on the
+Dutchman's shoulder. Hans turned the little horse down a dim road, one
+Ramsay had not yet noticed, on the edge of Three Points, and they came
+out on the borders of a river that emptied into the lake.
+
+There was a large shed with a chimney that leaned at a crazy angle and
+belched a thin trickle of smoke. Hans halted the little horse, who
+immediately lowered his head to nibble at one of the few patches of
+green grass growing on this sand beach. Ramsay turned his head to look
+at the place.
+
+Lumber of various sizes and cuts was stacked all about it, and there was
+a pile of uncut logs left to season. Ramsay saw the gleam of a saw and
+caught the scent of a wood-fired boiler. Now the saw's shrill roar was
+stilled and the boiler's fires were banked. Ramsay looked at the dozen
+boats that were drawn up on the river bank. They were sturdy, fourteen
+to sixteen feet long, and propelled wholly by oars. At the back of each
+was sort of a small winch. There were broad seats and long oars. Ramsay
+turned to face the man who emerged from the shed.
+
+He was tall, blond and so big that he was almost fat. But his quick eyes
+were not those of a dull-witted fat man, and his big hands tapered into
+slim, expressive, artist's fingers. A ready smile seemed engraved on his
+thick lips, and his blue eyes lighted readily. "Hans!" he exclaimed.
+
+"Hello, Tom," Hans said.
+
+"What the dickens! I thought you'd gone off some place!"
+
+Hans laughed. "Not me! I wish you to meet one of my new partners, Ramsay
+Cartou. Ramsay, Tom Nedley. He is an artist with the wood and could make
+fine violins, but he prefers to pass his time on this river bank, making
+pound boats for indigent fishermen."
+
+"Glad to know you." Tom wrung Ramsay's hand. "What are you up to?"
+
+"We have come," Hans announced, "to get a pound boat."
+
+"Sure. Take your pick."
+
+"We," Hans said grandly, "have the money to pay for it."
+
+"Gosh! I heard you lost the _Spray_?"
+
+"That we did," Hans conceded, "and three good men with it. But we shall
+build another boat as good. Can you, by the way, supply me with a good
+oaken keel and cedar planking?"
+
+"Sure. I'll even show you where there's some big cedar stumps that'll do
+for the ribbing."
+
+"I already know," Hans said. "What we wish to have you do now is deliver
+a good pound boat to Pieter Van Hooven's place. Two hundred dollars?"
+
+"Yup. But if you haven't the money ..."
+
+"We have it," Hans assured him. He counted out some money and pressed it
+into Tom Nedley's hands. The big boatmaker looked both embarrassed and
+pleased. "Gosh! Thanks! Got your spiles driven?"
+
+"Nope."
+
+"For that you need two boats."
+
+"Of that I am aware. But we do not have money to buy two."
+
+"I'll get my brother, my cousin and their sons," Tom Nedley offered. "Be
+down in the mornin'."
+
+"For that we will pay you."
+
+"Aw, Hans ..."
+
+"Take it." Hans grinned. "We are certain to get rich fishing but, if we
+don't, you will have something."
+
+"Aw shucks ..."
+
+"Take it!"
+
+"We'll be there."
+
+"Thanks," Hans said.
+
+Mounting the cart, he turned the horse around and at a smart trot drove
+up into the village. Ramsay sat proudly erect, feeling strength like
+that of a young bull arise within him. This was the village from which
+he had been driven in disgrace by Devil Chad, but it was a village he
+dared return to. Any time he felt like it he would return to Three
+Points, and let Devil Chad meet him if he dared. Hans stopped the horse
+in front of a cottage which might have been an exact duplicate of the
+one occupied by Pierre and Madame LeDou.
+
+Letting the horse stand, Hans leaped from the cart and faced Ramsay.
+"This," he announced loudly, "is the home of Frog-Mouth Fontan, whose
+good wife is about to sell us a pound net. Frog-Mouth, by the way, is
+one of Devil Chad's closest friends."
+
+As though summoned by the voice, one of the very few tall Frenchmen
+Ramsay had ever seen appeared at the door. His mouth, the boy noticed,
+was oddly like that of a frog. As soon as he recognized his visitor, he
+emitted an enraged bellow and charged.
+
+Hans grinned, stepped aside, and swung. But Frog-Mouth Fontan was an
+expert fighter, too. He dodged, pivoted and dealt two swift blows that
+set Hans' head to rocking. Then the Dutchman found the range, and sent
+his pile-driver fist into Frog-Mouth's jaw. He hit again, and a third
+time. Frog-Mouth Fontan staggered, weaved backwards, and with a silly
+grin on his face sat down against the cabin. He continued to grin
+foolishly, staring into the bright sun. A small, dark woman without any
+teeth appeared at the door. She looked at her husband, then spat at him.
+"_Cochon!_" she said. "Pig!" She looked at Ramsay and Hans. "What do you
+want?"
+
+"One of your excellent pound nets, Madame Fontan," Hans murmured
+politely.
+
+"Do you have the money to pay for it?"
+
+"We have it."
+
+"Load the net."
+
+Ramsay helped Hans lift the folded net, four pieces of
+three-and-a-quarter-inch webbing, two pieces of six-and-a-quarter-inch,
+and seven pieces of eight-and-a-half-inch, onto the cart. The latter
+sagged beneath almost seven hundred pounds of net, and the little horse
+looked questioningly around. But he stepped out obediently when Hans
+slapped the reins over his back, and Captain Klaus squawked over them as
+they returned to Pieter's farm.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next morning Ramsay stared in astonishment at a unique craft coming
+down the lake. Five men, one of whom was Tom Nedley, manned the
+outlandish rigging, and it was propelled by two sets of oars. Ramsay
+strolled down to meet it, and noticed some spiles--poles--about
+thirty-five feet long, that were piled on the beach. Evidently Hans had
+cut them, or had them brought down, after he and Ramsay returned home.
+The craft, and as it drew near, Ramsay saw that it was two sixteen-foot
+pound boats, bound together by stout planks front and rear, nosed into
+the pier. The crew disembarked, and Tom Nedley introduced Ramsay to his
+brother, his cousin and their two strapping sons. Ramsay turned a
+curious gaze on the boats.
+
+They were lashed solidly together by planks that kept them about fifteen
+feet apart. On top of the planks was raised a sort of scaffolding,
+connected by a heavy beam whose nether surface was about twenty feet
+from the water. Suspended from the beam was a four-pulley block with a
+rope through each pulley, and the ropes supported an iron drop hammer.
+There was another pulley whose use Ramsay could not even guess.
+
+Shouting and scrambling as though this were some sort of picnic
+especially arranged just for them, Tom Nedley's boisterous crew threw
+the spiles in the water and floated them out to the boats. They tied
+them to the stern, then set up a concerted shouting. "Hans! Hey, Hans!
+Pieter!"
+
+Grinning, Hans and Pieter, who had lingered over their breakfast after
+Ramsay was finished, appeared from the house. Tom Nedley's brother said
+plaintively, "Twenty minutes of six! Half the day gone already! Don't
+you fellows ever do anything except sleep?"
+
+"Yaah!" Hans scoffed. "Who is so filled with ambition?" He looked at the
+oarsman who had spoken and leaped lightly into the boat. "Now we will
+see who is the best man."
+
+Ramsay jumped on board just in time to keep from being left behind, and
+Hans bent his mighty back to the oars. In the second boat the other
+oarsman tried to match Hans' pace, and the unwieldy craft spurted away
+like a frightened deer. Trailing behind, the spiles left a path of
+bubbly ripples.
+
+Out of the bay they went and into the open lake. Then they turned south,
+obviously Hans had some destination in mind. At any rate, he seemed to
+know exactly where he was going. They stopped rowing on a reef about a
+mile from shore, and one of the men retrieved a spile.
+
+Tom Nedley spoke to Ramsay. "Feel strong?"
+
+"Sure thing."
+
+"Good. We'll need some strong men around here. Wait until they're set,
+an' then I'll show you what to do."
+
+Hans and another man up-ended the spile and probed toward the lake
+bottom with it. They hung it on the other pulley and, when it was in
+place, the end was about three feet below the drop-hammer. Hans fastened
+it to the pulley, steadied it with his hands and sang out, "Let her go!"
+
+Tom Nedley handed a long rope to Ramsay, bade him hold it tight, and two
+men in the other boat took the other two ropes. Jerking the rope in his
+hands, Tom Nedley tripped the latch holding the drop-hammer, and
+instantly Ramsay felt the weight.
+
+He hung on very tightly and was reassured by Tom Nedley's quiet, "You'll
+soon get the hang of it. When I give the word, let the hammer fall just
+hard enough to hit the spile. Stop it, of course, before it hits the
+boys steadyin' for us."
+
+Ramsay waited, his eyes on Tom Nedley. The big man said, "Now!"
+
+The hammer dropped squarely but not completely, because Ramsay tried to
+stop it too soon. Again Tom Nedley reassured him.
+
+"Just let her fall," he urged, as he helped raise the hammer back into
+position. "There's plenty of time to stop her, but don't be careless.
+That hammer weighs a hundred and seventy five pounds, an' I doubt if
+even Hans' head would take that much fallin' on it."
+
+This time Ramsay got the rhythm. The hammer dropped swiftly, squarely
+and with full force. It seated the spile in the lake bottom, so that
+there was no longer any necessity for holding it. Hans and the other
+stepped back. Again and again Ramsay helped drop the hammer, until the
+pole was driven about eight feet into the lake bottom and perhaps four
+feet remained above the surface. It had been about thirty-six feet to
+start with, therefore the water at this place was twenty-four feet deep.
+It should be right for whitefish.
+
+"Let me take that rope a while," someone said.
+
+Gladly Ramsay relinquished his rope to Pieter, and rested his aching
+shoulders while he watched interestedly. The piles were being driven in
+a geometrical pattern, a sort of square, and Ramsay understood that the
+first nine were to hold the pot, the actual trap. Measuring carefully,
+the boats moved away and more spiles were driven. These were for the
+hearts of the net. Finally, running straight toward shore, spiles were
+driven in a pattern that resembled the forks of a 'Y.' To these would be
+attached the tunnel, the webbing that guided fish through the hearts of
+the pound net and into the pot.
+
+Ramsay straightened, easing his aching shoulders. It was hard work, very
+hard, to lift the hammer and let it fall for hours on end. But now the
+spiles for one pound net were driven. The boy turned to Hans. "Gee whiz!
+How about moving all this?"
+
+"You don't move a pound net except, of course, to take up the webbing
+when the lake freezes. Otherwise, we'll leave this right where it is. It
+is possible to fish a pound net in the same location for fifty years or
+more."
+
+"What's next?"
+
+"Set the net. I think there is still time."
+
+They rowed back to the pier, where Marta, who had taken over the
+treasurer's post, paid Tom Nedley and his crew. The big man grinned his
+thanks.
+
+"You need us again, you know where to find us."
+
+"We'll probably take you up on that," Hans said.
+
+The ropes binding the two boats were loosened and the scaffold taken
+down. Leaving the boat Hans had bought, Tom Nedley and his helpers piled
+into the other one and started rowing up the lake. Hans, Pieter and
+Ramsay went to the pound net.
