The Adventures of Billy Topsail

Notwithstanding the ridicule he had to meet, Bobby never ventured out in the punt without a sharp axe. He could not tell what time he would need it, he said; and thus he formed the habit of making sure that it was in its place before casting off from the wharf.

As autumn drew near they found other things to think of; the big squids passed out of mind altogether.

"Wonderful queer," Billy said, long afterwards, "how things happen when you isn't expectin' them!"

CHAPTER IV

Recounting the Adventure of the Giant Squid of Chain Tickle, in Which the Punt Gets in the Grip of a Gigantic Tentacle and Billy Topsail Strikes With an Axe

ONE day late in September – it was near evening of a gray day – Billy Topsail and Bobby Lot were returning in Bobby's punt from Birds' Nest Islands, whither they had gone to hunt a group of seals, reported to have taken up a temporary residence there. They had a mighty, muzzle-loading, flintlock gun; and they were so delighted with the noise it made that they had exhausted their scanty provision of powder and lead long before the seals were in sight.

They had taken the shortest way home. It lay past Chain Hole, a small, landlocked basin, very deep, with a narrow entrance, which was shallow at low tide. The entrance opened into a broad bay, and was called Chain Tickle.

"What's that in the tickle?" Billy exclaimed, as they were rowing past.

It was a black object, apparently floating quietly on the surface of the water. The boys gazed at it for a long time, but could make nothing of it. They were completely puzzled.

"'Tis a small bit o' wreck, I'm thinkin'," said Bobby. "Leave us row close and see."

"Maybe 'tis a capsized punt."

When they were within about thirty yards of the object they lay on their oars. For some unaccountable reason they did not care to venture nearer. Twilight was then fast approaching. The light was already beginning to fail.

"'Tis a wonderful queer thing!" Billy muttered, his curiosity getting the better of him. "Row ahead, Bobby. We'll go alongside."

"They's something movin' on it!" Bobby whispered, as he let his oars fall in the water. "Look! They's two queer, big, round spots on it – big as plates."

Billy thought he saw the whole object move. He watched it closely. It did stir! It was some living thing, then. But what? A whale?

A long, snakelike arm was lifted out of the water. It swayed this way and that, darted here and there, and fell back with a splash. The moving spots, now plainly gigantic eyes, glittered.

"'Tis the devil-fish!" screamed Bobby.

Another arm was lifted up, then a third and a fourth and a fifth. The monster began to lash the water – faster and yet more furiously – until the tickle was heaving and frothy, and the whole neighbourhood was in an uproar.

"Pull! Pull!" cried Bobby.

Billy, too, was in a panic. They turned the head of the punt and pulled with all their might. The water swirled in the wake of the boat. Perceiving, however, that the squid made no effort to follow, they got the better of their fright Then they lay on their oars to watch the monster.

They wondered why it still lay in the tickle, why it so furiously lashed the water with its arms and great tail. It was Bobby who solved the mystery.

"'Tis aground," said he.

That was evidently the situation. The squid had been caught in the shallow tickle when the tide, which ran swiftly at that point, was on the ebb. The boys took courage. Their curiosity still further emboldened them. So once more they turned the punt about and pulled cautiously towards the tickle.

There was less light than before, but still sufficient to disclose the baleful eyes and writhing arms of the squid when the boat was yet a safe distance away. One by one the arms fell back into the water, as if from exhaustion; slowly the beating of the tail subsided. After a time all sound and motion ceased. The boys waited for some further sign of life, but none came. The squid was still, as if dead.

"Sure, he's dead now," said Billy. "Leave us pull close up."

"Oh, no, b'y! He's but makin' believe."

But Billy thought otherwise. "I wants that squid," he said, in a dogged way, "and I'm goin' to have him. I'll sell him and get a new punt."

Bobby protested in vain. Nothing would content Billy Topsail but the possession of the big squid's body. Bobby pointed out that if the long, powerful arms were once laid on the boat there would be no escape. He recalled to Billy the harbour story of the horrible death of Zachariah North, who, as report said, had been pursued, captured and pulled under water by a devil-fish in Gander Bay.3

It was all to no purpose, however, for Billy obstinately declared that he would make sure of the squid before the tide turned. He admitted a slight risk, but he wanted a new punt, and he was willing to risk something to obtain it.

