CHAPTER XVII A SEARCH FOR TRUTH
Early July, which saw the end of both oyster planting, and the shelling of the grounds, found the pile of shells of Cunningham and Hawley entirely exhausted. Where so recently these shells had risen in a mountainous heap, there was now only bare earth, whitened with shell chips. There had been thousands of bushels in the pile. When the partners reckoned up their income and adjusted their finances, each had a nice little sum of money.
The instant their affairs were settled, Alec set about other matters. Long ago he had ordered and received the instruments that he knew would be necessary in his summer's work. These included a compound microscope, half a dozen concave watch crystals, two settling glasses, two graduated cylinders, two glass pipettes, two large rubber pipettes, four small medicine droppers, a ten-quart galvanized bucket, a simple lift pump, some rubber hose, and a salinometer with thermometer enclosed. In addition Alec had picked up some wide-mouthed bottles, for holding samples; had fastened several needles in wooden handles he had whittled out of sticks; and had bought a yard of bolting-cloth with very fine meshes, from which, with Elsa's assistance, he had made a net, conical in shape, fastened about a metal ring, with an opening at the bottom that could be closed tight with a draw string.
Even by practicing what economies he could, Alec had had to spend nearly seventy-five dollars for the outfit. More than once he had asked himself if it was really worth while; if, after all, these old practical oyster captains didn't really know more about how and where to grow oysters than any mere scientific theorist possibly could. Wasn't he really foolish to spend all this money? Wasn't he really throwing it away? He had such need for it, in the purchase of articles more commonly seen in an oyster fleet. His doubts had hurt and discouraged him. He needed some one with whom he could talk the matter over. When he looked about, he saw the same old situation. It was useless to talk to any of his three friends, Hawley, Bagley, or the shipper. He knew that not one of them would consider the matter from a serious, impartial, reasonable view-point. So he had been forced to take the matter to Elsa.
"Never mind about the expense," she had counseled, when they had discussed the situation fully. "You won't be spending as much for your entire outfit as most young fellows spend for tobacco and the movies. You'll have something valuable to show for your money, and what you buy won't harm you, even if you shouldn't find it as useful as you hope."
"But suppose there's nothing in it, after all?" Alec had said. "Suppose I buy my outfit and it doesn't do me a bit of good. What then? I can't afford to throw away seventy-five dollars for nothing. I need every cent I earn if I'm ever going to get anywhere."
"You can't buy this outfit and have it do you no good," Elsa had replied.
"I just guess I could. Suppose I bought the things and then didn't find what I am after?"
"Even so, it would do you good."
"How?"
"Alec Cunningham! Sometimes I think you're the stupidest thing I ever met. The idea of asking a question like that, when you've been working and studying like mad for months to find out all you can about the oyster business. Of course it will help you. If you find what you want, you are benefited, aren't you? And if you don't find it, you're benefited just the same."
"How?" Alec had inquired.
"Stupid. It isn't oyster fry you're after. It's truth. You'll get it, no matter whether it pleases you or not. Won't you? You'll know whether that bulletin is right or whether the old oystermen are right, won't you? And that's worth a great deal more than seventy-five dollars, isn't it? Why, Alec, if you don't go ahead and test the thing, you'll never be happy. You'll fret and fret about it, thinking you ought to be planning your work differently. And if you do go ahead, no matter what you learn, you'll be satisfied. You'll know whether to follow old practices or try new ones. Certainly it's worth a good deal to know you're right. Then you'll know you must succeed if you keep on in the same way."
"Elsa," Alec had said, "I guess we are all fools at times. I had this thing all thought out in my mind and my decision made; but when it came to paying seventy-five dollars just to find out something, I hadn't the courage to do it. You don't know how big seventy-five dollars looks to me."
"Silly!" Elsa had replied. "Don't talk to me about lacking courage, when you make a practice of jumping overboard to fish drowning men out of the water. It isn't courage you lack. It's partnership. If you had somebody to back you up, you'd never hesitate a second about this thing."