+
+The pot, the trap, was loaded first. Then came the flaring, heart-shaped
+'hearts,' and finally the leads, or tunnel. Setting himself to the oars,
+Hans rowed back to where they had driven the piles. He tied the lead,
+the beginning of the tunnel, to the spile. A five-pound stone fastened
+to the bottom rope carried it down into the lake. Giving the oars to
+Ramsay and cautioning him to travel slowly, Hans fastened the lead to
+each spile and sank it with stones. The flaring hearts were set in the
+same way.
+
+Coming to the pot, Hans first fastened a four-foot chain with an
+attached pulley to the pile. Then he tied a rope, double the depth of
+the water and with some allowance for shrinkage, to the bottom of the
+pot. He did this on each spile, and they put the whole pot into the
+water. Ramsay began to understand.
+
+In effect, they had set a gigantic fly-trap. Any fish that came along
+would be guided by the tunnel into the hearts, and then into the pot.
+Should any escape, the flaring sides of the hearts would keep them
+trapped and, nine times out of ten, send them back into the pot instead
+of out through the tunnel.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Ramsay labored under the weight of a two-hundred-pound sturgeon which
+had been dragged in by the seine. Hans and Pieter hadn't wanted to
+bother with sturgeon because there was no market for them, anyhow, but
+Ramsay had permitted them to throw none back into the lake. Cradling his
+slippery prize across his chest, as though it was a log, he carried it
+to the pond and threw it in. For a moment the sturgeon swam dazedly on
+the surface, then flipped his tail and submerged. Ramsay gazed into the
+pond. It was alive with sturgeon weighing from seventy-five to almost
+three hundred pounds. There were so many that, to supplement the food in
+the pond, they were feeding them ground corn.
+
+Ramsay stripped off his wet clothes and dived cleanly into the pond.
+Water surged about him, washing off all the sweat and grime which he had
+accumulated during the day. He probed along the pond's bottom, and felt
+the smooth sides of a sturgeon beneath him. It was only a little one.
+
+He swam on until he had to surface for air, and dived again. Across the
+pond's murky depths he prowled, his white body gleaming like some great
+worm in the water. Finally he found what he was looking for.
+
+It was a big sturgeon, and it was feeding quietly. Moving as slowly as
+possible, Ramsay rubbed a hand across its back. Suddenly he wrapped both
+arms about the fish and took a firm grasp with his bare legs.
+
+For a moment, while the dull sturgeon tried to determine what was
+happening, there was no movement. Then the big fish awakened to danger
+and shot to the surface. With all the speed of an outboard motor he
+sliced along it, and a moment later he dived again. Grinning,
+exhilarated, Ramsay swam back to shore and dressed.
+
+Tradin' Jack Hammersly's rig was in the yard, and Ramsay heard the man
+say, "Marta, what you been feedin' your hens?"
+
+"The best!" Marta said indignantly. "The very best!"
+
+"The best of what?"
+
+"Why grain, and scraps, and ..."
+
+"And sturgeon roe?"
+
+"Why--yes."
+
+"What I thought," Tradin' Jack sighed. "Ye'll have to stop it. Ever'
+customer as got some of your eggs told me they taste like caviar!"
+
+A moment later there was a rapid-fire sputter of French expletives. His
+face red, seeming about to explode, Baptiste LeClaire raced around the
+corner of the house.
+
+"Get your guns!" he screamed when he saw Ramsay. "Get your knives and
+clubs too! Get everything! We have to kill everybody!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER NINE
+
+_PIRATES_
+
+
+Baptiste was dancing up and down, flinging his arms like the blades of a
+windmill and screaming in French. Ramsay wrinkled his brow. He had
+picked up some French, but not enough to translate the torrent of words
+that rolled out of the agitated man's mouth. And never before in his
+life had he seen anyone so mad. Baptiste was invoking every evil he
+could think of, a most generous portion, upon someone's hapless head.
+Ramsay made a move to stop him.
+
+"Wait. I can't follow you...."
+
+A few English words, among which Ramsay recognized pig, dog and son of a
+rotten fish, mingled with Baptiste's violent Gallic tirade. He continued
+to wave his arms and yell. Ramsay waited helplessly, unable to
+understand or to do anything. Attracted by the clamor, Hans, Pieter,
+Marta and Tradin' Jack appeared.
+
+Very quietly Hans advanced to Baptiste's side. "What is it, my friend?"
+
+Almost tearfully, grateful because, at last, he had someone able to
+understand, Baptiste turned his machine-gun rattle of French on Hans.
+Ramsay watched the Dutch fisherman's face tighten, and then it was set
+in white-hot anger. He waited for Baptiste to finish, and asked in
+English, "Do you know who did it?"
+
+"No." Having worn himself out, Baptiste lapsed naturally into English,
+too. He turned his hot, angry face on the others.
+
+Hans spoke again. "Go to Madame Fontan in Three Points," he said to
+Baptiste. "Tell her that I, Hans Van Doorst, said that you are to have
+the nets you need. If she has not enough woven, get them elsewhere.
+Madame LeDou makes excellent seines and gill nets. Go to the store for
+the rope you need, and tell them I will pay for everything. We ourselves
+will come to help you drive new spiles and make new sets."
+
+"It is good of you," Baptiste's face was still flaming with rage, "but
+we cannot let the matter rest there."
+
+"Nor can we," Hans' tone was calm and reasoning, "go about shooting
+people when we do not know who to shoot."
+
+"Pah! I know! It is Devil Chad!"
+
+"Have you proof of that?"
+
+"The proof is self-evident. Who but Devil Chad would dare do such a
+thing?"
+
+"Did you see him?"
+
+"Does one see the wise fox when he comes in the night to steal a fat
+goose? No, I did not see him."
+
+"Listen, my friend. Listen carefully. If this sort of piracy has been
+started and we do not end it, we are lost. But ours will be a small
+triumph if all of us get ourselves hanged. We must proceed with
+caution."
+
+"I do not like caution."
+
+"Nevertheless, we must now employ it. We cannot rush off with guns and
+shoot because we suspect. Get your nets and whatever else you need, and
+start anew. When you can bring me proof of the pirates, I myself will be
+the first to shoot."
+
+"It is the stumbling way."
+
+"It is the only way. If there is to be war, then let there be war. But
+we cannot strike out blindly. To do that will be to turn every man's
+hand against us. We cannot fight at all if we do not know our enemies."
+
+For a moment the dark-visaged little Frenchman stood uncertainly. Then
+he looked directly at Hans. "I will do as you say," he agreed. "But
+should I catch anyone at my nets, they or I will not live to speak of it
+afterwards."
+
+"The same will happen should I catch anyone at our nets," Hans promised.
+"But let us catch them before we act."
+
+Baptiste LeClaire swept his hat off, made a courtly bow, murmured, "Your
+health, Madame and Messieurs," and turned back toward the pier. Expertly
+handled, the _Bon Homme_ sailed gracefully into the lake. Astonished,
+Ramsay stared at Hans, and Pieter and Marta reflected his astonishment.
+
+"What's got him by the ear?" Ramsay asked.
+
+"Baptiste," Hans said, "had three pound nets which he tended with pound
+boats. He had a number of gill nets which he visited with the _Bon
+Homme_, a proper gill net boat."
+
+Hans stared out on the lake, as though seeking the answer to some
+question that plagued him. He turned to face the others.
+
+"Baptiste has no more pound nets. They have all been raised and ripped
+to shreds. The spiles to which he attached them were broken. Of the
+gill nets he once had, one remains. The rest were destroyed. Aside from
+his years of labor, Baptiste has lost more than two thousand dollars'
+worth of nets."
+
+"Who did it?" Ramsay gasped.
+
+Hans shrugged. "Someone who has discovered, at last, that there is money
+to be had in Lake Michigan fishing. Someone who will stop at nothing to
+get all of it for himself."
+
+There was conviction in Ramsay's "Devil Chad!"
+
+Hans shrugged again. "So Baptiste thinks."
+
+"What do you think?"
+
+Hans swung so fiercely on him that Ramsay retreated a step. "You heard
+what I told Baptiste!" the Dutch fisherman said. "We must be certain! It
+is not for us to appoint ourselves judge, jury and executioner! Before
+we act we must be sure!"
+
+"Should we call in the constable?"
+
+Hans said scornfully, "Devil Chad's man!"
+
+"What must we do?"
+
+"Watch ourselves," Hans declared. "Hereafter we must leave the nets
+unguarded and the lake without our own patrol, only when we are sure it
+is safe. If someone has come to take from us our right to fish, we must
+be our own protection. At the same time we must not act blindly. The
+lake is big enough for all. If one has come who would take everything
+for himself, we fight."
+
+"You know it's Devil Chad."
+
+"I know no such thing."
+
+"Do you suspect him?"
+
+"Yes," Hans answered frankly.
+
+"Then why not take action?"
+
+"Look, boy," and Ramsay writhed because never before had Hans addressed
+him in such a fashion, "lives are now at stake. Let us be sure before we
+lose ours or take someone else's!"
+
+"You are right," Pieter approved. "Yes, you are right."
+
+Puzzled, Ramsay looked at his two partners. It was absurd to suppose
+that either was afraid; they had proven their courage too many times.
+Yet, though both thought Devil Chad the raider, both refused to move
+against him until they had proof of his piracies. Ramsay thought of
+something he had read, 'A man is innocent until proven guilty.' Maybe
+Hans and Pieter believed that sincerely, while the hot-headed Baptiste
+was ready to strike at anything at all.
+
+Ramsay felt a rising admiration for his partners. "What must we do?" he
+asked.
+
+"I doubt if they'll strike by day," Hans said. "If they come, it will be
+in the night. We'll make three watches, and alternate on them. That way
+they cannot surprise us."
+
+"Suppose they come?"
+
+Hans shrugged eloquently. "Then we will fight and fight hard, for it is
+certain that no one else will do our fighting for us. Do either of you
+have a choice as to watches?"
+
+Nobody had a choice. Hans broke three straws of different lengths,
+concealed them in the palm of his hand, and held them out. They drew,
+and compared straws. Pieter had the shortest, the first watch, Ramsay
+the second and Hans the third. Hans looked thoughtfully at the
+twilight-softened lake. "Pieter, do you want to go out at seven and
+stay until eleven?"
+
+"Yaah."
+
+"Good. Ramsay, stay out until about two and awaken me."
+
+"All right."
+
+Ramsay ate the excellent supper Marta had prepared, listened idly to the
+chatter of Tradin' Jack, who knew what had happened and was nervous
+because of it, and went upstairs to bed. In spite of his inner tension
+and his excitement, his head had scarcely touched the pillow when he
+dozed off. A moment later, or so it seemed, Pieter was touching his
+shoulder.
+
+"It's time."
+
+"I ... Huh? Oh, yes."
