The Corner House Girls Under Canvas

“That sounds rather suggestive, Ruth,” whispered Agnes. “Do you suppose he expects us landlubbers to be really sick?”

“I hope not,” replied her sister. “But I don’t care! I’m going to eat that breakfast if it kills me! I was never so hungry in all my life before.”

They left the Nimble Shanks moored at the double-ender’s anchor-buoy, and the latter lurched away on the short leg of her tack for the entrance to the cove. There was a fresh breeze and the water began to sing under the sharp bows of the Hattie G.

The cook got busy in the galley and the fragrance of coffee and fried fish smothered all other smells about the craft – for it must be confessed that the double-ender had an ancient and fishy smell of her own that was not altogether pleasant to the nostrils of a fastidious person.

These hearty boys and girls were out for fun, however, and they had been long enough at Pleasant Cove to get used to most fishy odors. Before breakfast was over the Hattie G. had run through the “Breach,” as the cove entrance was called, and they were sailing straight out to sea.

The mournful wail of a horn in the fog now and then announced the location of some lobsterman. The Hattie G. answered these “scares” with her own horn and swept on through the fog.

But now the mist began to lift. A golden glow rose, increased, and spread all along the eastern horizon. Suddenly they shot out of the fog and sailed right into the bright path of the rising sun.

This wonderful sight of sunrise at sea delighted Ruth and Agnes intensely. It was just as though they had sailed suddenly into a new world.

The fog masked the land astern. Ahead was nothing but the heaving, greenish-gray waves, foam-streaked at their crowns to the distant skyline, with only a few sails crossing the line of vision. Not a speck of land marred the seascape.

Later, when the Hattie G. reached the Banks, there was something beside the view to interest and excite the Corner House girls.

The big sails were lowered and only a riding sail spread to keep the Hattie G. on an even keel. A “pulpit” was set up on each of her short booms – both fore and aft.

At the top of a mast was rigged a barrel-like thing in which the lookout stood with a glass, on the watch for the swordfish.

These can only be caught asleep on the surface of the sea. When one is sighted either the sails are hoisted, or the sweeps are used, to bring the vessel near enough for the skipper or his mate to make a cast of the harpoon.

Once one of the huge fish was spied, everybody aboard the Hattie G. was on the qui vive. The boys climbed the ratlines to see. The girls borrowed the cook’s old-fashioned spyglass to get a better view of the creature.

The Hattie G. was brought softly near the fish. Skipper Joline had warned his guests to keep quiet. Ruth kept her hand upon Tom Jonah’s collar so that he should not disturb the proceedings.

The skipper stepped into the pulpit – a framework of iron against which he leaned when he cast the harpoon. All was ready for the supreme moment.

The coil of the line was laid behind him. The crew brought the Hattie G. just to the spot Skipper Joline indicated with a wave of his hand.

Back swung the mighty arm of the skipper, the muscles swelling like cables under the sleeve of his blue jersey.

“Now!” breathed the mate, as eager as any of the boys or girls among the spectators.

Ping!

The skipper had let drive. The harpoon sank deeply into the fish. For a brief instant they saw blood spurt out and dye the sea.

Then the huge fish leaped almost its length from the sea. The crew drove the Hattie G. back. Good reason why the swordfishing craft are built sharp at both ends!

How the fish thrashed and fought! Its sword beat the water to foam. Had it found the double-ender, the latter’s bottom-planks would have been no protection against the creature’s blows.

A swordfish has been known to thrust its weapon through the bottom of a boat and break it off in its struggles to get free.

“Oh, Agnes!” gasped Ruth, when the fight was over and the huge fish killed. “Who would ever believe, while buying a slice of swordfish, that it was so dangerous to capture one of the creatures?”

The crew of the Hattie G. got four ere they set sail for Pleasant Cove again, and the Corner House girls became quite used to the methods of the fishermen and the tactics of the swordfish on being struck.

They sailed back to Pleasant Cove with what was called the prize catch of the season. When a fish is as big as a good-sized dining-table and sells for twenty-five cents a pound, retail, it does not take many to make a good catch.

Ruth and Agnes, and Neale and the other boys, were glad they went on the trip. They arrived at the camp late in the evening, filled with enthusiasm over the adventures of the day.