"Where did you learn so much?" Alec had answered, with genuine admiration in his glance. "Do you know that's exactly what I need, and I never before knew what it was that was wrong."
"Well, don't you let it worry you any longer, Alec," Elsa had replied. "I understand you and what you are trying to do, and I think it's just fine. And I'll stand back of you no matter what they say. I know Dad will think you are foolish. He thinks anything new is foolish. But never you mind. You just go ahead with your plans."
"That settles it," Alec had replied. "I am going ahead, no matter if it costs twice seventy-five dollars. I'm going to find out the truth at any cost. Why, if a fellow doesn't know the truth, he's like a man who doesn't know how to get to the place he's trying to reach. He may be walking in the wrong direction. It wouldn't do him much good if he was a good walker, would it? And just think how near I came to being a dummy like that myself—all for the sake of seventy-five dollars!"
So the matter had been settled for good, and Alec had ordered the articles, even laughing when it took almost his last cent to pay for them. Now he had them at hand, and he was almost ready to begin his search for the truth—the truth about the oyster fry.
He lacked only a boat. At first he thought he would buy a boat, but when he found that the kind of boat he wanted, fitted with a good motor, roofed over forward so as to make a little cabin, would cost several hundred dollars, and take every cent he had made in his shell business, he decided that he would rent a boat instead.
There was just such a boat as he wanted, for hire. It was about twenty-five feet long, with a snug yet roomy cabin forward, a single sail, which he could easily manage, and in the cockpit was a small motor, neatly boxed in to protect it from the weather. The boxing could be removed if one wished to run the engine. Alec secured the craft for a reasonable sum, put his scientific outfit aboard, brought his clothes and some bedding, and stocked the larder with sufficient provisions. Nor did he forget his wireless outfit. The Bertha B, like all other oyster craft, was to be overhauled during the summer, and be repaired and repainted. Of necessity, Alec's wireless would have to be taken down and he had already dismantled it and stowed it in a box before finding the little sloop. Now he had only to carry his box aboard, and his little craft was ready to sail.
The process of making ready went along merrily enough, but when it came to sailing away, a trip all by himself suddenly lost its attractiveness. Alec turned the situation over in his mind for some time.
Then he went to his partner in the shell business. "Jim," he said, "I'm going out to the Bay in a little sloop I've hired, to study oyster larvæ. Don't you want to go along?"
Hawley looked at him in blank amazement. "Alec," he said, "I'd do most anything for you, but I sure don't want to go out to no Bay and study oysters. I know all I want to about oysters already. Why, I been ketchin' oysters for twenty years."
Alec appealed to Captain Bagley, with no better results. Finally he went to the shipper.
"What fool's errand is this?" he exclaimed testily, when Alec laid the situation before him. "Why, I've been expecting to keep you busy all summer. I've got a job for you, helping about the boats. You can pay your board and still be saving something all summer, instead of spending all you've earned, like most of these fellows around here do."
Alec really felt grieved to refuse the offer. "Captain Rumford," he said, "I appreciate everything you've done for me, and I thank you for this offer. But I can't take it. This is the only opportunity I have to learn about oysters themselves and I must take it."
"What nonsense are you up to now?" demanded the shipper.
"I'm going out to the Bay to study oysters," said Alec, quietly but firmly. "I have my outfit all ready and I have hired a little sloop to sail in. I'd be mighty glad if you would go out with me."
"Study oysters!" exploded the shipper. "Didn't you learn enough about oysters on the Bertha B? And what better outfit do you want than a pair of good dredges, eh? What are you about, anyway? What does all this nonsense mean?"
It was useless to argue or explain. "I'm sorry we don't see things alike, Captain," said Alec. "I believe there is more to learn about oysters than most of us know, and I'm going to try to find it out. If you won't go with me, will you allow me to take Elsa? I'll be back early, sir; and I'll answer for her safety."
"Oh! I ain't afraid to trust the girl with you, boy, but you'll have a dull time trying to study oysters, as you call it, with her on board. She ain't one mite interested in oysters. She wants fun."