He proposed to put Bobby ashore, and approach the squid alone; but Bobby would not listen. Two hands might be needed in the boat, he said. What if the squid were alive, after all? What if it laid hold of the punt? In that event, two hands would surely be needed.

"I'll go," he said. "But leave us pull slow. And if we sees so much as a wink of his eye we'll pull away."

They rowed nearer, with great caution. Billy was in the bow of the boat. It was he who had the axe. Bobby, seated amidships, faced the bow. It was he who did the rowing.

The squid was quiet. There was not a sign of life about it. Billy estimated the length of its body, from the beak to the point of the tail, as twenty feet, the circumference as "the size of a hogshead." Its tentacular arms, he determined, must be at least thirty-five feet long; and when the boat came within that distance he shuddered.

"Is you sure he's dead?" Bobby whispered, weakly.

"I don't know!" Billy answered, in a gasp. "I thinks so."

Bobby dropped the oars and stepped to the bow of the punt. The boat lost way and came to a stop within twenty feet of the squid. Still there was no sign of life.

The boys stared at the great, still body, lying quiet in the gathering dusk and haze. Neither seemed to feel the slight trembling of the boat that might have warned them. Not a word was spoken until Billy, in a whisper, directed Bobby to pull the boat a few feet nearer.

"But we're movin' already," he added, in a puzzled way.

The boat was very slowly approaching the squid. The motion was hardly perceptible, but it was real.

"'Tis queer!" said Bobby.

He turned to take up the oars. What he saw lying over the port gunwale of the boat made him gasp, grip Billy's wrist and utter a scream of terror!

"We're cotched!"

The squid had fastened one of its tentacles to the punt. The other was poised above the stern, ready to fall and fix its suckers. The onward movement of the punt was explained.

Billy knew the danger, but he was not so terrified as to be incapable of action. He was about to spring to the stem to strike off the tentacle that already lay over the gunwale; but as he looked down to choose his step he saw that one of the eight powerful arms was slowly creeping over the starboard bow.

He struck at that arm with all his might, missed, wrenched the axe from the gunwale, and struck true. The mutilated arm was withdrawn. Billy leaped to the stern, vaguely conscious in passing that another arm was creeping from the water. He severed the first tentacle with one blow. When he turned to strike the second it had disappeared; so, too, had the second arm. The boat seemed to be free, but it was still within grasp.

In the meantime the squid had awakened to furious activity. It was lashing the water with arms and tail, angrily snapping its great beak and ejecting streams of black water from its siphon-tube. The water was violently agitated and covered with a black froth.

In this the creature manifested fear and distress. Had it not been aground it would have backed swiftly into the deep water of the basin. But, as if finding itself at bay, it lifted its uninjured tentacle high above the boat. Billy made ready to strike.

By this time Bobby had mastered his terror. While Billy stood with uplifted axe, his eyes fixed on the waving tentacle overhead, Billy heaved mightily on the oars. The boat slowly drew away from that highly dangerous neighbourhood. In a moment it was beyond reach of the arms, but still, apparently, within reach of the tentacle. The tentacle was withdrawn a short distance; then like a flash it shot towards the boat, writhing as it came.

Billy struck blindly – and struck nothing. The tentacle had fallen short. The boat was out of danger!

But still Billy Topsail was determined to have the body of the squid. Notwithstanding Bobby's pleading and protestation, he would not abandon his purpose. He was only the more grimly bent on achieving it. Bobby would not hear of again approaching nearer than the boat then floated, nor did Billy think it advisable. But it occurred to Bobby that they might land, and approach the squid from behind. If they could draw near enough, he said, they could cast the grapnel on the squid's back, and moor it to a tree ashore.

"Sure," he said, excitedly, "you can pick up a squid from behind, and it can't touch you with its arms! It won't be able to see us, and it won't be able to reach us."

So they landed. Billy carried the grapnel, which was attached to twelve fathoms of line. It had six prongs, and each prong was barbed.

A low cliff at the edge of the tickle favoured the plan. The squid lay below, and some twenty feet out from the rock. It was merely a question of whether or not Billy was strong enough to throw the grapnel so far. They tied the end of the line to a stout shrub. Billy cast the grapnel, and it was a strong, true cast. The iron fell fair on the squid's back. It was a capture.

