II—COTTERELL’S ISLAND
Early the next afternoon the few occupants of Lowe’s Wharf—a couple of men fishing for cunners, a sailor painting the bottom of an upturned dory, two small boys practising tying various kinds of knots with odds and ends of rope—saw three young fellows in dark blue jerseys and khaki coats and trousers and a man rigged out in a homespun Norfolk jacket and knickerbockers and greenish-gray golf stockings assemble as if they were about to start on an expedition.
Tom Hallett, slender but wiry, browned by the wind and the sun, dumped his duffle-bag of blankets and extra clothing on the wharf and introduced his companions. “Mr. Tuckerman, this is David Norton, and this is Ben Sully. They’d both like to go along, if you still want three of us.”
John Tuckerman shook hands with each. “I’m proud to have such a fine looking crew,” said he. “Though perhaps I ought to put it the other way about and say three such fine looking captains, I myself being the crew. It doesn’t need more than a glance to tell me that you three know all about the sea and the woods. Great luck, I call it. And if I’m not mistaken there’s our ship, waiting for us Argonauts to go aboard.”
At one side of the wharf, a man was holding the painter of an eighteen-foot sailing dory, already loaded with provisions and John Tuckerman’s bags. The three boys quickly had their own things stowed away. “All right, Mr. Jackson,” said Tuckerman to the man from whom he had rented the boat. “You see I’ve shipped a good crew. You needn’t lie awake nights wondering what’s happened to your Argo.”
The owner grinned. “I know ’em. I’ll trust ’em with the boat. But her name’s the Mary J. Jackson. See, it’s painted there in the bow.”
“So it is. Mary J. Jackson. That’s a very nice name; but somehow it doesn’t seem exactly to suit this business. We’re after the Golden Fleece, like the Argonauts of old; so if you don’t mind I’m going to christen her for this trip the Argo. Just a little fancy of mine.”
“Suit yerself, sir. She’s a good boat, no matter what you call her.”
“Many thanks, Mr. Jackson.” John Tuckerman sat down carefully. “Now, Captain Hallett, give your orders.”
The dory slid away, the experienced hand of Tom in charge of the tiller. Out into the harbor she sped, picking up the breeze as she danced along.
The afternoon sun was pleasantly warm, the water was translucent blue, with here and there wide sweeps of green, on the shore every house and tree stood out in vivid, fresh-tinted color. Tuckerman folded his arms and leaned back in great contentment. “This is something like, my lads!” he exclaimed. “My voyages heretofore have only been made on ocean grayhounds and fat-bodied ferry-boats.”
Ben looked at him pityingly. “It must be pretty hard,” he said, “to live inland, in a big city.”
“Yes, in some ways, though it has its compensations. You see, my ancestors grew restless in New England and moved out across the plains. That is, the Tuckermans did; the Cotterells stayed here. And now there aren’t any Cotterells left. That’s how it came about that I own this island.”
“My father,” spoke up David, “says that the Cotterells were once one of the best known families in Barmouth; but that old Mr. Christopher was as queer as all get out. He knows lots of stories about him. He says that Mr. Christopher lived there with a colored man for his servant, and never saw anybody.”
“Poor old chap!” said Tuckerman. “I can’t help feeling dreadfully sorry for him. Think what a good time he could have had in his big house. Why, in the old days it was one of the show places along the coast and the Cotterells used to have celebrated parties.” Tuckerman gazed out over the water and pulled his chin with his fingers, in a habit he had. “Do you know what I want to do? I want to take that old house and fix it up properly, make it look as it used to, and give it back its good name.” He smiled. “Maybe you’ll think it odd, but I feel as if houses were almost like people. I hate to see either the one or the other go to seed.”
“They are something like people,” Ben agreed. “There’s a church with a steeple in Barmouth that looks just like the pictures of the Pilgrim Fathers with their high-crowned hats. And the windows in front look like eyes, kind of boring eyes that are trying to see right through you.”
“Ben’s always thinking of queer things like that,” David explained, half in apology.
Mr. Tuckerman nodded at the small, dark-browed boy. “I’m glad that Ben came along. I think he’s going to be a great help in fixing up my house.”
In and out between islands, past long jutting ledges, where pine and juniper ran down to the water’s edge, the dory sailed smoothly. Sometimes Tom had to tack; again he ran for a stretch on a course due south. And after about an hour he raised his arm and pointed. “There—on the port bow—there she lies. See that white, sandy beach. That’s Cotterell’s Island.”