"I'll take a chance on that," said Alec, "if you are willing to let her go."
Alec's confidence in Elsa was more than justified. He called her on the telephone and stated the situation. She did not waste a moment in unnecessary talk, but hung up the receiver the moment she understood that Alec wanted her to help him, picked up a sweater and a broad-brimmed hat, and hurried to the oyster pier in her little car. Within a few minutes of the time Alec had called her, the two were afloat.
The little craft that Alec had rented was an excellent boat. Built rather for pleasure than for work, it was very comfortably fitted out. Furthermore, it was the fastest little boat in the harbor. Its lines were excellent, and it slipped through the water as quietly and gracefully as a swan. Being equipped both with sail and engine, the owner was independent of wind and weather, and could go where he liked, when he liked. Unlike most of the boats in the harbor, this craft was painted a dull, leaden gray, that almost matched the color of the water. Alec was glad, for there would be none of the usual glare from the summer sun shining on white woodwork. The glare on the Bertha B often made his eyes ache. He was glad that he would not be bothered in that way on the little boat, for he would need to have his eyesight at its very best.
With such an efficient helper aboard, Alec determined not to lose a moment. He started the motor, and soon the little boat was shooting down the river at a fast clip.
"It's queer this boat has no name," said Alec.
"Oh! It has a name all right, but the name was painted over when the owner put this gray paint on. This is the Osprey."
"We couldn't have named her better," said Alec, "for we are fish-hawks ourselves, to-day. That is, we are shell-fish hawks."
Elsa had often been aboard the boat before, but again she examined the craft carefully, for she had long wanted her father to get a similar boat.
"Oh, good!" she exclaimed, when she caught sight of Alec's wireless instruments, packed away in the box. "If you ever happened to be out over-night, we could talk to each other in the evening and I could know how the work progresses."
"I expect to be out all the time until I get my work done," replied Alec. "There is so much to be done and so little time to do it in."
"Won't I see you all this summer?" cried Elsa, and the look of real disappointment on her face made Alec happy.
"Yes. I shall come home at the end of each week. Perhaps it won't take me as long to do this work as I had expected. Why, do you know, I've found out a tremendous lot about the currents and eddies and tides, just from talking to Captain Bagley. And I had expected to have all that to learn by myself. And I've been studying the captain's map of the oyster-beds, and that has made my work easier, too. So much of the bottom is already leased, that there isn't any use fooling around to try to find out much about the grounds already staked out. What I've got to do is to find out the best spots in the areas not yet staked."
"I don't agree with you at all," said Elsa. "What you want to know is the whole truth, not part of the truth."
"But I can never hope to own land that is already staked out. Why, a good bed costs thousands and thousands of dollars."
"Alec Cunningham," protested Elsa, trying to look severe, "you make me so mad I could beat you. For a boy with so much energy and brains, you say and do the most foolish things I ever heard. Now think over what you've just been saying. Here you are working like a steam-engine, day and night, to become an oyster-planter. You ought to know that if you keep on this way, you'll get there sure. Everybody else knows it. And yet you turn around and say you'll have to take the leavings, instead of planning to take your pick. And you're going to find out half the truth instead of the whole truth, and so cripple yourself. Isn't that enough to make anybody mad at you?"
"But," expostulated Alec, "even if I do become a planter, I've got to take what I can get."
"Of course you do. But there are more ways than one of getting a thing done, aren't there? You've got this boat now, haven't you? You don't own her, but, for the time being, she's yours. It might be the same with an oyster-bed. My father often rents other men's beds, or works them on shares, or buys the oysters in them. Some day you may want to do the same thing. What you need to do is to know all the truth about these oyster grounds. It isn't worth while to do half of a job. And that isn't the kind of work you do, either. I know something about you, Alec Cunningham. You've got no end of brains and energy, but your judgment isn't always good. You need a guardian."