"That means a new punt for me," said Billy, quietly. "The tide'll not carry that devil-fish away."

"And now," Bobby pleaded, "leave us make haste home, for 'tis growin' wonderful dark – and – and there might be another somewhere."

So that is how one of the largest specimens of Architeuthis princeps– enumerated in Prof. John Adam Wright's latest monograph on the cephalopods of North America as the "Chain Tickle specimen" – was captured. And that is how Billy Topsail fairly won a new punt; for when Doctor Marvey, the curator of the Public Museum at St. John's – who is deeply interested in the study of the giant squids – came to Ruddy Cove to make photographs and take measurements, in response to a message from Billy's father, he rewarded the lad.

CHAPTER V

On the Face of the Cliff: Wherein Billy Topsail Gets Lost in a Perilous Place and Sits Down to Recover His Composure

IN summer, when there chanced to be no fish, or when no bait was to be had, and the fish were not to be jigged, Billy Topsail had idle time, which he was not slow to improve for his own amusement. Often he wandered on the cliffs and heads near the harbour – not always for gulls' eggs: sometimes for sheer love of the sky and space and sunlit air. Once, being bound for Breakheart Head, to watch the waves beat on the rocks below, he came across old Arch Butt.

"Wonderful sea outside," said the old fisherman. "Wonderful sea, Billy. 'Tis as big a tumble as ever I seed stirred up in a night."

"An' you'll not be takin' the punt t' the grounds?" Billy asked, in surprise.

"I'm not able, lad. 'Tis too much for any paddle-punt. Sure, the sea's breakin' right across the tickle. 'Tis so much as a man's life is worth t' try t' run out."

"Isn't you got a salmon net off Shag Rock?"

"I is that," Arch answered; "an' I'm wantin' bad t' get to it. 'Tis set off the point of Shag Rock, an' I'm thinkin' the sea will wreck it, for 'tis a wonderful tumble, indeed. 'Tis like I'll not be able t' get out afore to-morrow mornin', but I'm hopin' I will."

"An' I hopes you may, Skipper Arch," said Billy.

It was a fine wish, born of the fresh breeze and brightness of the day – a word let drop from a heart full of good feeling for all the world: nothing more. Yet within a few hours Billy Topsail's life hung upon the possibility of its fulfillment.

"Ay," he repeated, "I hopes you may."

Billy Topsail followed the rocky road to the Bath Tub, climbed the Lookout, and descended the rough declivity beyond to the edge of the sea, meanwhile lifted to a joyous mood by the sunlight and wind and cloudless sky. Indeed, he was not sorry he had come; the grim cliffs and the jagged masses of rock lying at their feet – the thunder and froth where sea met rock – the breaking, flashing water to seaward; all this delighted him then, and were not soon forgotten. Best of all, the third submerged rock off Shag Cliff – the rock they call the Tombstone – was breaking; the greater waves there leaped into the air in fountains of froth.

"I 'low I'll get closer t' the Tombstone," thought he.

Thus he was led along the coast to the foot of Shag Cliff. It was a hard climb, in which hands and feet were both concerned. There were chasms to leap, sharp points to round, great rocks to scale, narrow ledges to pass over on the toes of his boots; and all the while the breakers were crashing and foaming below him, and now and again splashing him with spray.

Had the day been drear, it may be he would not have ventured so far; but the sun was out, the day long, the gulls quietly soaring over the sea, and on he went, giving no thought whatever to his return.

Once under the cliff, he ventured farther. Detached from it, there lies Nanny's Rock, which must long ago have fallen from above; the breakers surrounded but did not sweep it when they rose and broke.

His wish to lie there in the sunshine, with the blue sky above him and the noise of the water in his ears, led him to dash across the dripping space between when the wave fell back, even though he must scramble out of the way of the returning water.

In a few minutes he was deep in an enchanting day-dream, which, to his subsequent peril, soon changed to sleep.