+
+Ramsay came fully awake, and Pieter lighted the candle in his room. Its
+beams sparkled brightly on the shining barrel of the muzzle-loading
+fowling-piece Pieter carried. Of a huge bore, the gun was charged with
+black powder and loaded with lead slugs. Ramsay shuddered as he accepted
+it. Such a gun would be sure to work great havoc among anything it was
+shot at, but its recoil alone would probably set a mule back on its
+haunches.
+
+"Anything happen?" Ramsay whispered.
+
+"Nothing," Pieter said. "Nobody came. The lake is calm and the boat
+awaits you on the beach."
+
+"I'll see you in the morning."
+
+"Good luck."
+
+His shoes in one hand and the shotgun in the other, Ramsay stole quietly
+down the stairs and out the back door. He stopped to put his shoes on,
+and looked around him.
+
+A pale moon shone through disheveled clouds that gave the sky the
+appearance of a man sadly in need of a hair-cut, and the faintest
+suspicion of a breeze kicked up small wavelets. Asleep on the ridge
+pole, Captain Klaus was a dull, shapeless blob in the night sky. Ramsay
+cradled the shotgun in his right elbow and walked down to the beach.
+
+The pound boat had wedged itself lightly against the sand. Ramsay put
+the anchor back in, carefully laid the shotgun on the rower's seat, and
+stood in the stern until he had tilted the craft from its mooring.
+Sitting down, with a vigorous stroke of the oars he sent the boat
+farther into the lake.
+
+In the bay a fish jumped out of water, and the sound of its falling back
+made a tinkling splash. Ramsay, dipping his oars quietly, steered toward
+the first pound net they had set. At intervals he halted to rest on the
+oars. There were no sounds save those that should have been present.
+Except for him and the pound boat, the lake seemed deserted. Lingering
+in the shadows, Ramsay circled the net and saw nothing. He started
+toward another of their pound nets.
+
+They had kept the seine busy, taken good catches from their pound nets,
+and turned most of their money back into additional equipment. They were
+getting ahead and setting themselves up in the fishing business. By next
+year they should have everything they needed. They would not have to buy
+any nets, or boats, and could begin to enjoy the profits they were
+earning.
+
+Ramsay found himself thinking of Devil Chad. Fishing was very hard work,
+and expensive, but whoever did it well could hope for a fine future.
+Lake Michigan was a vast reservoir of riches, and they were to be used.
+There was room for all, but so was there room in Three Points. Devil
+Chad wanted that for himself. Who but Devil Chad could now be plotting
+to seize the Lake Michigan fisheries?
+
+Ramsay shrugged such thoughts away. Out here on the lake he seemed able
+to think with great clarity, and he knew that Hans and Pieter were
+right. They must not lash out in thoughtless anger and hit at Devil Chad
+because he was the logical one to raid their nets. They must have proof,
+and strike as hard as possible when they struck.
+
+Ramsay visited all three pound nets, and rowed back to the first one.
+The lake remained calm and unruffled. When he thought it was two
+o'clock--the night was divided into one watch of four hours and two of
+three each--he went in to rouse Hans. At half-past five, when they ate
+breakfast, Hans had nothing to report. If pirates were out to get all
+nets, certainly they had not bothered theirs.
+
+Late that afternoon, when the fishing was done and Ramsay, much to the
+amusement of Hans and Pieter, had carried six more big sturgeon to the
+pond, Hans hitched the black horse and invited Ramsay to go with him to
+Three Points. Captain Klaus, as usual, flew to the back of the cart and
+perched where he could caress Hans with his bill. Hans turned the little
+horse down the road leading to Tom Nedley's. Ramsay stirred with
+interest.
+
+Big Tom Nedley came out of his shed, greeted them, and looked doubtfully
+at the little cart. He glanced from it to a long oaken beam that was
+supported on wooden horses. When he looked again at Hans, his voice and
+manner were almost accusing. "You aim to drag that piece of oak?"
+
+"You think I'm a fool?" Hans challenged.
+
+"Didn't think you'd drag it." Tom Nedley seemed relieved. "There ain't
+another piece of oak like that one in Wisconsin. How do you aim to get
+it home?"
+
+"You have an extra pair of wheels and an axle?"
+
+"Sure, but ..."
+
+"Ha! Bring me a wrench!"
+
+The wrench in his hands, Hans set to work unbolting the clamps that held
+the body on Pieter's two-wheeled cart. He lifted the body and seat off,
+leaving the horse hitched only to the wheels and the axle that joined
+them.
+
+Hans looked triumphantly at Tom Nedley, and the boatbuilder scratched
+his head. "You needn't think you're so smart. I'd of thought of that
+myself afore I let you drag that timber."
+
+"Why didn't you?"
+
+While Tom brought another pair of wheels, Ramsay looked at the solid
+chunk of oak. About twenty-six feet long, it was very fine-grained and
+it hadn't a crack or flaw throughout its length--fully seasoned, so that
+not a drop of sap remained in it. Even Ramsay, whose knowledge of wood
+was limited, could tell that this was an exceptionally fine chunk of
+oak. Hans and Tom Nedley seemed to look upon it as they would have
+looked upon some valuable jewel. Hans patted it affectionately.
+
+"Stronger than steel!" he said fondly. "Can you not imagine what a boat
+the _Spray II_ will be?"
+
+Tom Nedley said, "Building from that, you cannot fail."
+
+For a moment Hans was wistful, as though he had gone back in memory to
+the first _Spray_.
+
+Tom Nedley brought another set of wheels, rolled them into place, and
+covered the bare axle with a soft blanket. He used another blanket to
+pad the axle to which the horse was hitched, and Hans steered the horse
+into position. Hans, Tom and Ramsay lifted one end of the oaken beam
+onto the rear wheels. Ramsay helped lift the other end onto the other
+set of wheels, and stood aside while Hans lashed both with ropes.
+
+Ramsay watched interestedly. Hans used his ropes to permit flexibility,
+while at the same time he took no chances on their chafing or breaking.
+Apparently fishermen could do anything with ropes. Ramsay tied the
+unbolted seat and body to the top of the oaken beam. Hans took the
+little horse's bridle and led him carefully back to the road. Mounted on
+its four wheels, the long oaken beam swayed and turned.
+
+Leading the little horse, careful of everything that lay in front,
+behind and on both sides, Hans set a very slow pace. It was as though
+the beam were a very fragile thing that might break should it brush even
+the smallest tree. Actually, if it hit one hard, it would have broken
+any small tree in its path and rocked the larger ones. Hans continued to
+treat it as though it were a very delicate thing.
+
+Destined to be the keel of the _Spray II_, when they reached Pieter's
+house the beam was lovingly set up on three scaffoldings made of
+four-by-sixes and arranged near the lake. Hans patted it as lovingly as
+he would have stroked a favorite dog. "We have a start!" he said
+happily.
+
+"Why do we need another boat?" Ramsay queried.
+
+"For setting gill nets," Hans replied. "You are not a fisherman unless
+you know how to set a gill net, and you cannot set a gill net unless you
+have a proper Mackinaw boat." He petted the oaken beam again. "As
+responsive as a canoe it shall be, but as strong as a pound boat! This
+one shall not break no matter what happens. The lake will not breed a
+storm that it will be unable to ride out."
+
+That night Ramsay's was the first watch. He rowed the pound boat from
+one to another of their three pound nets. No strange vessel disturbed
+the lake, no hostile creature approached. Ramsay gave his watch over to
+Hans, and slept until dawn. They fished, processed their catch and
+loaded thirty thousand pounds of whitefish onto the _Jackson_ when she
+nosed into their pier.
+
+Ramsay went with Hans and Pieter to a place where some mighty cedar
+trees, that had grown for centuries, had been cut when the snow was
+deep. Their weathered stumps thrust six feet or more above the green
+foliage that surrounded them, and Hans chose very carefully. He wanted
+only those stumps with a fine, closely knit grain, those which, even in
+death, showed no cracks or flaws. He found three of which he approved,
+and Ramsay and Pieter used a cross-cut saw to cut them off very close to
+the earth. Ramsay began to understand the project in Hans' mind.
+
+Because of weather conditions, pound nets, at the very most, could be
+used for only about three to four months out of every year. The seine,
+though under no circumstances would Hans fish in the spawning season,
+could be dragged in until the bay froze. But gill nets could be used
+for seven or eight months if one had a proper boat, and Hans wanted to
+build one that would ride out any storm.
+
+It was not to be an ordinary Mackinaw boat, but one such as Lake
+Michigan had never seen. Its oaken keel had been chosen with an eye to
+the heaviest seas and the ice that speckled those seas in spring or
+fall. Though some fishermen used cedar planking for the ribbing of their
+boats, and steamed it until it could be bent into the desired shape,
+Hans intended to cut his directly from cedar stumps that had already
+endured five hundred years and ten thousand storms. Then the _Spray II_
+would be sheathed with the best possible cedar planking and calked with
+the best obtainable oakum, or rope soaked in tar.
+
+They would not float her this season. Neither effort nor expense were to
+be spared in the building of the _Spray II_, and constructing her
+properly would be a winter's job. But as soon as the ice broke next year
+she would be ready to float, and they would be ready to set their gill
+nets.
+
+Ramsay grinned fleetingly as he tossed bushels of ground corn into the
+pond so that the numerous sturgeon he had imprisoned there would have
+enough to eat. It seemed so very long ago that he had thrown in with
+Hans and Pieter and decided to become a fisherman, and he still hadn't
+two silver dollars to jingle in his pocket. Not one day, scarcely one
+hour had been free of grueling labor. But they had two pound boats,
+three pound nets, had bought another seine, and with spring they would
+have the _Spray II_. In addition, there was enough of the season left,
+so that they should be able to catch plenty of fish before either ice
+or the spawning period curtailed operations. That would give them enough
+money to buy gill nets, as well as anything else they needed. None of
+the four partners would come out of this season with money in their
+pockets. They would own a sufficient amount of equipment for next year,
+and much of what they earned then would be profit.
+
+That night Ramsay took the third watch. He rowed softly from one pound
+net to the other, always keeping in the shadows so that there was small
+danger of his being noticed. He had been out about an hour, and had two
+more to go, when he saw a boat approaching.
+
+It came from the north, Three Points, and its row locks were so well
+greased that not the faintest sound came from them. The oarsman was
+expert; he dipped and raised his oars so that there was no splashing.
+Ramsay raised the shot gun. He leveled it.
+
+Unseen by the other boatmen, he lurked in the shadows and let them pass.
+Ramsay was somewhat surprised to see them give a pound net a wide berth
+and head into the bay. He followed, rowing his own boat silently while
+he tried to discern the others' intentions. There were at least four,
+and perhaps five, men in the other boat and they were going toward the
+pier. Ramsay let them draw ahead, then circled around them and as fast
+as he could without making any noise, he rowed straight toward the
+beach. Grounding his boat, he stepped out. He was aware of the other
+boat being drawn up cautiously.
+
+He walked toward the nocturnal visitors until he was within a
+half-dozen rods. He could see them now, clustered about the pier. Two
+started for the barrels and the barreled fish. There was a faint
+whispering. Ramsay waited to hear no more.
+
+Had these people been well-intentioned, they would not be so secretive.
+Plainly they were up to no good.
