Chapter II: Part 2

We stole away, but Leonard followed us, as if asking where we went and why he was not to go with us. For the first time we pushed him away from us, though you can not know what it meant to us to do it. He stood still then, as if wondering, perhaps a little hurt, and we, not daring to look back, ran for the fence, clambered upon it, and gained the roof.

Once there, we could not resist watching a bit, and it was not long before the two luminous eyes gleamed from the underbrush. Then we saw a shapely, dark body come slowly into the open, and Leonard, with light, springing bounds, had rushed to meet his mother. For an instant we saw again the glowing orbs of two pairs of eyes. Then the lights vanished; two dark bodies moved side by side into the blackness of the woods; we heard the light crackle of underbrush; and then silence.

Silently we crept into our beds, and long afterward I heard Brother’s choking whisper coming through the darkness—my own face was buried in the pillow:

“I know—Leonard’s going to miss—his—gum—”

We cried ourselves to sleep that night, thinking of an empty pen and of a little brown friend gone from us forever.

_He questioningly sniffed the breeze._
]

_Part Four_
THE FAERY NIGHT

There came a night in June when the moon rose a great, yellow ball of light over the fir trees that crowned the hill. It was a night for adventure, for magic and mystery. And I, wide awake on the camp cot in the front yard of the cabin, listened to the faint lapping of the water upon the beach not a single stone’s-throw away, and to the wordless song of the pine trees as the night wind swept drowsy fingers across their branches—harps that woke to melody only when the daylight had gone and the stars stole out to listen to their song. The puffy maple tree which guarded the little log cabin was murmuring softly to itself, its leaves nodding to each other as if confiding some wonderful secret, and the giant fir tree on the other side of the porch stood erect and motionless as if it were a sentinel and thus disdained to gossip.

From far out in the bay came faint splashes which told of salmon leaping, and now and then the distant cry of a night bird, so faint as to be only the shadow of a sound. In the air was the smell of grass freshly wet with dew, of pine trees drenched and glistening, of wild syringa on the hillside, and, more pronounced, the scent of the tiny Mother of God roses that clambered over the cabin in a white and fragrant wreath.

The stars were bright as the tears of angels, from which the Chinook Indians say they were made, and the moon in their midst flooded hill and bay with a silvery light made more intense by the blackness of the forest.

Somehow there was a hint of expectancy in the air, as if the summer had looked forward to this one night and was a-thrill with the joy of its coming. I could not sleep, for I was attuned to the things of the out-of-doors, and I, too, was a-thrill with the expectation of something—I knew not what.

I watched Altair rise over the “Happy Family” pines with his two attendant stars that are like the outspread wings of an eagle, and I kissed my hand to him in greeting.

A star fell, leaving a trailing line of light in its wake, and suddenly I felt a little sad, for a Siwash Indian chief had told us that when a star fell, it was a flower tossed by the hand of a good spirit from Paradise to ease the pain of a soul passing out into the Great Darkness.

Then Amarillo, the big yellow cat, padded across the grass with little throaty mewings of greeting, and I felt the light thud of his body as he leaped on the bed and settled himself at my feet. He, too, was restless, for he would raise and lower his tawny head and would sometimes turn his golden eyes upon me as if seeking an explanation for the thrill that was in the night.

So I was not surprised when I heard a faint, familiar scraping which told me that Brother had climbed from his bedroom window and was sliding down the roof to the fence.

Since we had only one camp cot, Brother and I must needs take turns sleeping out of doors. And although this night was mine, I knew that he, too, had felt its magic and could not abide the stuffy darkness of the cabin when the world outside was bathed in moonlight. He came tiptoeing around the corner of the house very quietly so as not to waken the grown-ups, and Amarillo purred loudly as he saw him come, and dug his claws into the bedclothes with contented, prickling sounds.

Brother was fully dressed, and he put his lips close to my ear as he whispered: “Do you know what kind of a night this is?”

“No,” I answered breathlessly.

“A fairy night!” he breathed with awe. “The old fisherman told me that on moonlight nights the fairies dance in the moss ring on the Hill Trail. Come quick, let’s go!”

I needed no second bidding. Even as he spoke, I was drawing over my head the knee-length dress I had worn during the day, and was feeling for my moccasins tucked away from the dew under the rubber covering of the bed.

Hand in hand we slipped out of the yard and up the trail, moving as silently as wraiths. Amarillo followed to the edge of the woods and then slipped away on business of his own.

Up the hill we hurried, up the narrow trail patched with moonlight and shadows. The wet branches of the pines brushed across our faces; our bare legs were swished by fern fronds as we passed. Sometimes a twig crackled underfoot, and now and then we heard a slight rustling in the underbrush where a little animal was moving.

We passed by the spring which gurgled dreamily into the pool shadowed by ferns and alders. A mother deer and her baby were drinking there, and although they turned their great eyes upon us, luminous in the moonlight that sifted through the branches, they did not start or run as we stole by.