The tide was rising. A few drops of spray, falling upon his face from a great breaker, awoke him. On the instant he was wide awake and looking desperately about. Then he laughed to think that the breakers were reaching for him – that they would have had him fast in the trap had he slept much longer; for, in a glance, he thought he had made sure that his escape from the rock was not yet cut off. But his laugh was touched with some embarrassment when he found, upon trial, that the sea had blocked the path by which he had reached the foot of Shag Cliff.

"I must go 'tother way," he thought.

There was no other way; to right and to left the sea was breaking against overhanging juts of rock. He could pass from jut to jut, but he could round neither.

"Sure, I'll be late for dinner," he thought; "an' dad won't like it."

It was all very well to exclaim vexatiously, but he was forced to abandon the hope of returning by way of the foot of the cliffs. The tide had cut him off.

"I'll scale Shag Cliff," he determined.

He was not alarmed; the situation was awkward, but it promised the excitement of an adventure, and for a time he was rather glad that he had fallen asleep. To scale the two hundred feet of Shag Cliff – that was something to achieve! His father would say that he was "narvy," and forget that he had kept him from his dinner. Scale Shag Cliff, by all means!

He knew well enough that he had but to seek higher ground and wait for the tide to fall, if he wanted an unexciting return; but it pleased him to make believe that his situation was desperate – that the rising water would overwhelm him if he did not escape over the brow of the cliff: an indulgence which his imagination did not need half an hour later. When he looked up, however, to choose a path of ascent, he found that, from where he stood, close against the cliff at the base, there seemed to be no path at all.

"I 'low I'll have t' go back t' Nanny's Rock for a better squint," he told himself.

Back to Nanny's Rock he went, at no small risk, for the occasional flow of foam, which had cut it off from the mainland when first he crossed, had swollen to a strait of some depth and strength. He must make the leap, but he dreaded it. There was a moment of terror when his foot slipped, and he came near falling back into the very claws of the breaker which followed him; on that account, perhaps, his survey of the face of the cliff was a hurried one, and his return to safe ground precipitate and somewhat flurried.

He had seen enough, however, to persuade him that the ascent would be comparatively easy for at least a hundred feet, and that, for the rest of the way, it would not, probably, be much more difficult.

In point of fact, he knew nothing whatever of what lay beyond the first hundred feet. But the element of probability, or rather improbability, did not disconcert him. He could at least make a start.

If you have ever climbed about a rocky sea-coast, you will know that an ascent may be comparatively simple where a descent is quite impracticable; you will know that the unwary may of a sudden reach a point where to continue the climb is a nauseating necessity. There are times when one regrets the courage that led him into his difficulty – the courage or the carelessness, as the case may be.

Experience had long ago taught Billy Topsail that; but the lesson had not been severe – there had been no gulf behind him; the whip of life or death had not urged him on. Indeed, he had never attempted a climb of such height and ugly possibilities in the way of blind leads as Shag Cliff, else possibly he should not have made the start with a sense of adventure so inspiring.

Up he went – up and still up, his cheeks glowing, his nerves pleasurably tingling! Up – up and still up, until he could hear the whiz of gulls' wings near him, and the feeling of space below began to try his nerves. At last he stopped to rest and look about. Down deep lay the breakers, so far off, it seemed, that he marvelled he could hear the roar and crash so distinctly.

"An' they says 'tis a hundred feet!" thought he. "Hut! 'Tis two hundred if 'tis an inch. An' I isn't but half way up!"

Beyond that point his difficulties began. The cliff was bolder; it was almost bare of those little ledges and crevices and projections upon which the cliff-climber depends for handhold and foothold. Moreover, the path was interrupted from time to time by sheer or overhanging rock. When he came to these impassable places, of course, he turned to right or left, content with his progress if only he mounted higher and higher. Thus he strayed far off the path he had picked out from Nanny's Rock; indeed, he was climbing blindly, a thoughtless course, for – had he but stopped to think – there was no knowing that the cliff did not overhang at the end of the way he had taken.

Meanwhile, time was passing. He had climbed with such caution, retraced his steps, changed his course so often that noon was long past. So when next he came to a roomy ledge he sat down to rest before proceeding farther.

"Wonderful queer!" he thought, after a look about. "But where is I?"

It was a puzzling question. The cliff, projecting below him, cut off his view of the breakers; and the rock above, which came to an end in blue sky, was of course unfamiliar. At what part of Shag Rock he then was he could not tell.