+
+Ramsay pointed the shotgun toward the sky--he had no wish to kill
+anyone--braced the stock against his shoulder, and pressed the trigger.
+The gun belched its load of leaden pellets, and red flame flashed from
+the muzzle. Ramsay shouted as loudly as he could. "Pieter! Hans!"
+
+Dropping the shotgun on the sand beach, he rushed forward. The two men
+who had started toward the barrels and barreled fish came running back.
+Ramsay glared his anger.
+
+Though he could not be positive because it was too dark to identify
+anything or anyone positively, he thought that the man who stood just a
+little to one side of the rest was Joe Mannis, the body-watcher. Ramsay
+swerved toward him, sent his doubled fist into the other's stomach, and
+heard a mighty '_whoosh_' as he knocked the wind out of his enemy. Up at
+the house a door slammed.
+
+Then a club or blackjack collided soddenly with the side of Ramsay's
+head and set him reeling. He stumbled forward, feeling a little foolish
+because all the strength had left him. Without being sure that he did
+so, he sat down on the sand and blinked owlishly at the night visitors.
+Dimly he was aware of the fact that they were launching their boat and
+that he must stop them, but he did not know how to do so.
+
+A nightgown flapping about his legs and a tasseled red cap on his head,
+Hans Van Doorst appeared on the beach. A pair of trousers hastily
+strapped about his own nightgown, Pieter followed. Both men looked
+quietly at the retreating boat, which they might have followed and would
+have followed had not Ramsay needed help. They lifted him to his feet.
+
+"What happened?" Hans asked quietly.
+
+"I ... They came while I was out on the lake, but they didn't bother
+the nets. They rowed right into the pier, and I don't know what they
+wanted."
+
+"Did you recognize any of them?"
+
+"I think Joe Mannis was one."
+
+"Devil Chad?"
+
+Ramsay said positively, "He was not among them. I would have recognized
+him."
+
+"Did you shoot at them?"
+
+"No, I shot to attract you and Pieter."
+
+"Well, that's all right, too. They won't be back tonight, or likely any
+other night. Come on."
+
+They helped Ramsay into the house, bathed his head and put him to bed.
+He awoke to a mist-filled morning.
+
+No breath of air stirred. Visibility was almost non-existent; the mist
+was so heavy that it almost hid the lake. Ramsay, with all the
+elasticity of youth, had recovered quickly from last night's incident
+and he had a good appetite for the breakfast Marta had prepared.
+
+Then Marta tossed her head defiantly. "All of you have been away," she
+announced, "and you have done many things. I have been nowhere and I
+have not done anything. But today I go to Three Points to shop."
+
+"Sure," Pieter said. "I'll hitch the horse for you."
+
+They cheered Marta on her way and went down to cast the seine. The pound
+nets, having been visited within the past two days, would not again be
+visited today. Aside from that, they had seined tons of whitefish and
+sturgeon out of the bay in front of Pieter's house. Naturally the
+catches were growing smaller. If they didn't take the seine too far out,
+and set it shallow, three men could work the windlasses.
+
+Then, just as they were ready to fish, and just about when Marta should
+have reached Three Points, a man on a lathered horse came pounding down
+the sand beach. He drew his tired mount up. "Quick!" he gasped. "An
+accident! Marta is badly hurt!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TEN
+
+_THE GREAT FISH_
+
+
+The great White Sturgeon was not, in the truest sense of the word, a
+native of the lake. More years ago than any living thing could remember,
+he had been born, along with thousands of brothers and sisters, halfway
+up one of the many rivers that emptied into the lake. The sturgeon
+remembered little about that time, but just the same it had helped to
+shape him and make him what he was.
+
+The spawning sturgeon, a vast number of them, had started up the river
+together. It was a journey as old as the lake itself. Side by side they
+swam, in such numbers and so many evenly-spaced layers that none of the
+many Indians who fished along the river was able to thrust his spear
+without striking a sturgeon. Preying bears, otter, panthers, lynx and
+other creatures that liked fish, thronged the river's banks and struck
+at the horde as it passed. So little did all their raids combined matter
+that it was as though they had taken nothing. No creature that wanted
+one lacked a sturgeon to eat. But the great mass of fish, impelled by
+the desperate necessity of laying their eggs in the river, swam on.
+
+Only when miles were behind them and they were about a third of the way
+to the river's source, did the vast schools start to thin out. Then it
+was not because their enemies took too many, though they caught a great
+number. The schools started to lessen because many, too exhausted to go
+farther or content with spawning grounds already reached, dropped behind
+to spawn.
+
+Finally only a few, not necessarily the biggest but invariably the most
+vigorous, were left. Day after day, night after night, stopping only to
+rest or feed, they went on up the virgin river. Buck deer, drinking, saw
+the fleeting shadows pass, snorted and leaped skittishly away. Drinking
+buffalo raised their shaggy heads and, with water dribbling from their
+muzzles, stared after the migrating fish.
+
+Everything seemed, in some small way, to sense the mystery that went
+with the swimming sturgeon. They were part of the abundance of this
+wealthy land, and when they were through spawning, that abundance would
+be increased. The very presence of the fish was within itself a promise
+that more were to follow.
+
+Finally there were only half a dozen sturgeon left.
+
+One was a very strong female whose spawn-swollen body even now contained
+the egg, the cell, that was to be the great White Sturgeon. Swimming
+close beside her was an equally vigorous male. All the sturgeon that had
+been able to come this far were among the finest and best.
+
+They stopped in a quiet pool which, within itself, was almost a little
+lake. A third of a mile wide by a mile and a half long, the pool rolled
+smoothly down an almost level course. It was shaded on either side by
+gloomy pines that marched like soldiers in disordered rank for a very
+great distance. There were no grunting buffalo here, though an
+occasional white-tailed deer tripped daintily down to drink from the
+sweet, unpolluted water.
+
+On either side of the pool was a mat of green sedges and water-lilies,
+and in them a great horde of ducks were rearing their young. They
+skittered foolishly over the water, seeming to pay no attention to
+anything save the sheer joy of being alive. Now and then the water
+beneath them would dimple and ripple in widening circles towards either
+bank; and when it did, invariably there would be one less duckling.
+Nothing paid any attention whatever to such casualties. Life teemed in
+the pool, and there life also fed on life. It was meant to be, and the
+mighty pike that lived in the pool had to eat, too.
+
+Weary, but far from exhausted, the female carrying the White
+Sturgeon-to-be pushed herself into the sedges and lay quietly while she
+rid herself of the burden that she had carried so far. A million or more
+eggs she left there, and almost before she was finished two little pike
+that made their home in the sedges had started gobbling them up.
+
+The female sturgeon paid absolutely no attention, and neither did her
+mate, when he came to fertilize the eggs. They were here to do, and knew
+how to do, only one thing. Finished, they had no thought as to what
+might happen next. The two sturgeon swam back into the pool and rested
+before beginning their long return journey to the great lake. But they
+had chosen wisely and well.
+
+Almost before the parent fish left, a mink that had long had his eye on
+the small pike swam quietly down to take one while it was feeding. The
+other one fled. Though other things came to eat them, in due time what
+remained of the spawn hatched. The White Sturgeon was the first to
+appear.
+
+The baby fish came of strong parents, so that there were almost no
+infertile eggs, but such inroads had already been made among them that
+not one in twenty ever knew life. Immediately they were singled out by
+hungry enemies.
+
+The White Sturgeon should have died first for, though all his brothers
+and sisters were almost the color of the water in which they found
+birth, he was distinctly different. He was lighter--perhaps a throwback
+to some distant age when all sturgeon were white--and thus he was the
+easiest to see. But he seemed to have been born with compensating
+factors.
+
+When a foot-long bass, a very monster of a thing compared with the baby
+sturgeon, swam among them, they scattered in wild panic. The feeding
+bass had only to snap here and there to get all he wanted, but the White
+Sturgeon did not flee with the rest. Instead, he sank down beside a
+cattail and did not move. A tiny cloud of mud-colored water drifted
+around and covered him.
+
+Thus, from the very first, the White Sturgeon seemed to have a keener
+brain, or a sharper instinct, that made up for his distinctive coloring.
+Though he should have been the first to die, he did not die. He learned
+his lessons well, and saw how many of his brothers and sisters perished.
+Thus he discovered how to stay alive.
+
+For weeks he lived near his birthplace, swimming scarcely two yards from
+it and feeding on minute particles of both vegetable and animal life.
+Most of his time he spent feeding, and he grew very fast. Not until
+encroaching winter drove him there did he move out into the pool.
+
+Most of the ducks were gone before the first thin shell ice formed on
+the borders of the pool, and those that lingered after that flew out
+with the first snow. The snow blew in from the north on the heels of an
+unseasonably early winter wind, and the White Sturgeon saw the mighty
+pines heaped with feathery snow. Snow lay deep on the ground, and the
+deer that came down to the pool seemed almost jet-black against its
+virginal whiteness.
+
+Lingering in the shallows, the White Sturgeon held very still. His was
+the accumulated wisdom of ages. Ancestors almost exactly like him had
+swum in antediluvian seas when huge, scaley monsters roamed the earth,
+and perhaps the White Sturgeon knew that, as long as he held still near
+the snow-covered bank, he would be hard to see. Or perhaps he merely
+found the snow, his own color matched at last, interesting.
+
+Right after the snow stopped there was a spell of sub-zero weather that
+threw a sheathing of ice clear across the pool and froze the shallows to
+the very bottom. Only then did the White Sturgeon move out of them.
+
+He did not move far because it was not necessary to move far, and anyway
+the great pike lingered in the center of the pool. Almost one third jaw,
+the pikes' mouths were edged with needle-sharp teeth that never let go
+and never failed to rip what they seized. Of the young sturgeon that
+lived until fall, perhaps two hundred and fifty in all, the pike had
+half before the winter was well set. The rest were too wary to be easy
+prey.
+
+All winter long, living on the edge of the ice and finding all the food
+he needed in the soft mud floor of the pool, the White Sturgeon led a
+solitary existence. But it was not a lonely life because, as yet, it was
+not in him to be lonely. All he knew, and all he had to know, was that
+he must survive. Every effort was bent to that end.
+
+In the spring, shortly after the ice broke up and moved sluggishly down
+the river, the White Sturgeon followed it. With him went three of his
+brothers and two sisters, and if more than that had survived he did not
+know about them or where they were. Nor did he care. In his life there
+was no room for or meaning to affection; he traveled with his brothers
+and sisters merely because, like him, they too were going down the
+river.
+
+The journey was not at all hurried. The White Sturgeon, who by this time
+knew much more about the various arts of survival than he had known when
+he left the pool, passed the next winter in another, smaller pool, less
+than two miles from his birthplace. He chose the pool largely because it
+was the home of a vast number of fish smaller than he, and they offered
+an easy living to the pike, bass and other things that lived by eating
+fish. Grown fat and sluggish in the midst of super-abundance, these
+predators were not inclined to chase anything that cared to avoid them
+or to work at all for their living. All they had to do was lie still and
+sooner or later the living would come to them.
