The wind now blew a strong breeze, for it had gradually risen as the night had progressed.
Threatening clouds were bunching up and drifting across the sky. All the signs indicated a coming southeasterly storm, and it would likely be severe while it lasted.
Both men thought of this, for they were weatherwise. Still they might dig on two hours longer if necessary.
After widening the hole, they dug toward the centre, where they had struck the wood, and then down by the mysterious dark object. The sky was becoming more obscured and they could not see so well, even though the pupils of their eyes were dilated to the utmost. They dug farther down beside it. John reached a place where he got his shovel underside and began to pry. Something gave way slightly. He dug again, and got his shovel farther under and pried harder. The dark object began to crack. Pete seized hold of it with both hands and exerted all his strength. It gave way and they rolled it out of the hole. Then they examined it with their hands, feeling it all over. It was the hollow stump of a tree. John ran his arm to the bottom of the hole several times, but took out nothing but sand.
He stood a moment contemplating and then with his foot he pushed it angrily back into the hole. Quickly he turned, gathered up the coats and his shovel, and set off for the boat. Pete followed, and not a word was uttered.
They got their boat under way, each maintaining silence. The wind was free. John let the sheet run, and they swept out into the broad bay. The waves ran high. Their boat, as if a thing of life and spirit, would poise on the top of a wave while its crest broke with a rushing sound, and then drop gradually behind into its trough. Then the next wave would come up astern and bear them up in the same manner. And so their little boat rode each wave and swept onward. The rhythmic movement of the boat and waves had a quieting and solacing effect upon these disappointed argonauts. Half-way across, Pete spoke and said, “John, that hillock was covered with brier-bushes, you remember. That must have been a brier that pulled down the end of the rod.”
John made no reply to this, but ten minutes later he broke his silence:
“Pete,” he said suddenly, “hand me that stone forward with the rope tied to it. Now give me that old coat. No, hold on! You come here and steer.”
He moved forward, then tied the stone tightly to the old coat. Standing up, he threw the bundle from him with all his might, saying as he did so, “There goes that cussed thing overboard. I wish to thunder I had the money I put into that darned old granny’s hands six weeks ago.”
Having proved his dream, John returned to his work in the mill. He worked there contentedly several years longer. He liked the place. The merry rumble, the stream always rushing underneath, turning the wheels and slipping on down the creek and spreading out into the broad bay. And the tons and tons of paper that were made and kept going off somewhere John took greater pride in than ever.