CHAPTER VI

In Which Billy Topsail Loses His Nerve. Wherein, also, the Wings of Gulls Seem to Brush Past

"WONDERFUL queer!" thought Billy Topsail. "Lost on a cliff! 'Tis the queerest thing I ever knowed."

But that was Billy's case.

"I 'low," he concluded, at last, "that I'd better be goin' up instead o' down."

It did not appear that he would be unable to go down; the way up was the shorter way, that was all. Nevertheless, his feeling of security was pretty well shaken when he again began to climb. His grip was tighter, his shrinking from the depths stronger and more frequent; in fact, he hugged the rock more than was good for him.

He knew the symptom for an alarming one – it turned him faint when first he recognized it – and he tried to fix his attention upon the effort to climb higher. But now and again the fear of the space behind and below would creep in. Reason told him that the better part was to return; but he was in no condition to listen to reason. His whole desire – it was fast becoming frantic – was to crawl over the brow of the cliff and be safe.

But where was the brow of the cliff? It seemed to him that he had climbed a thousand feet.

A few minutes later he caught sight of a shrub; then he knew that he was within a few feet of the end of the climb. The shrub – a stunted spruce, which he had good reason to remember – was to his right, peeping round a projection of rock.

He was then on a ledge, with good foothold and good handhold; and a way of return to the shore lay open to him. By craning his neck he made out that if he could pass that projection he would reach shelving, broken rock, and be safe. Then he studied the face of the rocks between – a space of some six feet.

There was foothold there, midway, but he shrank from attempting to reach it. He had never thought in his life to try so perilous a passage. A survey of the course of a body falling from that point was almost more than he could support. Nevertheless, strange as it may seem, the waving shrub tempted him to risk something more to end his suspense. He summoned courage enough to stretch out his right foot and search with his right hand for a hold.

Unfortunately, he found both – a ledge for his foot and a crevice for his fingers.

He drew himself over. It took courage and strength, for it was a long stretch. Had he been cramped for room, had he not been free to move at the starting-point, he could not have managed it. But there he was – both feet on a ledge as wide as his feet were long, both hands with a comfortable grip on solid rock. He shuffled along until he came to the end of the ledge.

His last obstacle now lay before him. He must round the projection which divided him from the broken, shelving rock beyond. Had he foreseen the slightest difficulty he would not have gone so far. So, with confidence, he sought a foothold for his right foot – a crevice for the fingers of his right hand.

And he tried again, with confidence unshaken; again, with patience; again, with rising fear. There was no hold; the passage was impracticable. There was nothing for it but to return.

So he shuffled back to the other end of the ledge. Then, keenly regretting the necessity of return, he sought a foothold for his left foot – a crevice for the fingers of his left hand. He tried again, in some wonder; again, with a rush of fear; again, in abject terror.

To his horror, he found that he could not return. From the narrow ledge it was impossible to pass to the wider, although it had been possible to pass from the wider to the narrow. For an instant he was on the point of toppling back; but he let his body fall forward against the face of the cliff, and there he rested, gripping the rock with both hands until the faintness passed.

The situation was quite plain to him. He was standing on a ledge, as wide as his feet were long, some two or three hundred feet above the sea; his face was to the cliff, and he could neither sit down nor turn round. There he must stand until – who could tell? In what way could relief come to him? Who was to see? Who could hear his cries for help? No fishermen were on the grounds – no punts were out of the harbour; the sea was too high for that, as he had been told.

There was only one answer to his question. He must stand until – he fell.

"Yes," he was courageous enough to admit calmly, "I 'low I got t' go."

That once admitted, his terror of that space behind and below in some measure departed. The sun was still shining; the sky – as he knew, for he could catch a glimpse of it on each side – was still blue. But soon he began to think of the night; then his terror returned – not of the present moment, but of the hours of darkness approaching.

Could he endure until night? He thought not. His position was awkward. Surely his strength would wear out – his hands weaken, although the strain upon them was slight; his legs give way.

Of course he followed the natural impulse to cling to his life as long as he could. Thus, while the afternoon dragged along and the dusk approached, he stood on the face of the cliff, waiting for the moment when his weakening strength would fail and he would fall to his death.