The top of the hill was gained at last, and the Hill Trail which we called ours. Well we knew the fairy ring, a circle of moss in a clearing, ringed around with pink twin-flowers and wild strawberry vines, a fitting place for elfin feet to dance on a moonlight night. And as we neared the clearing flooded by the bright moonlight, we trembled with ecstasy and anticipation. That the fairies did dance there we never doubted, but would they reveal themselves to the eyes of mortals, even such friendly mortals as ourselves?

Crouched behind a cedar log and screened by salal bushes, we watched and waited, our eyes glued to the moss ring in the patch of moon silver—but no fairies came.

Just the same it _was_ a fairy night, as you shall see. For presently a little brown bear came out into the clearing, making considerably more noise than his size warranted, sat up on his haunches, and sniffed the breeze questioningly. He nibbled daintily at the leaves of a red huckleberry bush, and having finished his nocturnal repast, walked pigeon-toed over to a cedar tree, scratched his back against it, making rumbling noises of content, and finally raised himself to his full height—which was not so high after all—and marked how tall he was on the shaggy bark of the tree by scratching it deeply with his claws. Then he waddled away in his bow-legged fashion, and we heard the faint crashing of the underbrush as he passed through.

There came a wakeful brown rabbit, who hopped into the very center of the fairy ring, wiggled his ears and nose, and then began to make an elaborate toilet—in honor, we thought, of the elfin ball. He washed his paws with care and gave each tapering ear a thorough massage. Last, he twisted like a contortionist to assure himself that his white knob of a tail was in perfect order, and finally being satisfied with his inspection, he loped leisurely away without so much as the crackle of a twig.

The next two visitors to the moonlit clearing were two baby skunks striped with brown and white and with graceful tufts of white for tails. Strangely enough, Brother and I were not afraid of what might happen should they suddenly be aware of our presence and become frightened, for it seemed to us that we too belonged to the fairy night and that nothing could happen to mar the perfect beauty of it. The little animals played like kittens, dashing out at each other from the shadows and rolling about in mock ferocity, but presently they, too, stole away, silently, as wood creatures move, and we were left alone with the moonlit night and the empty fairy ring.

Then from the direction of the trail came a cry of pain—like a human cry. The spell of the night was shattered, and we gripped each other’s hands and thought of flight. But again came the sound, a whimpering cry like a child in distress, and the fear which had clutched at our hearts vanished as suddenly, for we knew it must be an animal—some woods friend sorely hurt. So without further pause we left the shelter of the log and hurried across the clearing to the trail. The sound came from beyond the “Happy Family” pines, and we hastened toward it.

In the lumber clearing just off the trail we found what we had half expected—a young fox caught in a steel trap by his front paws, and he was whimpering with the pain of it. The dark eyes which he turned toward us showed a frenzied, greenish light, and as we came nearer, he yelped sharply, tugging frantically at the sharp teeth which never relaxed their grip.

The pity in our hearts made us forgetful of his fear, but as we started toward him, he wrenched backward, dragging the heavy trap to the full length of the chain, his small, gray-brown body a-quiver with terror and pain. So then we waited, approaching very quietly and slowly. Finally his struggles ceased from sheer fatigue, and the eyes which he turned upon us were dull and lifeless. Brother tried to hold me back, but I would not have it so, and coming very close to the little fox, I put my hand on his soft, furry head. He did not bite or even cringe. Perhaps his pain was so great that he could suffer no more and so could not be afraid, or perhaps it was because he sensed that my touch was a friendly one and that help was near at hand.

Together Brother and I pried the steel jaws apart, and the little fox, set free, limped away for a few feet and then fell exhausted. So I picked him up, and walking quietly so as not to hurt or alarm him, we sought again the forest pool, mottled now with deep shadows and pale lights. The mother deer and her baby had gone, and in the cool, gurgling water of the little stream we bathed the wounded feet of our friend and named him “Reginald.” We made sure that the paws were not broken, only lacerated by the sharp teeth of the trap, and when he began to stir and move his head in quick jerks from side to side, we set him down on the cool moss. After a little while he commenced to lick the hurt paws, very gently at first and then with increasing confidence, and he did not go away at once. He feared us no more than he would have feared a brother and sister fox. So for an hour, until the moonlight gleams became fainter and the shadows deeper, the three of us lingered by the forest pool. Brother and I pretended that Reginald talked to us and that he could understand what we said to him. And when finally he finished licking his paws and slipped away into the darkness, we regained once more the moonlit Hill Trail and started for home.

But there was one thing we must do, and we turned back to “Reginald’s clearing,” as we called it. In the waning light we found the trap which had so cruelly hurt our little friend, and we unwound the chain from the tree. Into the blackness of the underbrush we flung it and laughed defiantly as we heard it crash in the thicket. Then, as if some avenging power were hard on our heels, we fled down the trail out of the wood and stole into the yard without even the creaking of a gate to betray us.

Thrilled to the very core of my being, I huddled into bed. And Amarillo, who had long since returned, arched his back and yawned widely as if to imply that such a nocturnal excursion was not respectable.

Brother started to tiptoe around to the fence and thus gain the roof and his bedroom, but I stopped him with a sharp hiss, and he tiptoed back to me.