Ben and David were familiar with the look of the place of course; they had cruised around it many times, and had always examined it with particular interest because it was a forbidden shore; but now they gazed at it as though it were somehow entirely new, as indeed it was to them, except for the beach and trees.
John Tuckerman nodded. “I’ll take your word for it, Tom. It lies exactly where it should according to the map of the harbor; though I can’t say that it looks very much like the small red dot on the chart Mr. Jackson showed me at his boathouse.”
There was not much to be seen except the whitish-yellow beach, several headlands of purple rock, and thick-growing pines that stood out black-green. There was, however, considerable to be heard as the sailing dory drew near. An immense cawing came from the tree-tops, and finally as the Argo nosed along close to the shore at least a score of crows flapped away from their meeting-place and went winging off to a more secluded grove.
“Uncle Christopher’s neighbors don’t seem to like visitors any better than he did,” observed Tuckerman with twinkling eyes. “Crows do sound dreadfully scolding, don’t they? And I never knew such birds for all wanting to talk at the same time.”
Tom knew where the old pier stood, and brought his boat skilfully up to the landing-stage. The sail was dropped and furled, baggage and stores carried ashore, and the four campers looked about them. From the old and rather decrepit pier a graveled path led up to the front of a wide white house, partially screened by trees.
“Cotterell Hall,” said Tuckerman, gazing at the ancient mansion. “That’s what they used to call it in Revolutionary days. Well, Tom, it’s up to you to tell us what to do. The house won’t run away, and something tells me it won’t be so very long before we’ll be hungry.”
“Suppose we look for our camping ground then,” said Tom, “since it seems to be understood that we’re not going to bunk in the house.”
“That’s the idea,” agreed Tuckerman promptly. “Fond as I am of ancestral halls and that sort of thing, I said to myself when I left the Middle-West for the New England coast: ‘John, you’re to sleep out of doors on a bed of pine boughs, even if the bugs do fall from the trees on your face and the boughs stick you as full of needles as a porcupine. You’re going back to the wild, that’s what you are!’”
His eyes behind his huge tortoise-shell rimmed spectacles looked so intensely serious that the three boys didn’t know whether to laugh or not. For all his dignified appearance he did seem extraordinarily guileless. David, the most outspoken of the three, shook his head solemnly. “This isn’t going to be what you’d call so all-fired wild, you know. If you’re looking for that, you ought to go up in the North Woods.”
Ben came to the rescue. “It’ll do as a starter though, Mr. Tuckerman,” he said encouragingly. “We can’t promise you bears or anything like that, but maybe there’ll be owls and loons and other things that sound sort of strange at night.”
Tuckerman smiled. “Ben, I can see you’re a friendly soul. And you must remember that what may not seem very wild to experienced woodsmen like you three may prove very thrilling to a tenderfoot like me.”
They decided on their camp readily; a smooth stretch of turf in a semi-circle of pines on high ground just above a small sandy beach. It was perhaps a quarter of a mile from the pier and from Cotterell Hall. Pine boughs were cut, trimmed, and spread out for bedding, stores were unpacked, driftwood collected for a fire, and the menu determined on for supper.
Tuckerman looked out at the water, a sheet of soft and beautiful opalescent colors in the setting sun. “Is there any reason why we shouldn’t take a bath?” he inquired. “I feel extremely sticky.”
“No reason whatever,” answered Tom. “The first rule of camp-life is, Obey that impulse. There’s plenty of room in that bathtub, but you won’t find much hot water.”
In five minutes they were all in the ocean, frisky as a school of porpoises, making enough noise to scare any wildfowl away. The boys struck out and swam, trying first one stroke and then another. Tuckerman, however, came lumbering along, jerking his arms and legs like an old and stiff-jointed frog. But he enjoyed himself. He was chuckling and gurgling and slapping his thighs with his hands as they all came out of the water.
“Tom, you must teach me to swim,” he begged. “I can see I’m not in your class now, but give me a week or so——”
“Righto. I bet you’ll learn quick.”
In fifteen minutes they were ready for supper. Fried eggs and bacon, grilled sweet potatoes, coffee, bread and butter, and then flapjacks with jam. “I can see,” said Tuckerman, as he finished his third flapjack, “that David’s reputation as a cook has not been exaggerated. I always wondered what it meant when I read that the gods lived on ambrosia and nectar. Now at last I know.”
“You’ll make his head swell,” cautioned Ben, “and it’s large enough already. We took him to a phrenologist last winter, and the man said he’d never felt such big bumps.”
