"No. It's a couple of boring rigs, Billy. Mr. Scroggie is going to earn the good will of all of us here by boring for water and giving us fine wells on our farms. Don't you think that is mighty good of him?"
"Yes, sir. If we had a good well I wouldn't have to drive the cows down to the lake every night, like this."
"That's so, Billy." Hinter laughed and slapped the lad's shoulder. "Well I'll see that he bores on your daddy's farm just as soon as he strikes water on his own. I intend to help him get started, because I think it's going to be a good thing for everybody. Besides, I know boring-rigs from bit to derrick. It's my trade, you see."
Billy nodded. "An' is the schooner still anchored off here?" he asked. "I might take a fish-boat an' row out to her, if she is."
"No," Hinter answered. "She didn't anchor off here; water's too shallow. She anchored off Gibson's Grove, five miles up the point. She's on her way back to Cleveland by now."
He was already several paces away, anxious to overtake the wagon. Billy stood looking after him, a frown on his brow. "Gibson's Grove," he repeated. "So that's where Gibson's Grove is!" Then the message which the strangers had sent by old Harry might have had some significance, after all.
Billy passed on slowly after his cows, up through the spicy pines to the pebbled beach of the lake, pondering for a solution to the biggest problem his young mind had ever had to wrestle with. He seated himself on the prow of the big fish-boat, his eyes on the thirsty cattle now belly-deep in the blue water, drinking their fill. Along the shore stood the big reels used for holding the seines and nets when not in use. The twine had been newly coal-tarred and the pungent odor of the tar mingled pleasingly with the breath of pine and the sweet freshness of the sun-warmed water.
Billy's eyes strayed to those reels and he sighed to think that the washing and retarring of the nets was just another sign that the glad summer holidays would soon be over and the drab days of fall—and school—would soon be there. A low-flying flock of black ducks passed over his head in flight from the lake's bosom where they had rested through the day to the marsh feeding grounds across the point, and the shadow passed from the boy's face.
After all fall had its compensations. Glorious days beneath lowering skies in a wind-whipped blind were before him; stormy days when the ducks would sweep in to his decoys and his old "double-barrel" would take toll. If only Frank Stanhope was to be the teacher instead of that cold-eyed, mean looking Johnston. He knew he would not get along with Johnston. And school was to open on Monday. Great Scott! The very thought made him shiver.
The cows waded to shore slowly, pausing to brush the troublesome flies from bulging sides with moist noses, halting to drink again and again, loath to leave this great body of cool delicious water. Billy did not hurry them. He thought he understood their feelings in the matter. It would be a long while before they would have a chance to drink again. It must be awful, he reasoned, to have to do without a drink so long. The thought made him thirsty. With his hands he scooped a hole close to the edge of the lake, and slowly the miniature well filled with milky water, which immediately cleared, and lay before him limpid and sweet and fit for king or thirsty boy.