And Skipper Joline presented the Corner House girls with a four-foot sword which, later, occupied a place of honor over the sitting-room mantelpiece in the old Corner House at Milton.

Ruth took Tom Jonah up to see the Wildwood girls with her the very next time she went to call.

The Corner House girl found Rosa and June shelling peas under the arbor, while Mrs. Bobster was talking with Kuk Somes over a “mess” of clams she had bought.

“You ain’t honest enough to count out a hunderd clams, Kuk,” declared the plain-spoken old lady. “Ye got such a high-powered imagination that ye can’t count straight.”

“Now, Mis’ Bobster, thet thar’s a hard statement ter make,” said Kuk, shaking his head, but grinning. “Don’t make me out so ’fore these here young ladies.”

“I reckon they know ye!” cried the widow. “If they’ve ever hearn ye spin one o’ yer sea-farin’ yarns – ”

“And we have,” interposed Ruth, smiling. “He’s told us about how he sailed in the Spanking Sal and lost his leg fighting pirates.”

“For the good land o’ liberty!” gasped Mrs. Bobster. “He never told ye that?”

“Oh, yes. It was very interesting,” laughed Ruth.

“Why,” said the widow, angrily, “that fellow never sailed in a deep-water craft in his life. The only time he ever went out in a double-ender as fur as the swordfish banks, he was so sick they had ter bring him ashore on a stretcher!”

“Now, Mis’ Bobster – ” began the clam digger, faintly.

“Ain’t that so? Ye daren’t deny it,” she declared. “He ain’t no sailor. He’s jest an old beach-comber. Don’t never go in any boat outside of the cove. Lost his leg fightin’ pirates, did he? Huh!”

“So he told us,” said the much amused Ruth.

“Why, th’ ridiculous old thing!” exclaimed Mrs. Bobster, laughing herself now. “He lost that leg in Mr. Reynolds’ sawmill at Shawmit – that’s how he did it. And he was tipsy at the time or he wouldn’t never have got hurt.”

“Oh!” cried Ruth, staring at the sheepish clam digger.

“And he goes over there to Shawmit ev’ry month an’ collects ten dollars from Reynolds, who’s good-natured and helps him out with a pension. Ain’t that so, Kuk Somes!”

The wooden-legged clam digger nodded. “Whar’s the harm?” he murmured. “Ye know these city folks likes ter hear my yarns. An’ it don’t hurt ’em none.”

“But that’s how Mr. Reynolds heard about our having Tom Jonah,” declared Ruth, accusingly. “You told him.”

“Yep. That’s his old dawg,” said Kuk.

“Well, you’ve made us a lot of trouble,” said Ruth, sadly. “For I am afraid that Mr. Reynolds will try to take Tom Jonah away. And,” she added, in secret, “how wrong I was to accuse Trix Severn, without stronger evidence.”

CHAPTER XXV – THE END OF THE OUTING

Tess and Dot Kenway had a very serious matter to decide. Ruth had determined that, as they were all enjoying themselves at Pleasant Cove so much, the Corner House flag should continue to wave for a time longer over their tent in the Willowbend Camp.

But there was something at home in Milton, at the old Corner House itself, that the younger girls thought they must attend to.

“It’s really a nawful state of affairs,” Tess declared, nodding her sunny head, gravely, and with her lips pursed up. “They are growing right up without knowing their own names. Why! I don’t see how their own mother knows them apart.”

“Oh!” gasped Dot, to whom this was a new idea indeed. “I never thought of that.”

“Well, it’s so,” said Tess. “I – I wish Ruth had sent for them and had had them brought down here when Rosa and Tom Jonah came.”

“But they couldn’t leave their mother, Tess,” objected Dot. “They’re too small.”

“I – don’t – know,” said Tess, doubtfully. “At any rate, it’s high time they were named. You know, Mrs. MacCall says so herself.”

Dot picked up the letter that the kind housekeeper at the old Corner House had written especially to the two smaller Kenway girls.

“She says they chase their tails all day long and they have had to put them out in the woodshed to keep them from being under foot,” Dot said, reading slowly, for Mrs. MacCall’s writing was not like print.