+
+For his part, the White Sturgeon had no desire to hurt anything. His
+sole wish was to be left alone, so he could peacefully pursue his own
+path of destiny. He grubbed in the mud for his food and idled when he
+was not eating. But, because he had a prodigious appetite, he was eating
+most of the time. As a consequence, he continued to grow very rapidly.
+
+Again and again, while he pursued his lazy journey down the river, the
+White Sturgeon saw the lake sturgeon swim past him as they headed
+upstream toward the spawning grounds. Swimming strongly, they came in
+huge schools. Spent from the spawning, they swam slowly past him on
+their way back to the lake.
+
+Vaguely the White Sturgeon identified himself with these fish. Never did
+he have more than a passing wish to join them. He wanted only to
+continue his leisurely trip down the river, and time meant nothing at
+all.
+
+Though the White Sturgeon did not realize it, everything was part of a
+mighty pattern and a vast scheme. Though there had never been a time
+when he was not in danger, the river had not been an unkind school.
+There he had learned how to avoid his enemies and how to become the
+powerful fish which he must be were he to live. Then the river gave him
+his last test.
+
+He was near the mouth, only a few miles from the lake, when he suddenly
+found himself face to face with a monstrous pike. The pike in the pool
+of his birth were big, but they were dwarfed by this one. Out of the
+shadows he came, a long, sinewy thing with the heart of a tiger and the
+jaws of a pike. Even wolves' jaws are not more terrible.
+
+The White Sturgeon did as he always did when danger threatened; he held
+very still. But this time it was futile because the pike had already
+seen him. Thus the thing which must never happen, did happen. The White
+Sturgeon came face to face with danger in its deadliest form. If he
+lived through this, then never again would he have to fear an enemy that
+swam in the water.
+
+Suddenly the pike whirled, flipped a contemptuous tail, and drifted back
+into the shadows out of which he had come. He was not afraid; no pike is
+ever afraid of anything, but the White Sturgeon was nearly as large as
+he and even the pike never killed wantonly, or destroyed that which he
+could not eat. The White Sturgeon swam on. He had graduated with honors
+from the river's school, and he seemed to know it. For the first time
+since his birth, a mighty restlessness gripped him.
+
+Not again did he linger in the pools, or stop to feed for a week or a
+month wherever he found a rich feeding bed. Urgings and commands within
+him that had been passive were suddenly active.
+
+With all this, he remained a harmless fish. Never born to battle, he had
+no wish to fight and he did not abandon all his hard-won caution. If the
+pike had not hurt him, nothing that swam in the river or lake would hurt
+him; but the White Sturgeon retained a fear of those creatures not born
+of the water. Aliens, they would not abide by the creed of the water.
+While heeding a sudden and great wish to get out of the river and into
+the lake, the White Sturgeon stayed far from both river banks.
+
+A ghost figure in the murky water, he shot out of the river's mouth and
+into the cold lake. For a while he sported like a dolphin, rising to
+the surface, showing his white back, and diving.
+
+An Indian who was spearing fish from a canoe stared his astonishment.
+Trembling, he sheathed his spear and paddled back to his encampment. He
+had seen the White Sturgeon, the Ghost Fish, and that night a mighty
+storm knocked down a big pine near the Indian's camp. Two people were
+killed when it fell.
+
+Knowing nothing of this, lying contentedly in thirty feet of water where
+he was aware of the storm only because his fine and deep senses made him
+aware of everything that occurred above, the White Sturgeon grubbed for
+food in the lake's bottom.
+
+The next time his tribe left the lake to rush up the river, the White
+Sturgeon journeyed with them. He went because he must, because it was a
+call even stronger than hunger and he could not resist it. The strongest
+of sturgeon, he stayed in the fore-front of the spawning horde and still
+remained away from the banks. The few Indians who saw him were so
+astonished that they forgot to strike with their spears, and he never
+even came close to the prowling bears and other beasts that waxed so fat
+when the migrating sturgeon came back to spawn.
+
+Guided by the most precise of instincts, the White Sturgeon went exactly
+to that spawning bed in the sedges where he was born, and fertilized the
+eggs that a female left there. Wan and spent, caring for nothing, once
+his main purpose in life had been realized, he turned and swam back into
+the lake. That was now his home.
+
+Again and again the White Sturgeon went up the river with his kind. Only
+once, in all the trips he made, was he in real danger, and that time an
+Indian's spear scratched his side. The Indian, fishing with two
+companions, promptly fell into the river and drowned.
+
+Thus the legend of the White Sturgeon grew. Born in a red man's fertile
+mind, it was handed from red man to white and distorted in the transfer.
+Now none could trace its origin and none knew exactly how it had begun.
+Lake men knew only of the White Sturgeon, and he had learned much of
+men. But he lived in the present, not the past.
+
+Years had elapsed since Lake Michigan was shadowed only by canoes. Now
+there were the Mackinaw boats, the pound boats, the churning
+side-wheelers and the rowboats. Because it was his affair to know
+everything that went on in the lake, the White Sturgeon knew them all.
+
+He knew also that it was good to rest in the lake's gentler places. Not
+in years had he rushed up the river with his spawning comrades. The
+fires of his youth had long since been quenched, and besides, he was now
+far too big to travel up any river. Perhaps the same quirk of nature
+that had granted him his pigment had given him his size. Other sturgeon
+were thought to be huge when they attained a weight of two hundred and
+fifty pounds. The White Sturgeon weighed almost a thousand pounds.
+
+He was still a gentle creature, though the sudden angers of age were apt
+to seize him, and on the morning that Ramsay, Pieter and Hans were
+called to Three Points, the Sturgeon was feeding quietly in the tunnel
+of the first pound net they had set. He stopped feeding when he sensed
+an approaching boat.
+
+It was a Mackinaw boat, used for setting gill nets, and it was shrouded
+in mist that sat like a fleecy blanket upon the lake. The White Sturgeon
+lay very still. He was not afraid but he had no wish to be disturbed,
+and if he remained very quiet, perhaps he would not be bothered. He was
+aware of something coming into the lake and of the boat's withdrawal
+into the shrouding mist.
+
+The White Sturgeon decided to move, but when he tried to do so he found
+his way blocked. A gill net was stretched across the entrance to the
+pound net, effectively preventing anything outside from getting in or
+anything inside from getting out, and the White Sturgeon was trapped by
+it.
+
+Gently he nosed against the gill net, seeking a way through. When none
+offered, he swam a little ways and tried again. A third, a fourth and a
+fifth time he sought escape. There was none, and the White Sturgeon's
+anger flared.
+
+He flung himself against the gill net, felt it cling to his mighty body,
+and twisted about. A hundred yards to one side, in a weak place, the net
+ripped completely in half. The White Sturgeon threshed and twisted until
+he had reduced the entrapping folds to a mass of linen thread.
+
+Segments of the ruined net clung to him as he swam away.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ELEVEN
+
+_FISHERMAN'S LUCK_
+
+
+The horse that had galloped from Three Points to Pieter's farm in order
+to bring news of Marta's misfortune was too spent to gallop back. Nor
+could he carry more than one man, even if he had not been spent. Ramsay,
+Pieter and Hans left horse and rider at the farm, while they started up
+the beach. For a short distance they stayed together. Then Ramsay, the
+youngest and best winded of the three, drew ahead.
+
+A cold dread and a great fear gnawed at him as he alternately walked and
+trotted. Marta had become like a beloved sister to him, and the
+messenger carried no news except that she was injured. How or why, he
+had not said. Ramsay glanced back over his shoulder to see if his
+companions were keeping up with him, and discovered that they were lost
+in the mist. In any event the day would have been unpleasant. There was
+just the right weather combination to make it so--a hint of rain
+combined with warm air to drape the fog over everything. And there was
+no indication that anything would change. Somehow it seemed just the day
+to get bad news.
+
+Ramsay lengthened out to trot again, and then increased his trot to a
+run. He was breathing hard, but far from exhausted, and with a little
+surprise he realized that he would not have been able to travel so far
+without halting, or so fast, when he first came to Wisconsin. A
+fisherman's life had toughened him immeasurably. Once more he slowed
+down and looked around to see if Pieter and Hans were in sight. They
+were not. He walked until he was rested, then trotted into Three Points.
+
+As though there was something in the village that drove it back, the
+mist had not invaded there. It was on all sides so thick that the lake
+could not be seen and the trees were ghost shapes, half-concealed and
+half-disclosed. Most of Three Points was at work, but the few passers-by
+on the street glanced curiously at Ramsay as he swung past them. He saw
+the little black horse, tied to a hitching post in front of the general
+store.
+
+He bounded up the wooden steps, pushed the door open and entered. Marta,
+the lower part of her left leg encased in a clean white bandage, was
+sitting on a chair. She turned astonished eyes on him. "Ramsay!"
+
+"Are you all right?" he gasped.
+
+"Why ... Of course, I'm all right!"
+
+"You're not hurt?"
+
+"A scratch!" She sniffed disdainfully. "Just a scratch! I stumbled when
+I stepped out of the cart. Ach! Such a clumsy one I was!"
+
+The storekeeper's wife, obviously the one who had bandaged Marta's leg,
+smiled her reassurance. "It is not bad," she said.
+
+"Oh!" Ramsay felt a moment's clumsiness because he could think of
+nothing to say, and again he exclaimed, "Oh!"
+
+Panting hard, deep concern written on their faces, Hans and Pieter came
+into the store. Marta's surprised eyes opened still wider. "I thought
+you boys were fishing!"
+
+"We--we had to come in for some more twine," Ramsay said somewhat
+lamely.
+
+"Three of you?"
+
+"Yaah," Hans, never slow to understand, smiled with affected laziness.
+"You know us men, Marta. There wouldn't one of us stay there and work
+while another was loafing in Three Points."
+
+"That's right." Slow Pieter finally understood that there was more here
+than met the eye. "How'd you hurt yourself, Marta?"
+
+The wondering gaze of the storekeeper and his wife were upon them now.
+Still puzzled, Marta glanced covertly at the three men. Ramsay looked at
+the storekeeper's wife.
+
+"You should have sent somebody to tell us she was hurt."
+
+"But," the storekeeper's wife was completely bewildered, "she is not
+hurt."
+
+"What's the matter?" Marta seemed worried now.
+
+"Nothing," Hans answered blandly. "Nothing at all. We just decided to
+have a holiday in Three Points."
+
+"Go long!" Marta scoffed. "Men! They're bigger babies than babies are!"
+
+"Be sure to bring us some twine," Hans said.
+
+"Oh, sure. That I will do."
+
+"Good."
+
+All three men were smiling easily. But as soon as they left the store
+and were out of Marta's sight, the smiles faded and their faces became
+grim and intent.
+
+"Who was the man who told us she was hurt?" Ramsay asked.
+
+Pieter shook his head, and Hans said, "I never saw him before and I
+don't expect to see him again. Probably he was riding into Milwaukee
+anyway, and somebody gave him a dollar to report an accident."
+
+Ramsay nodded. Hans, as usual, was logical and there could be only one
+answer. Somebody was indeed out to capture the fishing on Lake Michigan.