“What shall we say if some hunter asks us about the trap?” I breathed into his ear, and he doubled up and laughed noiselessly.

“We will tell him that anything can happen on a fairy night,” he whispered back and stole away to the fence, while I watched the moon settle behind the distant blue hills, and with the ensuing darkness came the breath of the morning breeze. The fairy night was over.

_Part Five_| THE FRIENDSHIP THAT FAILED

_Part Five_
THE FRIENDSHIP THAT FAILED

On the shores of Puget Sound, where the woods come down to the shore to fraternize with the little white-capped waves of the bay, lived Henry, the heron. How old he was before Brother and I came to know him, we could not tell. But an old-man bird he must have been surely, for his was a knowledge of fishing that comes from long experience.

Every day we would watch him from our little log cabin—watch him sail majestically toward the float, pause directly above, and flap down upon it, using his lanky legs as balancing weights. He would stand there for many moments, turning his head slightly from side to side as if revolving in his mind whether he had done the wise thing in coming, and what his next move ought to be.

_Cannon came charging in a whirlwind of feathers._
]

Such a deliberate bird Henry seemed, but this apparent deliberation was only one of the tricks of his trade. I am sure that had I been a fish, I would have believed there was nothing to fear from the immobile bunch of gray feathers balanced on two skinny stilt legs, and I would have swum merrily under the very tip of his beak. But Henry’s sharp, black eyes missed nothing, as the hapless fish found to their cost when they ventured too near the surface. With one lightning swoop the great bill cleaved the water, and the next instant a shiny fish was wriggling in his beak.

Sometimes he did his fishing while standing in the water up to his knees—or where his knees would be if herons had such things. With his head drawn in between his feathered shoulders and his long beak sticking out at right angles like a lance at rest, he seemed to be taking a siesta, and only the occasional plunge of his long bill into the water, and the accompanying twinkle of a small silver fish as it flapped in amazement before it slid down into his gullet, proved that he was awake—and hungry.

We gave Henry his name when he was but an acquaintance of ours. We never really hoped to have him for a friend, but we liked him, and we felt that he liked us, too. So when he did his fishing on our float or knee-deep in the water of the little cove before the cabin, we threw scraps of bread to him, which he accepted gravely and always dipped in the salt water before swallowing.

We used to hear his strange, mournful cry late at night as he flew northward past the cove on his way to the pine tree where he lived, and we always pretended he was giving us a greeting before he turned in for the night.

We found out, too, where he made his home. We had often seen him land on a bony, fallen tree half a mile up the beach, which jutted straight out into the water and which we called “the Pointing Finger.” Once, in our explorations along the beach trail, we saw Henry standing on the gray shaft of the dead tree, and as we watched, he stooped slightly, then flapped upward and flew into a tall pine tree almost in front of us. When we stood under it, we could distinguish the outlines of a nest high up in the branches. Perhaps at that time there was a Mrs. Henry and maybe some young Henrys—I do not know. But certain it was that when he became a friend of ours by reason of a happening which might have ended in tragedy for him, he seemed to be without family cares or responsibilities.

During the season when the salmon were running, the Old Fisherman, who was at once our mentor and playfellow, spread his nets from the shore-line straight out into the bay for a hundred yards, leaving them there the night through to catch the large silver salmon on their way to the creeks to spawn. One of these nights he had laid his net near the Pointing Finger, and Brother and I, going with him in his creaky, flat-bottomed boat to see the result of the haul, heard ahead of us a great splashing, and saw dimly outlined in the midst of the cork floats a dark body that flapped and struggled.

We whispered excitedly that perhaps a seal had become entangled in the net, but the Old Fisherman thought it only a salmon, or perhaps a dogfish whose pointed snout had been caught in the meshes of the cords.

But it was neither seal nor salmon, for on rowing close to the net we saw by the light of the Old Fisherman’s lantern a huge, gray bird with flapping wings and slashing beak. It was Henry, the heron, who had alighted on one of the cork floaters, perhaps thinking it safe footing, and had thus become hopelessly snared in the net.

What was even worse, he had hurt himself cruelly in his struggles, for one long leg was dangling helplessly, and one of his wide gray wings hung limp at his side. When the Old Fisherman, with gruff words but tender hands, released him from the cords which bound him, he could not fly, but flapped helplessly upon the water. And so it was that we lifted him into the boat and tied a gunnysack around him so that he should not injure himself further, for he did not understand that our intentions were kindly and snapped at us fiercely with his huge beak.

The Old Fisherman, who had lived with the Indians and who had acquired their curative gifts, took Henry, the heron, in charge when we reached the little cabin in the cove, first muzzling him by tying a stout cord about his beak. Then he set the broken wing and put the leg in splints. The grown-ups suggested putting Henry in the hen-house for the night, but Brother and I would not have it so, and with their help we constructed a pen behind the kitchen stove where he could be warm and comfortable. We left him moving his head jerkily from side to side, blinking his beady eyes now and then and snapping his bill as if in troubled retrospect.