Both Elsa and Alec laughed heartily at the idea; then Alec's face grew sober. "I'm beginning to realize that that isn't any joke," he said. "I think it's because I haven't had any one to talk things over with. It's pretty hard for a fellow to decide things right all by himself every time." Then he smiled again, as he added, "I think it will be all right hereafter, for now I do seem to have a guardian."
Elsa's face grew scarlet. "Oh! Alec," she cried, "I don't want you to think I meant what I said—that is, not in the way it sounded. And if you don't take back what you just said, I'll never talk to you again."
"I'll take it all back," said Alec, "just as Galileo took back his assertion about the earth's turning round."
"How was that?" demanded Elsa.
"That's for you to find out," laughed Alec, and he would not tell her.
Soon they were in the open Bay. "Even if I do need to study all the oyster grounds," said Alec, "I'm going to begin on the unstaked areas."
"Of course. You may find grounds as good there as any in the Cove. Then you could get them direct from the state, at a minimum cost."
Alec spread out the map of the oyster-beds he had borrowed from Captain Bagley. "We'll begin here," he said, "and work straight offshore. Are you going to help me or just watch me?"
"Help you, of course. If I couldn't be of any more use than a phonograph, there wasn't much sense in my coming."
"Then suppose you take soundings and test with this salinometer. The instrument will give you the density of the water, and the thermometer in the bulb will register the temperature. I've made several copies of this map of the oyster-beds, and we'll mark our position with a cross and write down beside it whatever we find. While you are doing that, I'll be testing for larvæ."
Elsa took the sounding-line and dropped the lead into the waves, the line paying out over her finger. When the lead came to rest on the bottom, she noted the depth on the line. Then she took Alec's fountain pen and set down the depth beside the cross Alec had made on the map.
"Just date it, too," said Alec, "and note down the stage of both wind and tide. It's pretty well toward ebb now, and, if the book is right, we oughtn't to expect to find many larvæ. They seem to drop down to the bottom and anchor themselves during the ebb-tide to avoid being swept out to sea. They come up when the tide turns, and we ought to find more in the flood-tide than in the ebb."
Alec, all this time, was getting ready for his part of the work. He took a galvanized bucket that belonged on the Osprey and lowered it overboard for a few moments so it would take on the temperature of the Bay. Then he lifted it aboard, brimming with water, and set it in the shade. Elsa thrust the salinometer and testing tube into the bucket to cool. Then Alec attached his hose to his lift pump, and carefully lowering the hose to a point within a few inches of the bottom, pumped his own bucket, which had also been cooling in the waves, full of water. It was the sample from the bottom, in which the oysters actually lie, that he wanted to test.
Elsa drew her tube and salinometer out of the cooling bucket, and Alec filled the tube with water from his own bucket. Elsa lowered the salinometer into it and put the tube in the shade. Then she held the bolting-cloth net over a tub, while Alec slowly emptied his bucket of water from the bottom into it. The bucket contained ten quarts and Alec had it brimming full. Gradually the water filtered through the net into the tub, leaving on the inside of the net whatever sediment had been in the water. In this sediment Alec expected to find the oyster larvæ. Ten times they did this, until they had strained one hundred quarts of water through the net. From time to time Alec threw the filtered water overboard. Finally the net was lifted clear of the tub and the last of the water allowed to filter through it. While Elsa held the net up, Alec washed the sediment from the sides down into the tip of the net, with water dipped from the tub. When the filtering process was fully completed, and the sediment all concentrated in the tip of the net, Alec carefully untied the draw string, opening the end of the net, and, using his large rubber bulb pipette, washed the sediment into one of his wide-mouthed settling bottles.
Now Elsa turned her attention to her salinometer. It was intended to register the density or degree of saltiness of the water. Alec could hardly restrain his impatience, so eager was he to see what the instrument would tell.
