Chapter XXII: The New Captain of the Bertha B

Day after day Alec toiled at his self-appointed task. Under the broiling sun and when cold rains were falling, with the wind whistling through the _Osprey's_ rigging and in periods of calm, he was daily to be seen on the oyster grounds in his little boat. For whole days at a time he did nothing but take soundings and record the results. Other days he spent studying the currents, watching the tides, searching the face of the water diligently. At other times he gathered water samples here, there, yonder, everywhere, and followed that task by the more trying labor at the microscope. With every sample of water he analyzed, and every survey he made of the currents, he became more and more certain that he had found the thing for which he was searching. He knew exactly where he would put his oyster-beds. He would lease as much land along the edge of the depression in the bottom and immediately adjoining the land already staked as he could handle. By taking a long and narrow strip, he would be certain to have his grounds in the very heart of the slick.

No sooner had Alec made up his mind than he laid the matter before Captain Rumford. "I want to lease one hundred acres right here," he said, pointing to a spot he had marked on his chart of the oyster-beds.

The shipper frowned. "What do you want of oyster-beds now?" he demanded. "You have no way to work them, and the tax on them will eat up your savings. You'll have to pay $75 a year rental, besides the cost of surveying and staking your bed. The sum you'll pay out, just to hold that ground while you're earning your equipment, would go a long way toward paying for your boat. Besides, I don't like grounds so far out. The water's too deep. Oysters ought to be planted in shallow water."

"But you have some beds in deep water yourself, Captain," urged Alec.

"None of them is much good."

"Perhaps they aren't out far enough."

"Nonsense. Shallow water's the only good place for an oyster-bed. There's lots of beds out in deep water, but that's because all the grounds near shore had already been staked out and their owners had to take deep-water grounds or none at all. But it's no place for oysters."

"There's Hardy's bed," urged Alec. "That's as far out as any of them and it's a good bed. With proper care it would be one of the best. I've been examining the water there, and it's full of spat."

"Nonsense, all nonsense," said the shipper impatiently. "Elsa has been pumping me full of rubbish about what you are doing. As though you could tell anything about an oyster ground by looking at a few drops of water through a microscope. This foolishness is the only thing I ever saw in you that I don't like. If only you'd drop it and go to work on my boats as I want you to, you'd get on fast. As for your leasing one hundred acres of oyster-land, and away out there at that, why, it's not to be thought of. It's ridiculous."

Alec looked very sober. From the quarter where he had expected help, came sudden opposition. It almost made him hesitate. "Captain Rumford," he said, "I'm mighty sorry we don't see things alike. I know it seems foolish for a lad of my years to be telling an old oyster captain like yourself anything about oystering. But I have to live up to my lights just as much as you have to live up to yours. I believe I'm right. When I'm done with this work I'll know whether I'm right or wrong. If I'm right, then I've found one of the best locations in the entire oyster region to start a new bed. I know it will cost me a lot to carry that bed. But I'm so sure I'm right that I'm willing to risk the money. I'm willing to bet on myself, if you want to put it that way. That matter is settled. The question is, Will you help me get the land I want, or must I ask somebody else to help me?"

"Well, I admire your pluck, anyway, youngster. If your judgment was half as good, you'd be a winner sure. Since you're so dead set on having those grounds, I'll have to help you get them, of course. You're not of age, are you?"

"No, sir. I was nineteen soon after I came to Bivalve. It won't be so long now until I am twenty."

"You have no guardian?"

"No. But I've been told I need one." Alec grinned. "Elsa says so."

"Well, she's right for once. I'll have to lease these lands in my own name and then transfer them to you later."

"That will be all right."

"Eh? You trust the old man, do you? Haven't you learned that you can't trust everybody? You've had experiences enough here to teach you that lesson pretty well. Suppose your bed _should_ turn out to be worth something, and I decided not to hand it over to you? Had you thought of that possibility, lad?"

"Captain Rumford," said Alec, "there isn't anything I've learned better than the lesson that there are some people I can't trust. And while I've been learning that, I've found that there are some I can."

"Thank you, lad," said the shipper, evidently deeply touched. "Thank you. You can put your mind at rest about your oyster grounds. I'll get them and I'll give you a paper showing that I only hold them in trust for you. And I'll do more. If you don't have the money to pay the expenses, I'll lend it to you and you can pay me whenever you can. But that's because I have confidence in you and not in your oyster grounds."

"Thank you, Captain," said Alec. "It won't be necessary. I have the money."

The captain turned away and went to his desk to make out his application for the desired grounds. But all the way to his chair he kept muttering, "The little fool. He's just throwing his money away."

Having decided the question of his own grounds, Alec turned his attention to the shipper's beds. He spent several days sounding them and studying the water above them. Mostly the captain's beds were well in shore. These he had inherited from his father, who had begun oystering before the shipper was born. These beds were usually very productive. In deep water the captain also owned considerable holdings that he had acquired with profits derived from the beds he had inherited. But none of these had ever proved to be very productive. There was never any very great set of spat in them, and unless they were planted with seed-oysters it hardly paid to dredge them. But, of course, the captain always put seed in all his beds and so he had steadily made some money from them. When Alec analyzed the larval content of the shipper's various beds under the microscope, he found that the shallow water was very rich in spat. The contour of the shore made a vast eddy where these beds lay. The beds farther out were located in the strong current, with not the slightest suspicion of a slick or an eddy near them.