But during the next week Henry, the heron, came to know that we were his friends and that he had nothing to fear from us. He allowed us to stroke him and would accept morsels of food from our fingers, even taking care not to nip us with his powerful beak.

When he had finally ceased to fear us, we gave him the liberty of the back-yard, and he would stalk about stiffly like a peg-legged veteran of the wars. But most of the time he would stand with his head drawn in between his shoulders, the picture of dejection, and Brother and I knew he was longing for the freedom of the air and the water which had been his. He was longing for the cool lapping of little waves against his legs, for the silver gleam of fish in the blue depths; and he wanted to fly once more—to circle over the bay, to flap down upon the Pointing Finger. Perhaps he was even lonesome for the nest in the pine tree. At any rate we were sorry for his sadness and set about to remedy it as best we could. We fished indefatigably from the float, and the Old Fisherman brought us smelts and silver perch from his nets.

Then, to make our guest feel more at home, we would put our catch in a washtub filled with water, and Henry would fish for them choosing his prey with calculating eye and gobbling it up with one great peck. It was the best we could do for him, and we felt that he appreciated that, too, for he obligingly hunted down every fish in the tub, and then would turn his grave head toward us, giving us the broadside effect of one shiny eye, whether in thanks or in petition for more we could not determine.

But it was really due to Cannon, our bantam rooster, that Henry’s convalescence was not entirely unendurable. Cannon was the eldest son of Liberty, a small bantam hen who had brought forth her brood on the fourth of July—hence her name and his. He was the undisputed king of the poultry yard, for a strain of game cock in his blood had made him fearless of everything and an unspeakable bully. There was no hen or cock of twice his size who dared come near his end of the feed trough, and even Prince, the mammoth White Rock rooster, stood in awe of him. Perhaps he was merely amused at the airs Cannon gave himself, and so let the tiny cock have his way, but at any rate his record of combat was unsullied by a single defeat.

I have seen many a strange friendship between animals and between birds, too, but never one so curious as that of Henry, the heron, and Cannon, the bantam rooster. For friends they were, and real friends, too. They became acquainted when Cannon, flying into the back-yard one day, spied the stiff-legged Henry and immediately decided to do battle with him. He ruffled up his neck feathers, whirled round and round with one wing dusting the ground, and advancing on Henry, dared him to come on and fight. At first Brother and I thought to rescue Cannon from what we believed would be his sure death. But we were wrong; for Henry regarded the little brown cock contemplatively, snapped his bill in warning, then blinked and turned away as if overcome with boredom. But Cannon was not used to being ignored. If his enemies would not fight, they must at least give way before him. So his neck ruff distended more and more, his tiny comb glowed an angry red, and in his best game-cock fashion he hopped up and down stiffly, trying to strike at the heron’s broad, feathered breast above him.

Henry eyed him curiously, almost saturninely, and at last with a sort of wearied annoyance gave one sweep of his broad bill, and Cannon was sent tumbling in a scurry of brown feathers and outraged squawks. But he was a warrior; back he came in a series of frenzied leaps, and once more Henry’s massive bill swept him lightly but conclusively aside.

Time after time, to the number of twelve, Cannon came charging in a whirlwind of feathers, trying to slash the feathered breast of his passive enemy, always to be met by the calm but decisive buffet of Henry’s beak. At last it was a wearied little bantam cock who stopped pantingly and turned his back upon the gray heron, owning himself defeated.

Perhaps it was respect for Henry’s superior prowess which actuated Cannon, and perhaps the merry little bantam’s pluck appealed to the grave fisher bird, for they became almost at once inseparable friends. Cannon deserted his feathered acquaintances and spent his time in the back-yard with Henry. When finally the invalid was well enough to hobble down on the float, Cannon went with him and would stand beside him while Henry, the heron, swooped joyfully upon minnows and silver smelt and gobbled them down with a zest he had never displayed when fishing in the washtub. Such became the intimacy of the tall Henry and the diminutive Cannon that Henry would even share his catch with Cannon, dropping down upon the float a small, wriggling fish for Cannon’s delectation.

We noticed that at first the bantam rooster eyed askance the flapping tidbits offered by his friend. He was not accustomed to such lively food, but little by little he learned to peck and devour the fish with the same relish that Henry showed for them. He became a feathered parasite, depending almost entirely upon the heron for his meals.

It was such a pleasant friendship—comradeship between man and man always is—and it was broken up, I am sorry to say, in the usual way—by a woman.

As Henry grew stronger, his leg and wing knit rapidly. And on the day when the Old Fisherman removed the bandages and pronounced the patient out of danger, we feared our heron friend would leave us. But he did not. He had become accustomed to the float, to the cabin, to the yard, and to Brother and me. Above all, there was Cannon, the bantam rooster. So he stayed with us, flapping up into the firtree in the front yard at night to roost, and fishing from the float or the beach in the daytime. It was an idyllic state of affairs which might have lasted indefinitely had it not been for Sironda, the Black Minorca hen.