“They must be named,” repeated Tess, with conviction.

“But Ruth won’t let us go home to do it,” quoth Dot.

“And I don’t want to. Do you?” demanded Tess, hastily. “I don’t want to leave the beach now, just when we’re having so much fun.”

Neither did Dot. But the state of the unchristened kittens – the youngest family of Sandyface – troubled her exceedingly.

Tess, however, suddenly had one of her very brilliant ideas. “I tell you what let’s do!” she cried.

“What?”

“Let’s write Mrs. MacCall and Uncle Rufus a letter, and ask them to name Sandyface’s children their own selves.”

“But – but we want to name them,” cried Dot.

“Goosey!” exclaimed Tess. “We’ll choose the names; but Mrs. MacCall and Uncle Rufus can give them to the kittens. Don’t you see?”

“Oh, Tess! we might,” agreed Dot, delighted.

Tess ran to the tent for paper and pencil, and bespoke the favor of an envelope addressed in ink to Mrs. MacCall.

“Of course, I’ll address one for you,” said Ruth, kindly. “But what’s all the hurry about writing home?”

Tess explained the necessity that had arisen. Sandyface’s family of kittens was growing up without being christened – and something might happen to them.

“You know,” said Tess, gravely, “it would be dreadful if one of them died and we didn’t know what to put on the headboard. It would be dreadful!”

“And what names shall we send Mrs. MacCall?” Dot wanted to know, when Tess had started the letter “Deare Missus Mcall” and was chewing the pencil as an aid to further thought.

“Let’s call them by seashore names,” suggested Tess. “Then they’ll remind us of the fun we had here at Pleasant Cove.”

“Oh-oo! Let’s,” agreed Dot.

“Well, now,” said Tess, promptly. “What will be the very first one? I’ll write Mrs. MacCall what we want,” and she proceeded to indite the following paragraph to begin the letter:

“We are having so much fun down here at plesent cove that we cant find time to come home and name Sandface’s babbies. But we want you and unc rufs to do it for us and we are going to send you the names we chose. They are – ”

Here Tess’s laboring pencil came to a full stop. “Now, you got the first name, Dot?” she asked.

“I got two,” declared Dot, confidently.

“What are they!” queried Tess. “Now, we want them to be real salt-water names. Just like fishes’ names – or boats’ names – or like that.”

“I got two,” declared Dot, soberly. “Lots of men must be named those names about here. I hear them hollerin’ to each other when they are out in the boats.”

“Well, well!” cried Tess, impatiently. “What are the names?”

“One’s ‘Starboard’ and the other’s ‘Port,’” declared Dot, seriously. “And they are real nice names, I think.”

Tess was rather taken aback. She had a hazy opinion that “Starboard” and “Port” were not Christian names; they might be, however, and she had heard them herself a good deal. Besides, she wanted to agree with Dot if she could, and so she sighed and wrote as follows:

“We got to names alreddy, Missus Mcall, and one’s Starborde and the other is Port. They are very pretty names, we think and we hope you an unc rufs and Sandface will like them, to. You give them to the kittens that they seem to fit the best, pleas.”

Neale, and Ruth, and Agnes came along some time afterward and found the smaller Corner House girls reduced almost to a state of distraction. They had been unable to decide upon two more names. “Starboard” and “Port” had been inspired, it seemed. Now they were “stuck.”

“It does seem as though there should be some other seashore names that would sound good for kittens,” sighed Tess. “I think ‘Starboard’ and ‘Port’ are real pretty – don’t you, Ruth?”

“Very fine,” agreed her older sister, while Agnes restrained her giggles.

“Why not call one of the others ‘Hard-a-Lee’?” suggested Neale, gravely.

“Is that a seashore name?” asked Tess, doubtfully.

“Just as salt as a dried codfish,” declared Neale, confidently.

“I think it is real pretty,” Dot ventured.

“Then we’ll call the third one ‘Hard-a-Lee,’” declared Tess. “I’ll tell Mrs. MacCall so,” and she laboriously went at the misspelled letter again.

“But how about the fourth one?” asked Agnes, laughing. “He’s not going to be a step-child, is he? Isn’t he to have a name?”