+They had started by destroying Baptiste's nets and now they were moving
+against Ramsay and his friends. But they knew well the prowess of the
+three and had no wish to strike while they were present. Marta's
+reported accident had been only a ruse to draw them away.
+
+Ramsay started toward the sand beach, but Hans laid a restraining hand
+on his shoulder. "Wait!"
+
+"We'd better get back and look to our nets."
+
+"There is time, and we'd better not go blindly."
+
+"What are we going to do?"
+
+Hans said grimly, "Find the constable and ask him to accompany us. Then,
+if there is trouble, and I expect it, we will have the law with us
+rather than against us."
+
+"Suppose the constable doesn't care to come along?"
+
+"He'll come," Hans promised.
+
+They strolled down the street, stopping in various places, until they
+found Jake Hillis, the constable Devil Chad had put in office, in the
+Lake House. The woman who had given Ramsay the steak and then made him
+wash dishes to pay for it, looked up and smiled. "Hello."
+
+"Hi!" Ramsay grinned.
+
+"You didn't run, after all."
+
+"Nope. I didn't."
+
+The constable, standing at the bar, turned around to face the three. He
+hooked both thumbs in his belt, letting his fingers dangle. His right
+hand, Ramsay could not help seeing, was not too far from the pistol that
+swung from his belt. There was no readable expression on his face, but
+the woman, who knew him well, went hastily into another room.
+
+Flanked by Ramsay and Pieter, Hans walked directly up to the constable.
+
+"We have something," he said softly, "that demands your attention."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"It has to do with nets and a raid upon them."
+
+"I got no authority over what happens on Lake Michigan."
+
+"Nevertheless, we need a good, honest man of the law with us. And we
+will pay you well enough."
+
+Jake Hillis shook his head. "I can't go off on any wild goose chases. My
+duty is to protect this town."
+
+Hans' voice softened even more. "I am asking you again to come with us."
+
+The constable's right thumb slipped from his belt and his hand dropped
+to the butt of the revolver. His fingers curled around it. As though by
+accident, Pieter stumbled forward. Strong enough to stop a bull in its
+tracks, Pieter wrapped his own steel fingers around the constable's
+right wrist, and when they disengaged the pistol was in Pieter's hand.
+
+"Excuse me!" he said contritely. "I am so clumsy!"
+
+"Well?" Hans inquired.
+
+Jake Hillis looked from one to the other. He was like a drum which
+almost always must sound the cadence someone else beats. Strength was
+the only force he recognized, and now he saw himself surrounded by
+strong, determined men. For a moment he struggled with himself. Then
+"I'll go," he said.
+
+Hans responded graciously, "Thank you. We knew that you would come as
+soon as you understood the reason in it."
+
+"Here's your pistol." Pieter extended the weapon.
+
+"I got to warn you," the constable pronounced, "that I am going to hold
+you responsible for anything that happens here while I am away. And I
+better tell you that I won't put up with any law-breaking."
+
+"Good!" Hans said. "You are a conscientious man!"
+
+The mist dipped and twisted about them as they started down the sand
+beach toward Pieter's farm. Ramsay tried to find answers to the many
+questions in his mind. Certainly somebody had lured them away from their
+fishing gear. Who had done so? Was Devil Chad involved? If so, why did
+Jake Hillis accompany them at all? Certainly the servant would not
+willingly provoke a fight with the master. If Devil Chad was the leader
+of the pirates, did he trust his minion so little that he had told him
+nothing?
+
+Ramsay shrugged: they would have to wait and find out.
+
+Reaching the farm, Pieter entered the house to get the shotgun and a
+pair of exquisitely carved pistols which Ramsay had never seen before.
+Dueling pistols, they looked like, and Ramsay glanced curiously at
+Pieter. The man was anything except stolid, yet he never spoke of his
+past and of what had really brought him across the Atlantic Ocean to
+this wild inland sea. Ramsay dismissed the thought. In this country it
+was often just as well to forget a man's past or that he had ever had a
+past.
+
+Jake Hillis looked narrowly as Pieter handed Hans a pistol, kept one for
+himself and gave the shotgun to Ramsay. "I don't hold with shooting
+scrapes!" he said. "And I don't want any part of 'em!"
+
+"There'll be none," Hans assured him, "unless we are shot at first."
+
+They launched a pound boat, and Hans took the rower's seat. Jake Hillis
+sat beside Pieter and Ramsay crouched to one side. A shiver ran through
+him. The mist seemed to be settling in even more thickly; they had
+scarcely left the shore when they were unable to see it. From the top of
+the house, the bedraggled Captain Klaus squawked his protest at such
+weather.
+
+Hans rowed swiftly but there was no trace of hesitation in his manner,
+and Ramsay marveled. The mist was heavy enough to cut visibility to
+almost nothing, but Hans steered as certainly as he would have on the
+sunniest of days. He seemed to know the lake so intimately that, no
+matter what happened, he could still find his way. They reached the
+first pound net, rowed around it. Ramsay sighed with relief.
+
+If pirates had come to raid, they had not yet touched this net. Ramsay
+shifted his position, and Jake Hillis stirred uneasily. Then, almost
+beside the boat, the water rippled and the White Sturgeon surfaced for
+a moment. Nearly the color of the mist, he lay quietly on top of the
+water, then dived.
+
+Hans' low laughter rippled. "We have a friend!" he said.
+
+They were near the second pound net now, and Ramsay gripped his shotgun
+fiercely. He could see nothing, but something seemed to be present. It
+was a half-sensed threat, like an unseen tiger crouching in the darkness
+beside a campfire. They saw the spiles of the second pound net rising
+like a ghost's fingers. Slowly Hans started rowing around it.
+
+Then Ramsay glanced behind him and snapped the shotgun to his shoulder.
+From shorewards another mist-wreathed craft appeared. It was a Mackinaw
+boat, like the _Spray_, and the men on her were only half seen in the
+heavy overcast. Ramsay breathed a warning, "Watch it!"
+
+Hans let the boat drift and took the pistol in his hand. Almost
+carelessly, as though there was no hurry about anything at all, Pieter
+did likewise. Jake Hillis drew his breath sharply. The two boats came
+closer together, and Ramsay recognized Joe Mannis. There were also three
+nondescript loafers of the riff-raff type who are always found on any
+frontier and who will do anything for money. But Ramsay centered his
+gaze on the fifth man in the Mackinaw boat.
+
+There could be no mistaking him, even in the mist. It was Devil Chad.
+
+The other boat came nearer and was much easier to see. Ramsay felt a
+cold chill seize him. All the men in the boat were armed with shotguns,
+and they could sweep the pound boat from one end to the other if there
+was to be a fight. Ramsay glanced at Jake Hillis. The constable was
+sitting quietly, tense and strained, but he did not seem to be afraid.
+
+Devil Chad's bellow blasted, "What are you doin' here?"
+
+Ramsay heard Hans' low laugh and his quiet, "The man is most uncivil."
+
+"Don't get smart with me!" Devil Chad threatened. "You come to rob our
+net, didn't you?"
+
+Hans, surprised, made a momentary slip. "Your net?"
+
+"Yes, our net! You come to rob it like you robbed all the rest!" Chad's
+expressionless eyes pierced Jake Hillis like daggers. "What are you
+doin' here?"
+
+Hans answered calmly. "He is here as our guest, and at our invitation.
+Now let us hear some more about 'your' net."
+
+"You know what I mean! Touch it an' we start shootin'!"
+
+"But we haven't touched anything," Hans said smilingly. He turned to
+Jake Hillis. "Have we?"
+
+Jake Hillis, too dull-witted for quick evasion, said, "No, you haven't."
+
+Cold rage mounted within Ramsay. He swung his shotgun so that the muzzle
+centered squarely on Devil Chad. If it came to a gun battle, he decided
+grimly, his arch-enemy would at least be shot at.
+
+Hans, unruffled, took command. "Where is your net? Show us."
+
+"Right here."
+
+Ramsay heard the mockery in Hans' voice. "And I suppose that it is a
+gill net?"
+
+"How'd you know that?" Devil Chad challenged.
+
+"I gazed into my crystal ball," Hans said smoothly, "and I discovered
+that, when one fisherman wishes to eliminate a competitor, he can
+always stretch a gill net across the tunnel of a pound net. There is
+certain to be a battle, and whoever survives controls the fishing."
+
+Ramsay began to understand. Fishing on Lake Michigan was governed by no
+enforceable law but only by the ethics of the fishermen themselves. Most
+of them were ethical; when one found a good fishing ground, others
+usually respected his rights. But there was no law that said they had to
+respect them. Should one fisherman care to trespass on the rights of
+another, he could always find some way to provoke a quarrel. Then,
+regardless of anything else that happened, he could say that he was only
+trying to protect his property or claim in some other way that his was a
+just quarrel. Few people would be able to prove to the contrary.
+
+Then a blue-and-white buoy, a marker used on a gill net, floated into
+sight. Hans saw it, too, and again his voice was mocking. "Is that the
+net you mean?"
+
+There were subdued voices on the Mackinaw boat. Joe Mannis put his
+shotgun down and stepped to the bow of the boat with a gaff hook in his
+hand. He lay prone, stabbed with the gaff, and hooked the buoy. Foot by
+foot he reeled in thirty yards of tattered gill net. Hans' scornful
+laughter rolled like a barrel through the mist and bounded back in
+echoes. Ramsay, highly amused, echoed Hans.
+
+"Find your other buoy!" Hans called. "Pull it in, take it home, and
+repair your gill net! But do not again set it on our fishing grounds!"
+
+The Mackinaw boat floated into the mist. Ramsay saw the baffled rage on
+Devil Chad's face. But mostly he was aware of the contempt of Hans for
+Devil Chad.
+
+"Here!" Hans called. "You're missing a man!" He turned to Jake Hillis.
+The constable glowered back, like a stupid horse.
+
+"Want to swim over and join your little friends?" Hans invited.
+
+"No."
+
+"Well, we brought you out from the sand. We'll take you back to the
+sand."
+
+Hans' shoulders were shaking with silent mirth as he bent his back to
+the pound boat's oars. He steered in to the pier they had built, and
+expertly nosed the boat in to its landing. A mist-draped wraith, Marta,
+awaited them. "What happened?" she queried anxiously.
+
+"Nothing," Pieter assured her.
+
+"A great deal," Hans corrected. "They caught the White Sturgeon, for no
+other fish in the lake could have wrecked a net so completely. I told
+you we have a friend."
+
+He took a pouch from his pocket, counted five silver dollars from it,
+and dropped them into Jake Hillis' hand. Captain Klaus flew down from
+the house top to alight on Hans' shoulder. "_Quark!_" he squawked.
+
+As though he understood perfectly, Hans said, "That is right, my little
+one." And to Jake Hillis he said, "If you see them, tell them not to
+come again."
+
+Deliberately turning his back on the constable, Hans stared out over the
+lake. Then Jake Hillis was gone, and somehow it was as though he had
+never even been with them. Ramsay waited expectantly. Hans turned away
+from his intent study of the lake, and he was frowning as though there
+was some complicated problem which he must solve. Yet when he spoke, his
+voice betrayed nothing abnormal and there was no sign that he might have
+been under the least strain. "Perhaps it would be well not to fish again
+today. That is a shame, for the season draws to a close and we cannot
+fish much longer, anyway. Still, we have done all that it is necessary
+to do, and next year we will be well-situated. We will have gear and
+tackle. I go to work on the boat."