When Alec had concluded his examination of the shipper's beds, he went directly to their owner, though he made a wry face as he thought of what was probably before him.

"Captain Rumford," he said, "I've been working out in your beds for several days. Your shallow water beds are very fine grounds, but----"

"Of course they are. Of course they are. Shallow water's the only proper place for an oyster-bed."

"Your other beds, I was going to say," went on Alec, "are not nearly so good."

"Of course not. Of course not. What are you telling me all this for? Think I don't know it?"

"I don't believe you'll ever get a big set of spat in those outside beds," went on Alec. "I don't believe you'd get enough of a set to pay for shelling the grounds."

"Well, well," said the shipper rather testily, "is this supposed to be news to me?"

"I was going to say," went on Alec, choking down a feeling of resentment, "that if you would sell those beds and buy Hardy's bed, you'd make a profitable deal. I'd be willing to wager that you'd get as many oysters from spat in Hardy's bed as you would from the seed you planted. You'd get a tremendous catch every year."

"Fiddlesticks! I never heard of such a thing in a deep-water bed."

"But, Captain Rumford," protested Alec, "don't the other oystermen who own beds near Hardy's get good hauls?"

"I can't deny some of them do," admitted the shipper, "but I can't understand it. That's no place for an oyster-bed, way out in that deep water. They can't expect to have luck always, though."

Alec gave up. It was no use to try to overcome the shipper's prejudices.

Day after day he continued his labors. He was so constantly on the water that those who saw him became curious to know what he could be doing. Now this oysterman, and now that, as Alec ran across him, tried to learn what Alec was doing out on the Bay so much. Occasionally boats sailed near him simply to watch him. At such times Alec pretended to be fishing. Rather he did fish. So he caught many a toothsome meal. He also made a large net of mosquito-netting, which he used for catching crabs. Of course, all this curiosity was aroused, not about Alec himself, for nobody cared much about a homeless lad, but because Alec was supposed to be doing something for Captain Rumford. If the leading oyster shipper at Bivalve found it worth while to keep a man out among the oyster-beds week in and week out, the curious figured it might be worth their own while to do a little examining themselves. The difficulty was that nobody knew exactly what Alec was doing. So it came about that Alec did exactly what he did not want to do. He called attention to his own efforts. But his work was well along toward completion before it was generally known that he was doing anything out of the ordinary. What annoyed Alec most of all about the matter was his fear lest some one track him to the _Osprey's_ Nest and so discover the secret hiding-place. Frequently, when other boats were near at hand toward dusk, Alec came up to the oyster wharf and tied up in the slip at Captain Rumford's pier. He knew that even the most reckless would hesitate to touch him there, under the glare of the pier-shed light and with the watchman within call. So, whether any of Hardy's friends ever wished to harm him or not, Alec came through the summer unscathed, and his hiding-place remained undiscovered.

One day, when August was more than half gone, Elsa called him on the wireless and announced that repairs on Captain Flint's boat, the _Rebecca_, were completed and the paint dry, and that the Rumfords were going to take their annual family cruise aboard of her. Alec was invited to go along and no answer but a favorable one would be accepted. Of course, there was nothing for Alec to do but put his work aside and say he would go. In his heart he was more than glad to put his work aside. Week after week he had stuck to it, holding himself with iron determination to his task. But now the zest was gone out of it. The long grind was wearing on his nerves. Joyously he looked forward to this holiday.

The next morning he did not put out in his boat, but went to the shipper's office to thank him for the invitation and to see if he could be of assistance in preparing for the cruise. But the instant Alec saw the shipper, he knew that something had gone wrong.

"Bagley's left us," blurted out the shipper, the moment he saw Alec. And there were tears in his voice, if not in his eyes.

"What do you mean, sir?" asked Alec.

"He's going to the Chesapeake next fall. Got a chance to go into partnership with a shipper there. Don't blame him a bit, but Gad! I hate to lose him. He's been with me seventeen years. Never worked anywhere but on the _Bertha B_. Started oystering on her as a deck-hand. Don't know what I'll do for another captain."

"You can get plenty of them," said Alec.

"Certainly," said the shipper, "but not plenty of Bagleys. Why, I could trust that man with my life."

"Take Hawley," said Alec.

"What!" cried the shipper. "Make a captain out of a fellow that was fired from the _Bertha B_ less than a year ago for being drunk? You're crazy."

"You're foolish if you don't take him," urged Alec. "Why, Captain Rumford, that man's the very soul of honesty. I know him like a book. I'd trust him just as far as I would you, Captain, and that's saying all I know how to say. It's old John Barleycorn you have in mind. But Jim cut his acquaintance long ago. And you know as well as I do that there isn't a better sailor in the fleet."

The shipper was silent a long time. "Hanged if I don't try it," he said at last. "I always liked Jim when he was sober. I'll take him along on this party and see how he can handle a boat. Now don't you give him any hint of what's coming."

"I'm mighty glad you're going to take him," cried Alec. "I haven't a better friend in the world than Jim. By the way, when are we going to start on our little party?"

"Just as soon as we can get ready. It will likely take most of the day to get the boat provisioned and get the stuff aboard that they want to bring from home. We ought to be off in the morning."

"Then I'll call up Elsa and see what I can do to help." And Alec bustled away, joyful in the thought of the little outing ahead of him. Could he have known exactly what was to happen to the little pleasure party, his face would have worn a very different aspect indeed.