“Yes. We must have one more,” Tess said, wearily. “Won’t you give us one, Aggie?”

“Sure!” said Agnes, promptly. “Main-sheet.’”

“‘Starboard, Port, Hard-a-Lee and Main-sheet.’ Some names, those!” declared Neale.

“I like them,” Tess said, reflectively. “They don’t sound like other cats’ names – do they, Ruthie?”

“They most certainly do not,” admitted the oldest Corner House girl.

“And are they pretty, Ruthie?” asked Dot.

“They are better than ‘pretty,’” agreed Ruth, kindly. “If you children are suited, I am sure everybody else – including the kittens themselves – will be pleased!”

The labored letter was therefore finished and sent away. As Dot said, “it lifted a great load from their minds.”

But there was another matter that served to trouble all four of the Corner House girls for some days. That was what Mr. Reynolds, the lumberman, was going to do about Tom Jonah.

The girls seldom left their tent now without taking the dog with them. He was something of a nuisance in the boat when they went crabbing; but Agnes would not hear of going out without him.

“I know that man will come back here some time and try to get him away,” she declared. “But Tom Jonah will never go of his own free will – no, indeed!”

“And he won’t sell him again, he said,” sighed Ruth. “I don’t just see what we can do.”

However, this trouble did not keep the Corner House girls from having many good times with their girl friends at the Spoondrift bungalow, and their boy friends on the beach.

There were fishing trips, and picnics on Wild Goose Island. They sometimes went outside the cove in bigger boats, and fished on the “banks,” miles and miles off shore. There was fun in the evenings, too, at the hotel dances, although the Corner House girls did not attend any of those held at the Overlook House, for they were not exactly friendly with Trix Severn.

One day Pearl Harrod’s Uncle Phil arranged to take a big party of the older girls to Shawmit, which was some miles up the river. Ruth and Agnes went along and that day they left Tom Jonah at Willowbend to take care of the smaller girls.

Ruth determined to see Mr. Reynolds, so when they reached Shawmit, she hunted up the lumberman’s office. She found him in a more amiable mood than he had been on the morning he drove to Pleasant Cove to get Tom Jonah.

“Well, Miss!” he said. “How do you feel about giving up that dog?”

“Just the same, sir,” said Ruth, honestly. “But I hope you will tell me who the man is you sold Tom Jonah to, so that we can go to him and buy the dog.”

“Do you girls really want old Tom Jonah as much as that?” asked Mr. Reynolds.

“Yes, sir,” said the girl, simply.

“Willing to buy the old rascal? And he’s nothing but a tramp.”

“He’s a gentleman. You said so yourself on his collar,” said Ruth.

The man looked at her seriously and nodded. “I guess you think a whole lot of him, eh?”

“A great deal, sir,” admitted Ruth.

“Well! I guess I’ll have to tell you,” said the man, smiling. “Old Tom evidently thinks more of you girls than he does of me. Tell you what: After I got home the other day I thought it over. I reckon Tom Jonah’s chosen for himself. I paid my brother-in-law back the money he gave me for him. So you won’t be bothered again about him.”

“Oh, sir – ”

“You keep him. Rather, let Tom Jonah stay as long as he wants to. But if he comes back to me I sha’n’t let him go again. No! I don’t want money for him. I guess the old dog likes it where he is, and his days of usefulness are pretty nearly over anyway. I’m convinced he’ll have a good home with you Corner House girls.”

“Just as long as he lives!” declared Ruth, fervently.

So Mr. Reynolds did not prove to be a hardhearted man, after all. Agnes and Tess and Dot were delighted. There was a regular celebration over Tom Jonah that evening after Ruth got home and told the news.

It is doubtful if Tom Jonah understood when Dot informed him that he was going to be their dog “for keeps.” But he barked very intelligently and the two smaller girls were quite convinced that he understood every word that was said to him.

“Of course, he can’t talk back,” Tess said. “Dogs don’t speak our language. But if we could understand the barking language, I am sure we would hear him say he was glad.”

And as our story of the Corner House girls’ visit to Pleasant Cove began with Tom Jonah, we may safely end it with the assurance that the good old dog will spend the rest of his life with Ruth and Agnes and Tess and Dot, at the old Corner House in Milton.

THE END