+
+Ramsay asked, "Do you think they will come again?"
+
+Hans answered deliberately, "I do not think so, but no man may say for
+certain. They are not without determined and intelligent leadership. If
+he does come again, he will come hard and directly at us. He will not
+bother with the nets. There is no need to keep a patrol on the lake
+tonight."
+
+Without another word Hans turned on his heel and strode off to where the
+_Spray II_ was supported on its blocks. Ramsay went into the barn,
+shouldered a hundred-pound sack of cornmeal, and carried it to the pond
+in which he had imprisoned almost countless sturgeon. With both hands he
+cast the ground corn into the pool, and returned for another sack, and
+another. Then he stood with the last empty sack limp in his hands, idly
+watching the pond.
+
+It had been an exciting summer, the most adventurous and most satisfying
+he could remember, but it must soon end.
+
+Already there was a hint of frost in the air, and frost meant that the
+whitefish would soon spawn. Nothing could persuade Hans to fish in the
+spawning season, when every fish caught meant the loss of perhaps ten
+that might be. Even if Hans would have fished, autumn meant storms when
+none but a fool would venture onto the lake in a small boat.
+
+Ramsay turned slowly away from the pond. He wandered over to where Hans
+was working on the _Spray II_. It was to be a Mackinaw boat, somewhat
+like a canoe, and it was to be used for setting gill nets. These, Ramsay
+understood, could be set almost as soon as the ice went out.
+
+Handy with almost any sort of tool, Hans himself had fashioned a wood
+vise that turned on a wooden gear. He had a section of cedar stump
+clamped in the vise, and with a rasp and a fine-toothed saw he was
+painstakingly fashioning a rib for the _Spray II_. Unhurried, a true
+artist, he shaped one side of the rib to the other. When he had
+finished, it was a perfect thing, so evenly balanced that a feather's
+weight on either side might have unbalanced it. Ramsay wandered away,
+satisfied. The _Spray II_ was to be no ordinary vessel. There would not
+be another Mackinaw boat on Lake Michigan to match it.
+
+Restlessly Ramsay worked on the seine until Marta called them. He ate,
+went to bed, and dropped into his usual instant deep slumber.
+
+At first he was vaguely irritated because noises in the night disturbed
+him. Then he identified those sounds as the crying of an alarmed sea
+gull. Captain Klaus, on top of the roof, was vehemently protesting
+something. Ramsay became aware of a strange, unreal sunrise reflecting
+through his bedroom window.
+
+Fully awake, he rushed to the window, and saw that, down on the beach,
+all their boats were burning fiercely.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWELVE
+
+_THE POND_
+
+
+Captain Klaus made a swooping flight that carried him out toward the
+burning boats. Frightened by a puff of smoke, he flew back to the top of
+the house and continued to call querulously.
+
+For a moment Ramsay stood still, petrified by the spectacle. Then his
+shout alarmed the house. "Hans! Pieter!"
+
+By the light that flickered through his window he sprang for his
+clothing and hastily pulled his trousers on. Letting the tails and front
+hang out, he donned his shirt and put shoes on his bare feet. He was
+aware of muffled cries echoing from the rest of the house, and a lighted
+candle flared in the hall.
+
+He rushed out to meet Hans coming from his bedroom, and a second later
+Pieter's door flew open. Only half-awake and less than half-dressed, the
+latter blinked like a sleepy dog in the candle's little light.
+
+Marta peered uneasily over his shoulder. "What is it?"
+
+"The boats are burning!" Ramsay gasped.
+
+With a mighty, outraged lion's roar, Pieter came fully awake and sprang
+toward the stairs. For one brief second Ramsay was aware of Marta's
+face, dead-white, then he leaped to follow Pieter. Holding the candle
+aloft, Hans followed. Again the Dutch fisherman seemed to take complete
+command of the situation. There was anger in his voice but no trace of
+panic when he warned the other two, "Slowly! Go slowly!"
+
+His hand on the kitchen door, Pieter halted. Ramsay paused uncertainly
+behind him, and Hans blew the candle out. The Dutch fisherman had
+weathered so many savage storms that he seemed to know exactly what to
+do, no matter what the crisis. Ramsay watched and approved. He must
+learn to be more like Hans and to rule the emergencies that arose rather
+than let them rule him.
+
+Hans spoke again, "Let us not go like sheep to the slaughter. If they
+came again, they are probably armed and they may shoot. Pieter, get the
+guns."
+
+Pieter shuffled off to the dark kitchen and came back. Ramsay felt the
+familiar shotgun being pressed into his hands, and he knew that Hans and
+Pieter each had a pistol. Because that seemed the thing to do, Ramsay
+waited until Hans acted. The Dutch fisherman spoke again, and his voice
+remained unruffled. "We cannot tell who or what is out there. Until we
+discover exactly, keep out of the light cast by the burning boats. Do
+not use your guns unless they shoot first. Then shoot to kill. Come on."
+
+Silent as a shadow, Hans slipped into the blackness that reigned at the
+back of the house. Pieter followed, while Ramsay brought up the rear. He
+shivered, but only part of his chill was caused by the cold night. This
+afternoon on the pound boat he had felt only tense excitement. But then
+Hans and Pieter had backed him and their presence had been a very real
+thing. Now, in the night, he was almost completely unaware of them. It
+was as though he stood completely alone.
+
+Ramsay felt his way along the rear wall of the house to the corner, and
+there the darkness was broken by the glare from the burning boats.
+Ramsay crept up beside Hans and peered around the corner.
+
+The mist was gone, and a sharp breeze had sprung up in its wake. Every
+night, when the fishing was done, or any time at all when they weren't
+being used, the pound boats were pulled far up on the shore. Casting a
+circle of light over the water, the burning boats illuminated the rising
+waves whose whitecaps broke and fell. A fierce storm was in the making.
+
+Ramsay's fear gave way to terrible anger. The wind from the lake would
+have fanned the flames anyway, but obviously, before they had been set
+on fire, the two pound boats had been coated with tar, pitch, or
+something else that would burn hard and assure their complete
+destruction. They were already charred beyond the faintest hope of
+salvation. Ramsay gritted his teeth.
+
+Hans left the house and swung back, away from the lake, on a course that
+would keep him in the shadows. Ramsay followed, and he was aware of
+Pieter following him. There was not the least sign of the raiders or of
+the boat they might have come in. Ramsay hesitated. Perhaps they had
+done their work and fled, or perhaps they were lurking in ambush near
+the burning boats. Five shotguns could be ready to cut down whoever
+came.
+
+Then Ramsay set all his doubts at rest. He knew what he must do.
+
+There could no longer be any question but that this was Devil Chad's
+work. He controlled everything around Three Points that made any money.
+He was out to gain control of the fishing, too, and he was not a man who
+would leave any job half-done. Failing to provoke a fight because the
+White Sturgeon had ruined his gill net, he had taken the direct
+approach. Beyond any doubt he would be able to produce any number of
+witnesses who would swear that Hans, Ramsay and Pieter were the
+aggressors. Ramsay knew what he was going to do about this.
+
+"Take the shotgun," he whispered, and pressed the weapon upon Pieter.
+
+"But ..."
+
+"Take it," Ramsay repeated.
+
+Leaving the shotgun with the bewildered Pieter, he dropped to the ground
+and wormed farther away from the circle of light. Into the shadows he
+went, then on toward the lake. Now he did not know where Hans and Pieter
+were or what they were doing, but he was positive that they would take
+any action necessary when the time came. He no longer felt alone.
+
+This was a thing that could never be settled with guns but must be
+slugged out toe to toe and man to man. The fishing was worthwhile, and
+any man who would get and keep anything worthwhile had to be ready to
+fight for it. If Devil Chad had already fled, tomorrow they must go into
+Three Points and seek him out.
+
+Ramsay halted, peering around. He could see nothing clearly. The flames
+had died down and there was only dimness, filled with varying shadows
+that were most difficult to identify. But what was that down at the edge
+of the lake?
+
+It seemed to rise and fall with the rising and falling waves. Most of
+the shadows were there one second and flitted away the next, but this
+did not flit away, and after another thirty seconds Ramsay was fairly
+sure that it was a Mackinaw boat, anchored out in the lake. Its crew had
+waded ashore from it and, when and if they ran, they would wade back to
+it.
+
+Ramsay began a slow, steady crawl toward the anchored craft. The burning
+pound boats flared brightly, seeming to ring him with a halo of light.
+He shrank back, certain he could be seen, then as the glare subsided,
+crawled forward again. If he could see no one in the darkness, neither
+could anyone see him.
+
+He was within thirty yards of the lake now, and he no longer gave a
+thought to Hans and Pieter. He was sure only that they would be present
+when they were needed and that his way was the right one. There could be
+no compromise with destruction and no lingering aftermath of this
+outrage. Whatever was to be settled had to be settled completely, and
+tonight.
+
+Ramsay was certain now that the thing he saw was an anchored Mackinaw
+boat. It remained in the same place, rising and falling with the waves,
+and no nebulous shadow did that. Intent on the boat, he was not aware of
+the man until he heard his voice, "Gus, you fool! I said be quiet!"
+
+Ramsay held very still, and a rising exultation flooded him. He had
+heard that voice before, and there was only one just like it. He had
+heard it first when he stood on the _Holter_--that seemed years ago. He
+knew that he lay within feet of Devil Chad, who was indeed waiting in
+ambush with his men.
+
+The angry voice repeated, "Be quiet! They'll come!"
+
+Ramsay rose and rushed forward, flinging himself into this combat with
+all the fierce joy of a newly awakened warrior. He had given a full
+summer, an important part of his life, to building up a career which he
+greatly loved. Now he stood ready to defend it with his muscles, his
+heart and, if need be, his life.
+
+He saw Devil Chad rise uncertainly to meet him, not knowing whether he
+was friend or foe. He aimed a mighty kick at the shotgun in the other's
+hands, and he knew that he had knocked it completely out of his enemy's
+grasp. He felt a fresh burst of wind on his cheek and, strangely, knew
+all about the storm that was brewing on the great lake. He closed with
+his enemy.
+
+Devil Chad and his men had come to destroy and, if necessary, to kill.
+But they had counted on Ramsay, Pieter and Hans, charging angrily up the
+sand beach. Outlined against the burning boats, they would be at a
+tremendous disadvantage. A hail of lead from five shotguns could cut
+them down in almost no time. They had their choice between surrendering
+or dying for what they believed in.
+
+It had never occurred to Devil Chad or his men that an enemy would dare
+crawl into their very midst. The darkness that had befriended them now
+became their enemy. Nobody dared shoot because nobody could possibly be
+certain whether he were shooting at friend or foe. Ramsay edged up to
+Devil Chad and swung a tremendous upper-cut to the other's jaw.