“Si” we sometimes called her for short, and we had known her from the day of her birth. Even before that; for Brother and I had set the very egg in the incubator from which she was hatched. She was a trim little hen with shiny black feathers, a red comb that fell coquettishly over one eye, and a “singing voice” that made her the prima donna among the poultry. She was in every respect fitted to make an impressionable cockerel forget the ties of friendship, and Brother and I have always believed that she mapped out a campaign to that end after seeing how well Cannon fared by trailing at Henry’s heels.

She took to wandering down upon the float, singing softly to herself and ostensibly on the lookout for bugs, but, as we noticed, keeping an eye upon Cannon and his fisher friend and always drawing nearer and nearer to the pair.

Finally she grew so bold as to come up to Cannon’s side, and when Henry, the heron, next dropped a shining smelt upon the float, the bantam, innately chivalrous, voiced a high-pitched invitation to Sironda to partake of the dainty.

Cannon, watching her, was content to have her devour the juicy morsel, but not so was Henry. He would fish willingly for Cannon, but not for his lady friends, and with one hair-raising scream he opened his huge bill, spread his wings and lunged for Sironda, who dropped the remnants of the fish and fled down the float, half running, half flying, and uttering hysterical cackles.

Cannon watched her precipitous retreat with a surprised and worried countenance; then he turned upon Henry. And though Brother and I could not hear what was said, I am sure that there were fierce words between them, for Henry had to knock Cannon down three times in rapid succession before the irate bantam turned heel and followed Sironda up the float and into the yard.

The rift in the lute had come, and it grew wider. For Sironda became bolder in her advances, and Cannon, flattered by her feminine wiles, laid his fish—of Henry’s catching—at her feet. It was a triangle situation which could end only in one way. For at the end of each one-sided fight Cannon would stalk away with outraged dignity in every ruffled feather, and Henry would gaze after him sadly and would thereafter peck at the swarms of silver smelt solemnly and without zest.

And so he left us. One day he tried his massive wings and sailed upward and outward into the blue sky, circled in midair as if trying his strength, and then flapped quietly away toward the Pointing Finger, and as he flew, he uttered a mournful cry that trailed behind him like a wisp of smoke.

And Cannon, the thankless one, did not even know that he had gone. He was scratching worms for Sironda. But I really think it broke Henry’s heart, for he never came to our float again. And I am positive that he became a woman-hater and remained a bachelor the rest of his life.

_His constant barking set the grown-ups against him._
]

_Part Six_
STOP THIEF

In the days when the roving fisher boats chugged into the little cove to set their nets for salmon or silver smelt, we spent most of our time on the bay. We knew every broad-beamed gray launch that rounded Green Point, a mile away, and we knew most of the fishermen who owned them. We would wait until the coughing engine was silent and the anchor was cast; then we would hoist the sail of our tiny, round-bottomed skiff and, using an oar for a rudder, skim out across the ruffled surface of the bay to pay a visit to the swarthy-visaged men with heavy, grizzled beards and rough, red hands. They always made us welcome in their strange and guttural tongues, for we took them apples from the orchard, and sometimes a glass of jelly or a loaf of home-made bread. And in exchange they gave us curious souvenirs of their travels—dried starfish of monstrous size, lovely, iridescent shells, and reed baskets bartered from the Siwash Indians.

The boat we knew best was called _Rosenzweig_, which, the Austrian owners said, meant “Rose-branch.” These two fishermen, dark, powerful men, anchored just beyond our float in the smelt and salmon seasons, and we were fond of them. They let us help them haul in the nets, and more than once Brother and I have stood in huge hip boots many sizes too large, tugging at wet ropes heavy with seaweed, excitedly pulling at the drag net and watching for the first glint of splashing silver in the brown meshes which would tell us that the net was nearly to the beach and filled with fish.

We were always sorry to see the _Rosenzweig_ leave us, and it was always a day of rejoicing when we sighted the little gray boat chugging around the Point, its bow and stern piled high with seine and drag nets. The two fishermen brought us a gift each time—we expected it. Sometimes it would be a bunch of letters with Austrian stamps attached—Brother and I were confirmed philatelists; sometimes it was a sugar-cured salmon, and once they brought us a carved canoe paddle which they had purchased of a Nittenat chief, far up the straits toward Alaska.

But the day of days was when, coming alongside their gray boat just as the anchor splashed, we were greeted by Andrin, the elder brother, who grinned delightedly and signified in his broken English that he had something wonderful for us.

We clambered over the gunwale of the _Rosenzweig_, with its littered deck and its heavy, perpetual smell of fish, seaweed, and tar calking, and Karl, the younger fisherman, made us shut our eyes while he carried something up from the hold and put it on the deck, something that thrashed about wetly and barked in a high-pitched baby voice much like a puppy’s.

We opened our eyes and stared in amazement. For there, before us on the deck, was a baby seal! He was wet and shiny brown, with great, bright eyes that peered at us curiously, but without fear, and delicate nostrils with neat, gentlemanly whiskers protruding from each side. With his tiny fore-flappers he propelled himself along the deck, barking constantly. Andrin threw him a piece of dried fish, which he caught in the air and devoured instantly.