"You know, Elsa," he said, "that sometimes the best seed grounds are in waters of so low a density as to be entirely unsuitable for fattening or even growing oysters. I've been thinking about that a whole lot, for most of the oysters we dredged on the Bertha B this year were very poor. They hadn't fattened a bit. Captain Bagley said he never had caught any good oysters in that bed. I've just been wondering if the water wasn't of the proper density. Why, those oysters would have been worth a whole lot more if they had been fat."
Elsa lifted the salinometer from the tube. "The water ought not to be very dense here," said Alec, "for we're so near the shore and it's near the end of the ebb-tide. There's fresh water pouring in all the time from the tributaries."
They found, as Alec had surmised, a low degree of density. The reading of the thermometer was also low. "That's what I expected, too," commented Alec. "This has been the coldest spring I can remember. I thought for a time that I was deceived because I was out in the wind so much, but the skipper said it really had been unusually cold this spring. I asked him the other day. It doesn't look as though we'd get much of a set this year. Why, that water is barely warm enough for oysters to spawn at all. And this water close to shore ought to be warmer than that farther out."
Elsa marked down on the chart the density and temperature.
"We forgot to make a note about the weather," said Alec. "Please add that, also."
"It's going to take a long, long time to make a complete job," sighed Alec, as Elsa noted down the weather. "I suppose I'll have to work at it for several summers."
"I suppose you'll have to work at it every summer," said Elsa, "if you intend to become a scientific oysterman. Don't you suppose conditions change from year to year in the oyster-beds? They must, for lots of times I've heard my father say he can't understand why the oysters in some given bed don't fatten some years. There must be changes from year to year. Whatever the reason was, I know his oysters have been poor enough this year. I heard him telling mother the other night that it had cost him hundreds of dollars because the oysters in some of his beds hadn't fattened as they usually do."
From time to time Alec carefully lifted the settling bottle and examined it. By the time a quarter of an hour had elapsed he said, "That looks clear enough now to begin our count."
A distinct layer of sediment had fallen to the bottom of the bottle, while the water near the surface was quite clear. This upper layer of water Alec now carefully drew out with a pipette. The sediment became more and more concentrated. When Alec had removed all the water he dared, he washed the sediment into his graduated cylinder. Then, with a medicine dropper, he transferred a very small portion of the sediment to a watch crystal. Very gently, at the same time, he rotated the crystal in his hand, slightly agitating it. Gradually the sediment seemed to divide into two parts. About the edge of the liquid the lighter particles of mud and other impurities seemed to collect, while the heavier particles were concentrated in the centre of the glass. It was in this central deposit of sediment that Alec expected to find the oyster larvæ.
No wonder he was glad there was no glare of white paint to hurt his eyes, for the work before him was enough to try even the best of vision. The total amount of sediment in his watch crystal was so small that its entire surface could be seen at one glance through the microscope. And the oyster fry were presumably gathered in the tiniest of spaces in the very centre of this tiny bit of sediment.
The actual counting of the larvæ might have troubled one unaccustomed to the use of the microscope; but Alec was at home with the instrument. He placed his watch crystal under the lens, adjusted the instrument to his own vision, and with one of his wooden-handled needles began to pick over the central windrow of debris. One by one he found and counted the oyster larvæ, or what he thought were larvæ. There was no question whatever about the largest larvæ. They possessed a reddish-purple hue that is found in the larvæ of no other bivalve. Also there was a distinct beak or bulge in the shell next to the hinge that he had read about in his bulletin. So he was sure of the identity of the larger oyster fry. But when it came to those more recently spawned, Alec could not be so sure. He knew that there was no certain way to distinguish between very young oyster and clam larvæ except by measuring them. This he was not equipped to do. Nor did it make any material difference whether Alec ascertained the exact number of larvæ in the water or not. What he was after was to find the relative quantities of larvæ in different places and at different times.
Under the microscope Alec found the oyster larvæ were a very beautiful sight indeed. The reddish-purple color was very similar in hue to the color of the muscle scar on the shell of an adult oyster. After the death of the oyster, Alec knew, this vivid color rapidly disappeared. Elsa was as much pleased as Alec had been, when she looked through the microscope and saw the brilliant-hued oyster fry.