+
+He missed, felt his knuckles graze his enemy's cheek, and stepped back
+for a new try. Only vaguely was he aware of muffled exclamations that
+became shouts and then grunts. He knew that Pieter and Hans had closed
+in. Then it was as though he and Devil Chad were alone.
+
+This was something that had to be. The seed that made the task necessary
+had been planted long ago, on the _Holter_. It had taken deep root
+during the fight in the tannery. Since that time Ramsay had met every
+challenge the lake had flung at him. Now he would have to prove himself
+capable of meeting the challenges men flung at him. Then, and only then,
+could he survive.
+
+Ramsay's lips framed a grin. He had taken the risk, and he had won. For
+one brief second somebody might have shot him down, then the opportunity
+was forever gone. Now nobody dared shoot. He found a firm footing on the
+lake sand.
+
+Ramsay dodged a terrific blow that would have knocked him flat had it
+connected, and went back in with his arms swinging. He sunk a left and a
+right to his adversary's midriff and heard Devil Chad's breath whistle
+out of his clenched lips. He drew back to strike again.
+
+Like the bull he was, Devil Chad charged recklessly. He took Ramsay's
+stinging blows without flinching, and the boy had to give ground. But it
+was not lost ground, and for one brief, glorious second Ramsay stood and
+traded blows. His head rocked, but he took what the other had to offer
+and returned it in full measure. Then he learned his mistake.
+
+A pair of gigantic arms were flung about his middle. They tightened like
+a vise, bending him backward and seeming to compress him into a space
+not half-big enough. His spine was ready to crack, and lights danced in
+his head. He gasped for air.
+
+The many lessons he had been taught by Hans Van Doorst came to his
+rescue. Four months ago, and perhaps even one month ago, the fight would
+have been ended by that terrific bear hug. But now Ramsay remembered in
+time that he was not fighting a man alone but a man who was part beast.
+And it was never wise to lose one's head. A man must always adapt
+himself and fight like a beast if he fought with one.
+
+Summoning all his remaining strength, Ramsay drew back his right foot
+and sent his heavy shoe smashing into Devil Chad's shin. The fellow
+relaxed his hold and staggered back into the darkness.
+
+Ramsay stumbled away from him. Devil Chad was a bull, he remembered, and
+he did not know about matadors. The next time he rushed, the boy stepped
+aside and let his opponent's momentum carry him past. Ramsay's strength
+and breath came back.
+
+He became cool, able to reason coolly. Devil Chad outweighed him by
+fifty pounds, so he must not close again. If he did not, and there were
+no accidents, he, Ramsay, would win this fight. For the first time in
+his life Devil Chad was fighting his equal.
+
+Ramsay felt strength swell within him. It was the strength of the lake,
+and it had flowed into his body through the numberless sturgeon he had
+carried to the pond and from the many times he had helped bring in the
+seine and from the many fish he had scooped from the raised pound nets.
+He was no longer a boy but a man.
+
+The burning pound boats were falling into embers now, and as the light
+they cast receded the blackness of the night became more intense. Wind
+keened in from the lake, and the waves assaulting the sand beach made
+themselves heard.
+
+Ramsay waded in, his fists flying. In the darkness he was aware of Devil
+Chad coming to meet him, but his deception of his opponent was complete.
+From the first, he had had no intention of meeting him squarely.
+
+He stepped aside, lashing out with both fists as he did so, and felt
+both of them collide soddenly with Devil Chad's chin. The latter
+bellowed, swung his head and hooked viciously. But he hooked falsely,
+for Ramsay was not there. His lithe body, dodging and twisting, now here
+and now there, became like the cape that lures the bull to its doom.
+Devil Chad swung and kicked, and often he struck his target. But he did
+not strike hard enough to bring Ramsay down, and he could not again get
+a grip with his giant arms, although he tried desperately.
+
+Roaring wildly, he charged. But it was a blind, mad attack, directed
+almost completely by rage and desperation.
+
+Ramsay licked his upper lip, vaguely aware of the fact that he was
+tasting his own blood but not caring. He felt no pain, and it was oddly
+as though he sat on some high pinnacle from which he could watch himself
+and direct himself. Both his fists lashed squarely into Devil Chad's
+face, driven by all the strength in his hard, young body.
+
+Devil Chad paused, as though bewildered, and Ramsay knew that he was
+stunned. Not stopping, throwing some of his caution to the wind, he
+followed up his advantage. His fists worked like cracking whips as he
+struck again and again. Devil Chad spun around, took two halting steps,
+and sank to one knee.
+
+He remained there like some carved statue, and again Ramsay licked away
+the blood that flowed down his face. Now, if he did the correct thing,
+he would go in and end it with kicking feet. He would beat Devil Chad as
+mercilessly as he had been beaten. But he did not.
+
+He waited, cool and poised, while the other bowed before him. Only when
+Devil Chad lurched to his feet and struck out drunkenly did Ramsay go in
+again, and he went in with his fists. He beat a continuous, almost
+unopposed tatto on his enemy's chin. The second time Devil Chad
+collapsed he measured his full length on the sand, and he did not move
+again.
+
+Ramsay stood watching intently for several moments. He wanted to make
+certain that he had met his enemy fairly and defeated him fairly. How
+long he had been fighting he did not know. It seemed like a few seconds,
+but it must have been much longer. He only knew that he had come out of
+the battle stronger than he was when he went into it. He called, "Hans?"
+
+"Here," the Dutch fisherman answered.
+
+His voice was strained, but even now there was nothing of desperation in
+it. Rather, it was a joyous voice. Ramsay turned toward it and saw
+scuffling men. He approached them and reached out with groping hands
+until he touched another man. It was neither Hans nor Pieter, and as
+soon as he was sure of that he swung.
+
+He felt a strong disappointment, for the heat of battle flared strong
+within him and, instead of fighting back, the man merely collapsed on
+the sand. Obviously he had already been manhandled by Hans and had
+little strength left. Ramsay looked strangely at him, as though there
+was something that should not be. Then he became aware of the fact that
+dawn had come and he could see. He turned to help Hans or Pieter,
+whichever needed it the most, and he turned just in time to see Hans hit
+Joe Mannis so hard that the body-watcher flew into the air, described a
+little backward whirl, and fell on the sand.
+
+Hans stood, shaggy and huge, breathing hard, but unbeaten and
+unbeatable. Moving over beside him, Ramsay felt that at last he was
+worthy to stand there. Both watched while Pieter teased the single
+remaining man, one of the hired ruffians who had helped set the gill
+net, then slapped him resoundingly on both cheeks. As though he were
+unworthy of further notice, Pieter whirled on his heel and left his foe.
+The man went weaving up the beach into the lightening morning.
+
+Hans grinned wryly at Ramsay. "Your face, it looks like a horse stepped
+on it."
+
+"You've got a couple of mosquito bites yourself."
+
+"Yaah." Hans grinned again.
+
+Ramsay said, "They got our boats."
+
+Hans said, "They got our nets, too. Joe Mannis, he told me that when we
+fought. They would get us, he said."
+
+"They didn't."
+
+"No, they didn't."
+
+They turned at a sudden wooden scraping out on the lake, and saw the
+Mackinaw boat under way. Beaten and bruised, Devil Chad crouched at the
+oars. Hurriedly he sent the boat farther out, toward the open lake. They
+watched as though this were some foreign sight of no interest whatever.
+
+Hans walked over to prod Joe Mannis with the toe of his shoe. "Get up,"
+he said.
+
+Joe Mannis stirred and groaned. He opened his eyes, blinked stupidly and
+raised himself on one hand. There was a deceptive gentleness in Hans'
+words and tone, but Joe Mannis was not deceived. He knew that Hans meant
+it when he said, "Come down the beach once more after this storm. You
+will find something to interest only you. Then never let me see you
+again. If I do, I will drown you in the lake."
+
+Hans looked out on the lake, into the gathering storm and at the
+receding Mackinaw boat. High waves were already clawing at it, and Devil
+Chad was not yet out of the bay. Hans said, "He is not a fisherman. He
+is not even a sailor. I myself would think twice about taking the
+_Spray_ out now."
+
+Near the boat something white, something not born of the rolling
+whitecaps, appeared for a second and disappeared. Ramsay smiled softly.
+He knew that he had again seen the White Sturgeon. He also knew what Joe
+Mannis would find in the morning. Devil Chad.
+
+The three partners walked back down the sand to the embers of the pound
+boats. They stood near them, warming themselves in the last of the
+fire. Ramsay prodded the sand with his toe.
+
+They were right back where they had started. A whole summer's hard work
+had gone to satisfy the greed and lust of one man. What they had left
+was the seine, the row boat, the forming skeleton of the _Spray II_ and
+the pier. Ramsay set his jaw. They could do it again. They had done it
+once.
+
+He looked toward the Mackinaw boat, and discovered that it had gone out
+of the bay into the open lake. But his eyes were attracted by something
+else on the horizon.
+
+A moment later he identified it as a plume of smoke. Five minutes
+afterward, storm-lashed but defiant, the _Jackson_ nosed out of the lake
+into the sheltered bay. Manned by able seamen, sure of herself, the
+_Jackson_ came up to her accustomed place at the pier. Ramsay, Hans and
+Pieter caught her mooring ropes.
+
+Resplendent in his uniform, little Captain Williamson came down his rope
+ladder and strutted on the pier. "A blow," he said, as though a storm on
+Lake Michigan meant nothing to him. "We'll tie up here until it's over,
+then go back to Chicago. Have you got any fish?"
+
+"Some," Ramsay admitted.
+
+He thought of the ten barrels of whitefish that were ready for shipment,
+and he watched Captain Williamson's face fall. The little captain
+emitted a long sigh. "Some, eh? I was hoping for better news. Chicago's
+growing like a weed in the sun, and it's hungry. Most of the fishermen
+made their last shipments ten days ago. The markets are almost empty,
+and even sturgeon's bringing five cents a pound."
+
+For one brief second the storm clouds parted and the sun shone through.
+Then the sky was again overcast and the storm leaped furiously. Ramsay
+turned his shining face toward Hans and Pieter. The tons of sturgeon in
+the pond ... At five cents a pound there would be more than enough
+money to replace everything and to buy the finest planking for the
+_Spray II_.
+
+Ramsay said, "Save plenty of room on the _Jackson_. We'll need it."
+
+On top of the ridge-pole, Captain Klaus fluttered his long wings and
+curved his sinuous neck. As though he approved thoroughly he called,
+"_Quark!_"
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+_Books by Jim Kjelgaard_
+
+
+BIG RED
+
+REBEL SIEGE
+
+FOREST PATROL
+
+BUCKSKIN BRIGADE
+
+CHIP, THE DAM BUILDER
+
+FIRE HUNTER
+
+IRISH RED
+
+KALAK OF THE ICE
+
+A NOSE FOR TROUBLE
+
+SNOW DOG
+
+TRAILING TROUBLE
+
+WILD TREK
+
+THE SPELL OF THE WHITE STURGEON
+
+THE EXPLORATIONS OF PERE MARQUETTE
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Spell of the White Sturgeon, by 
+James Arthur Kjelgaard
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 41662 ***