“We bring you nice present,” said Karl, showing his white teeth in a smile, and he indicated the baby seal, who reared himself up as high as he could on his front flappers and barked vociferously.

That we were delighted goes without saying. We had seen many seals from a distance, but never had we thought to have one for a friend.

Often one would pop out of the water in the wake of our boat as we rowed to town, his wet, sleek head blackly silhouetted against the blue water. And if we whistled or called, he would follow us indefinitely, for seals have more than their share of curiosity. They are interested in strange sounds and in bright colors. Once, when Brother was wearing a red sweater, a seal followed our boat for nearly a mile.

We had often known when they were near us in the Bay even without seeing them. For when we saw a salmon jumping many times, in a series of frenzied leaps, we knew it was not through sport, but because he was pursued by a seal who would surely seize him the minute his strength gave out. We had seen salmon nets spread in the water with only a row of fish heads remaining in the meshes. Robber seals had neatly bitten off the rest of the body. Once, while Brother and I were swimming far out from the float, a smooth, heavy body brushed against mine, and I screamed with fear. But an instant later a brown, wet head arose not twenty yards away, and two bright eyes were turned on me inquiringly as if to ask why I had been frightened.

You see, we were well acquainted with the seal family at long distance, but never before had we been so close to one of the brown brethren.

I took a piece of fish from Karl’s hand and stooped toward the baby seal, who turned his head from side to side, sniffed once or twice, and then dragged himself along the deck to me, taking the friendship offering gingerly from my outstretched fingers. A little later he found a warm, sunny place on a pile of nets and turned over on his back, scratching himself negligently with one of his fore-flappers.

Karl said he would not take it amiss if we scratched him under the chin, and indeed he did not. He stretched his head back and closed his eyes, while we gently stroked the glossy fur, which, as it dried, became gray rather than brown in color.

The fishermen told us that the baby seal had attended a net-robbing expedition with his mother. Both the lady seal and her baby had become entangled in the nets. The mother had fought and had finally escaped. But the baby they had loosed from the heavy meshes, and had taken him, barking and protesting, on board the _Rosenzweig_, where they had kept him in the hold, first as a prisoner and then as a pet, to bring to Brother and me.

I know they were sorry to part with Alfred, as we christened the little seal, but they needed the hold of their small boat for their catches of fish. They could not afford to turn it permanently into a bath-tub for a water-baby who could not live long away from the element to which he was accustomed. So when the _Rosenzweig_ chugged away a few days later, Alfred was left to our care, with a hundred instructions as to how to regulate his diet and behavior.

The grown-ups were none too pleased at our latest pet, and it was a tribute to Alfred’s winning ways that he finally established himself as firmly in their affection as in ours. For there was no doubting his intelligence, handicapped as it was by his unwieldy body that seemed half fish and half animal.

He learned to respond to his name sooner than most dogs, and he displayed his love for us in a manner which was unmistakable. At first we were afraid to let him go into the bay for fear he would swim away and leave us. We did not know how large seals had to be before they could earn their living in the water, but we chose to think—selfishly perhaps—that Alfred was too small to make his way in a submarine contest of wits against older and more experienced of his kindred.

We need not have worried, however, for the baby seal adopted us in the same spirit that we had adopted him. He evidently had no thought of leaving us. The float in front of the cabin was his headquarters, and from it he would slide off into the water, rolling and splashing like a young dolphin, to return when he was tired or when we called him.

I can see him now, his small, sleek head, with its great brown eyes, sticking up out of the water, at our call pointing for the float like a periscope; lifting himself by his wet fore-flappers with their short, clicking nails and dragging himself toward us, leaving in his wake a trail of salt water.

It was his constant barking which at first had set the grown-ups against him, so we made him refrain from it. He learned that when we said, with finger upraised reprovingly, “Alfred, less noise!” he must be quiet, or there would be no piece of dried fish for him, no bottle of milk, and no gum-drops.

It might not have been necessary to bring Alfred up on the bottle, especially as the fishermen of the _Rosenzweig_ had been feeding him dried fish ever since they had caught him, but our experience with other baby animals had convinced us that milk was a pleasant if not absolutely essential form of food. So we trained Alfred to drink from a bottle with a rubber nipple, and he loved it. He broke the first two, banging them down on the float, so Brother and I devised a padded bag for it. From this Alfred daily took his milk, blinking his great, shining eyes at us and pausing occasionally to bark. We came to know it for his sign of approval.

The gum-drops were given to him experimentally. Brother maintained that the Esquimaux lived on them, and that Alfred, being a relative of northern fur-bearing seals, would doubtless thrive on the same diet. His reasoning may have been faulty in theory, but in practise it was amazingly successful. Many a time did Brother and I row the three miles to town for the special purpose of purchasing gum-drops for Alfred. He seemed to know instinctively when we had the candy with us, for when, in returning, we reached the Pointing Finger, half-way between Green Point and the cove, we could make out a black speck on the float ahead of us, a speck that wriggled and flopped and finally slid down into the water. Then we would see a round dot against the blue little waves of the bay, a dot that resolved itself into a sleek, brown head, and there would be Alfred, swimming toward the boat, lifting himself as high out of the water as he could, his eyes fixed upon us beamingly. We always made him wait until we reached the float and moored the boat, then we would toss him the candy a piece at a time, making him catch it in midair.