The dishes were washed. The moon rose. Tuckerman lighted his pipe. “Well,” said Ben, “aren’t we going to have a look at the old house? It seems to me we ought.”
The house, when they approached it a little later in the moonlight—for Ben’s suggestion had met with favor from the others—presented a blank and shuttered white surface, against which the dark outline of the trees around it showed in jagged forms. It had been a fine old dwelling, built in a day when carpenters and joiners took a real love in their work and were as eager to make a graceful, artistic window or doorway as the medieval masons of Europe were to perfect every detail of their great cathedrals.
Broad steps led up to the front door, which was wide and adorned with a big brass knocker and knob. Tuckerman, taking a little electric flashlight from his pocket, aimed it at the moulding above the door. “Aha,” he exclaimed, “there’s the green and gold pineapple in all its glory! They used to put beautifully carved pineapples like that in such places in colonial days; they were the emblems of hospitality. My ancestor Sir Peter seems to have been friendly disposed when he built his dwelling at least.”
“I’ve seen pineapples like that over the doors of some old houses in Barmouth,” said Ben, “but I never thought much about them. That was a pretty nice idea. There’s some style to that front.”
“There was style, real dignified style to the houses of those days,” Tuckerman agreed. “We may think we’re pretty smart nowadays, but let me tell you those ancestors of ours who settled the country could teach us a good deal.” He felt in his pocket for a key. “Well, the pineapple bids us welcome. If there are any ghosts in the house, I think they’ll turn out friendly.”
The lock was rusty, but finally opened to the new owner’s efforts. They stepped into a large hallway, from which a wide stairway ascended at one side. Using his flashlight, Tuckerman discovered a gatelegged table, on which stood a cluster of small candlesticks, all ready for use.
“Now that’s something like—hospitality again!” he declared in a pleased voice. “They used candles in the old days; every guest in the house had one to light him to bed. I suppose these have been waiting for me here ever since Uncle Christopher died.” Lighting the candles with a match, he handed one to each of his companions. “I’m beginning to feel at home already, boys. Welcome to Cotterell Hall.”
Even David, who could see nothing very thrilling in going over an old house, felt something of the excitement that had so obviously taken possession of John Tuckerman. As for Tom and Ben, they peered up the stairway and through the open doors as if they half-expected to see gentlemen in curled wigs, knee-breeches and small swords advancing to meet them.
Tuckerman led the way into the room on the left, a spacious apartment, wainscoted and with a pictured paper, representing scenes in fields and woods, covering the walls to the ceiling. There was a large fireplace, with a carved mantel above it. Fine old pieces of furniture filled the room, and, except for the musty air that is to be found in all houses that have been closed for some time, the place looked precisely as though it were lived in, even to a pile of magazines and books that lay on the centre-table.
“The drawing-room,” said Tuckerman, holding his candle high as he gazed about him. “And there, if I’m not mistaken, is old Sir Peter himself.”
Ben gave a start and looked quickly around. But it was not a ghost to which Tuckerman referred; it was a large painting that hung on the wall across from the fireplace, the portrait of a man in buff-colored coat and breeches, wearing a white tie-wig, and with his right hand resting on the head of a greyhound that rubbed against his knees.
“Fine looking old fellow,” said Tom.
“Yes,” agreed Tuckerman. “Sir Peter was really handsome. I’ve seen pictures of him before. He was a great beau in his time, before the Revolution. What a shame it was that he couldn’t agree with his neighbors about the right of the colonies to be free. That made it mighty hard for his wife and children.”
He went over to look closer at the portrait, and as he held the candle near to the canvas he saw a folded piece of paper stuck into a corner of the heavy frame. “What’s this?” he exclaimed, and drew the paper out. “You don’t suppose the old fellow has left me a message?”
The candle set on the table, Tuckerman opened the sheet. “This is an authentic portrait of Peter Cotterell, painted in 1770,” he read aloud. “He shared with me, his descendant, Christopher Cotterell, a dislike for the society of his kind, though for a different reason. But with me the line of the Cotterells comes to an end, and I care not whether any now learn my ancestor’s secret or not.”
Tuckerman dropped the paper. “So there was a secret, boys! You remember, Tom, what I told you. And Uncle Christopher knew what it was.”
“Hello!” exclaimed Ben. “My candle’s blown out!” He turned. “Why, that window’s open a little at the bottom. See how the curtains blow.”
“Spooks,” scoffed David. “It looks to me as if Crusty Christopher were playing a joke on us.”