Little by little, Alec transferred the contents of the bottle to his watch crystal and counted the larvæ. He found only a few dozen in all. That did not surprise him for he had not expected to find many. The fact in itself meant very little until he learned whether other portions of the oyster grounds contained relatively more or fewer larvæ under similar conditions. That was what he most wanted to know—where the oyster fry collected, so he could do as the book suggested, and get his shells under them.
Now that he had started the work, Alec meant to keep at it until he found where the very greatest number of larvæ were concentrated, and then try to secure the ground beneath. If he found good beds unstaked, he could get them direct from the state. If some one else already had claim to them, he could work with a view to acquiring them at some future time. For the friendly scolding Elsa had given him had settled the matter in his own mind instantly. He wasn't going to do any half-way job.
Before noon, Alec had made tests in a number of places, working straight out from the shore as he had planned. That gave him a sort of cross-section of the bed, as it were. He decided that he would go over the same ground again at once to see if the flood-tide made any difference in his count. For by this time the tide had almost finished running out.
At dinner time Alec and Elsa headed the Osprey for a little point of land near by. A tree growing back on the point offered shade. They managed to get ashore, though it bothered them to find a place where they could get near to firm ground with the tide so low. Then they fastened the Osprey, and made their way through the rank marsh growths, to the tree. They made a little fire, slung a coffee-pot over the blaze, and toasted some Wieners while the coffee was cooking.
After dinner they went back to the boat and resumed their work, making tests in exactly the same places they had tested in the forenoon. And in the flood-tide they found many more oyster fry than they had in the ebb.
"Looks as though there wasn't much use working on an ebb-tide," said Alec, "though, of course, I might find out after a while what the relative number is in the two tides. But there is a lot I can do in ebb-tide as well as in flood. I can take soundings just as well, and I can examine the bottles even better. I'm going to try to make a sort of topographical map of the bottom. It'll be a poor enough thing, at best, but it will help me to understand about the currents. Then I can examine the currents themselves at flood-tide for larvæ."
Their supper they ate on the Osprey. Then Alec hoisted the sail, and in the gentle breeze that still blew, and with the incoming tide to carry them, they sailed silently and swiftly homeward through the sunset and the gathering dusk. Very different was the river from the stream as Alec had first seen it. Now hardly a boat was visible. They passed only one, The Shark, anchored apparently for the night.
"Elsa," said Alec, as they neared the harbor, "it has been a wonderful day. It has meant everything to me. It will make my whole summer happier. I see clearly enough that this job is going to become mighty tedious. But the remembrance of this day will help me to stick to it, even if I do have to work alone."
"You won't be so much alone as you think," replied Elsa. "You have your wireless, and we can call each other every noon and night. We can talk in the early evening and after Arlington sends out the time and the weather news. If you are going to be out on the water so much, you will want to get the weather forecasts, sure. It makes me nervous to think of you all alone out on the Bay. All sorts of things might happen to you."
"Nonsense," replied Alec. "I'll be as safe and snug as a bug in a rug."
"I hope so. But when I think of you all alone out on that great expanse of water, it makes me shiver. You might be caught in a big storm, or pirates might rob you."
"I thought you had such good judgment," taunted Alec. "Now listen to you."
"That's the very reason I'm cautioning you. Besides, who has a better right to do so than your guardian?"
They both laughed at the joke, then Elsa said: "When we talk to each other, let's telegraph. It takes longer, but not so many people can understand what we say. Since you installed our wireless telephone, everybody in the neighborhood has been getting one."
"All right, we'll telegraph. I'll call you up as soon as Arlington is done sending. Then you'll know that the bogey man hasn't got me yet. But seriously, Elsa, there isn't a particle of danger. Now I must hustle back to the Osprey or I may not get my wireless rigged up in time."
Could Alec have seen ahead through the darkness that was fast enfolding the world, he would not have felt so sure about the absence of danger. Once before he had thought himself safe when death stalked close to his heels.