As Alfred grew older and larger, we trained him to do some of the things we had seen his kindred do in the circuses. And how eager he was to learn! He put Brother and me to shame, for we hated lessons. He loved them. We taught him to balance an indoor baseball on the tip of his brown nose, and when he saw us coming down the float with his ball in our hands, he would set up a hilarious barking and wriggle over to us, his head moving up and down in an ecstasy of anticipation. There was no barking, though, when he went through his tricks. If Alfred had been a man, his power of concentration would have made him a millionaire. He would sit, moment after moment, posing the ball on his nose, flexing his body from side to side to keep the balance, his bright, intelligent eyes fixed steadily on the leathern sphere.

We taught him to “play dead,” to dive from a high springboard, and to fetch us a stick that we threw into the water.

Some people say there is nothing in heredity. I am sure there is. I do not pretend to be an expert on the question, but I can account in no other way for Alfred’s deflection from the path of respectability. It was certainly not because of lack of nourishment that he took to robbing seine nets of salmon. I am rather inclined to think it was his mother’s waywardness which was cropping out in him. At any rate, he took to making nocturnal excursions, and in the morning we would find him on the float, stretched out listlessly, his stomach actually distended by too much food, and he would eye with disdain the padded bottle of milk and the pieces of griddle cake we had brought for his breakfast.

Still we did not suspect that our friend had become a net robber until the Old Fisherman descended on us one morning with wrath in his eye. He told us of having made the rounds of his salmon nets the night before to find the bodies neatly snipped from half a dozen king salmon. He had even caught the fish burglar in the act of amputating a Chinook salmon’s silver body from its head, and the seal had stared at him in the lantern light and had barked at him.

That it was Alfred, he was sure. Brother and I demurred that one seal was much like another. But no, said the Old Fisherman; this was a small seal, a seal unafraid of people, an impudent, half-grown seal—Alfred!

“And he chose the best fish o’ the lot,” he fumed. “If he’d taken a dog-salmon, now—but no, he has to pick out the kings, the steel-heads and the Chinooks!”

We faced Alfred and charged him with suspicion of robbery. It seemed to us that he avoided our questioning eyes. He flapped over to his ball at the side of the float and occupied himself in trying to hoist it on his nose. It was perfectly clear to us that his conscience was clouded with guilt.

What to do? We loved Alfred dearly, but we loved the Old Fisherman, too, and his living depended upon the hauls of fish he made. A scanty living it was at best, and we could not bear the thought of being even indirectly the cause of poverty descending upon him.

We built a wire cage in which we confined Alfred the next night, much against his will. And the Old Fisherman reported in the morning that no salmon had been stolen. But the following night heredity and appetite proved stronger than the wire netting we had devised, and Alfred robbed the seine net, near the Pointing Finger, of three large steel-heads.

The question of turning Alfred loose was a difficult one. We had never restrained him in any way, and our float and the beach beside it were the only homes he knew. The Old Fisherman spoke of killing, but that was against the law, since the seals of Puget Sound are considered in the same class with sea-gulls and other scavengers. Besides, Brother and I would never have permitted such a thing. Alfred was our friend. Somewhat of a reprobate, it is true, but after all, he had as much right to the salmon in the Bay as had the Old Fisherman. It was not his fault that he could not understand the man-made ethics by which human beings assumed control over the water and its inhabitants.

Then the next morning, as if in response to prayer, the _Rosenzweig_ came chugging around Green Point. Hardly had its anchor splashed when Brother and I were easing our boat alongside and clambering up to the smelly deck.

We told Karl and Andrin, all in a breath, how Alfred, the seal baby, had grown up to be a salmon thief, just like his mother. We told how sorry we were for the Old Fisherman, and how we could not seem to explain to Alfred about controlling his appetite.

Karl and Andrin took counsel with each other. We hung hopefully upon the strange foreign sentences that we could not understand. Then Karl grinned broadly. They were going to buy a new boat, he said, a bigger boat. They could fix a sort of a tank for Alfred, wherein he could submerge himself in water. There would be no question of fish; he would have his fill of them. They had missed him, Karl said. He had been “such a smart babee!”

So Alfred left us as he had come to us—on board the _Rosenzweig_. He nuzzled against my hand like a dog as I gave him a gum-drop, and his shining eyes were fixed on me with so much affection in them that I had to blink hard to keep from crying. He had forgotten Karl and Andrin. His heart was plainly in our keeping.

But the parting had to be. It was with sorrowful faces that we watched the _Rosenzweig_ weigh anchor and commence to chug out into the current.

Brother and I stood on the float, trying to pretend to each other that we weren’t down-hearted, when suddenly I spied between the boards Alfred’s ball.

“Oh,” I cried, “he must have that to remember us by.”

We piled into the little white boat and, pulling on the oars with all our might, set out in pursuit of the gray fishing launch. Our cries finally reached Karl and Andrin, for the engine stopped, and in a few minutes we came alongside.

