CHAPTER XIV.
A Disaster To Master Brooks Brooks Cunninghame—Exit into the Bottom of the Pool—Nobody that could Swim, and Margaret Hayley in Excitement—"H. T." in his element, in two senses—Another Introduction and a new Hero—Scenes in the Profile parlor—Rowan and Clara Vanderlyn—The Insult.
"But what has become of the crazy old philosopher?" asked the same elderly gentleman who had first introduced the subject,—only a moment after Halstead Rowan had delivered himself of his speculations concerning the centre of the earth, China and suicide, given at the close of the last chapter.
"Oh," answered Rowan, "I was asking Jennings about him this morning, before we came away from the Profile. Did you ever hear of the mode in which the two Irishmen conducted their little debate, which ended in a couple of broken heads?"
"I do not know!" laughed the old gentleman.
"Well, they debated physically—they held what they called a little 'dishcussion wid sticks'! Poor old Merrill got into a debate with the Sheriff of Coos County, last spring a year, Jennings tells me, and he carried it on with an axe, nearly killing the official. The result of all which was that he was lugged off to jail at Wells River and the Pool is bereaved."
"Sorry that his boat is not here, at least," said the old gentleman. "We have just a nice party for circumnavigating the Pool; and I do not know that even the letter from Queen Victoria and the lecture would be so much of a bore, now that there is no danger of them."
"Couldn't manage to get up a boat, unless we improvised one out of a log," said the Illinoisan, "and that would be a little unstable, I fancy. And by the way, I think I never saw a place more dangerous-looking for a sudden tumble than that deep black pool, or one more difficult to get out of than it would prove without something afloat to depend upon. So we must give it up—the glory of the Pool has departed! Sic transit gloria big hole in the woods!"
At that moment, and when the attention of the whole company had been drawn to the peculiar depth and quality of the Pool by the last observations—an event took place which may or may not have been paralleled in the earlier history of that peculiar wonder of nature. Sambo, of those days when the negro only half ruled the great Western republic instead of ruling it altogether,—related a story about a 'coon hunt of his, in which an episode occurred at about the time when he had climbed out upon an extending limb that was supposed to have the 'coon at the end. "Just then," said Sambo, graphically—"just then I heard sumfin drap, and come to look, 'twas dis yer nigger!" The party of visitors at the Pool heard "sumfin drap" about as suddenly and unexpectedly; and when they had time to look around them, they discovered that one of their number was missing—not a very valuable member of the combination, but still one that was supposed to have the usual immortal soul and antipathy to sudden death.
There never was a troublesome boy of an age corresponding to that of Master Brooks Brooks Cunninghame, who did not have the propensity for climbing developed in exact proportion to the incapacity for climbing at all; and Master Brooks Brooks had not done half mischief enough that morning to be content without making another effort. As the party climbed down to the Pool, some of the members had spoken of the clearness of the water and the coolness which it was said to possess even in the heat of midsummer; and one of the ladies had extracted from her reticule one of those telescopic ring drinking-cups of Britannia which are found so convenient in touring or camping-out. Captain Hector Coles had volunteered to play Ganymede to the rest of the company, and stepping down to the edge of the Pool, balanced himself with one foot on a projecting stone, stooped down and dipped up some of the sparkling coolness, which was thereupon passed around from hand to hand and from lip to lip. That done, Master Brooks Brooks had been allowed to possess himself of the cup, very much to the disgust of the owner, but inevitably—and to make various demonstrations with it, around the verge of the water. For a moment every one had lost sight of him—his careful mother included; and during that moment he had climbed round to the western side of the Pool, on the high rocks, where he stood brandishing the cup in a series of motions which varied between mischief and idiocy. Then and there an accident, not uncommon to persons who climb to high places and are not careful of their footing there, had happened to the young scion of the baronial house of Cunninghame, who, losing balance in one of his gyrations, tumbled down some twenty or thirty feet of rock and went splash! into the Pool, just where the waters seemed deepest, darkest and most unfathomable!