“Alfred’s ball!” we explained breathlessly. “He’d be lonesome without it.”

And at the sound of our voices, we heard a high-pitched barking from the hold. It was Alfred, who was calling to us as best he knew how, begging us not to leave him, asking us to please take him home with us—

We did not wait for the fishermen’s thanks. We were on the verge of tears. So the engine started again its steady drumming, the propeller churned the water into green and white whirlpools, and the _Rosenzweig_ made out towards the Straits, while our little boat rocked gently in her wake.

And then, as we sat there, a sleek brown head appeared out of the water not a dozen yards from the stern—a shiny seal head with brilliant, intelligent eyes. It was not Alfred, of course, but for an instant we thought it might be. For the space of a few breaths the eyes watched us intently, then the head disappeared from sight.

“I’ll bet it was Alfred’s mother,” said Brother solemnly, “wanting to know what we’d done with her child.”

“Well,” said I, “what has happened is her own fault. If only she hadn’t made a robber of him!”

_Part Seven_
O’HENRY, THE QUAIL BABY

_If Clarence had been a man, he would have endowed orphanages._
]

_Part Seven_
O’HENRY
_The_
QUAIL BABY

It was upon the Hill Trail that Brother and I came to know O’Henry, the Quail Baby. You would have liked our Hill Trail. It ran from the old logging chute, just at the top of the hill above the cabin, straight through woods of pine and fir until it ended at Bright Creek, two miles distant, a turbulent little stream full of rapids and miniature waterfalls, where the lady salmon fought their way up through the fresh water to deposit their eggs. The Hill Trail was bordered by ferns and salal bushes, with delicate, overhanging red huckleberry bushes and rows of young alders who whispered to each other all day like children in church. On either side of the brown ribbon that was the trail a carpet of grass and green moss stretched back into the deep woods, and tapestries of twin-flower vines and wild blackberry bushes hung from stump and fallen tree. The sunlight slanted down through the tall pines and touched the trail with tapering fingers of light as if it loved it. Even in the hottest summer there was always a little breeze that stirred the alders into sleepy gossip and set the pine trees humming gently to themselves. There was the scent of pine-needles, of fallen leaves, of wet moss.

We loved the Hill Trail best on the drowsy days of summer, when the shadows of the trees were long and cool, and the gentle splash of the tiny waterfall deep in the woods came like distant music. It was on such a day that we lay in the cool, deep moss near the Fairy Ring and stared through interlacing branches at the blue patchwork sky. We heard the tap-tap of a woodpecker not far away, the drowsy hum of a bee, and the shrill twittering of a flock of juncoes who were flying overhead. Then from afar came a call that we knew and loved, the deep woods call of the quail, with its three clear notes which said, as we imagined, “Oh, _Hen_-ry! Oh, _Hen_-ry!”

The Chinook Indians say that long ago a lady quail was unfaithful to her mate, but afterward repented. Her husband never forgave her, however, and would not come back to her, so now she goes through the forest calling plaintively to him, “Oh, _Hen_-ry!”

As we listened, the quail call came nearer, then a faint, almost imperceptible scurry of leaves that told us that a bevy of the little brown birds was close at hand. Indeed, closer at hand than we thought, for at that instant a mother quail tripped out from the underbrush and at sight of us stopped short with an imperative danger note, sounded, as we suspected, in warning to the children who were following her. We had not moved, but the mother heart was filled with terror. There was a whir of wings, and she rose in the air for a short distance, then fell, crashing heavily into a clump of fern.

“She’s hurt,” said Brother in a low tone, and quietly yet quickly we rose to our feet, our one thought to aid the little brown lady in her distress. But as we came near her—so near that my outstretched hand almost touched her—she fluttered away out through the clearing and down the trail, one wing dragging piteously.

Of course you must know it was only a trick. Brother and I should have known it, for we had heard of it many times. But such was the excellent acting of the brown mother bird, with her trailing wing, her helpless fluttering, and pitiful little cries, that we never questioned her sincerity. Half a dozen times we almost touched her, and each time she eluded us and fluttered a few feet ahead. Then suddenly with triumphant whir of strong wings she rose in a graceful arc and disappeared in the thickness of the forest shadows.

We stood and laughed—a little ruefully, for we prided ourselves upon our woodcraft. Then I touched Brother’s arm as a thought came to me.

“Her children are back by the Fairy Ring,” I told him. “Let us hide there and see if she will return to them.”

So down the trail we sped, across the little clearing, and stooped behind a thick screen of salal bushes. Nor had we long to wait, for presently there was a soft flutter of wings, a scuttle of leaves, and out from the underbrush, at almost the very spot where we had first seen her, came the mother quail uttering a soft, piping call which meant “Danger is past; all’s well!”

As if by magic, a dozen tiny brown bodies scurried out from under leaves, baby birds the size of bantam chicks. They eddied around and behind her like little leaves in the wind, and she spoke to them in soft, maternal notes, telling them perhaps of the two fierce humans from whom she had saved them by exposing herself to capture.