Captain Ted Part 8

This story, with Judge Ridgway's comment added, was over the heads of the uneducated young backwoodsmen who listened with heavy gravity, but several of them expressed polite appreciation of it and spoke in complimentary terms of Ted's recital.

The fires were now replenished, more corn-beer was imbibed, fresh pipes were lighted, and the yarn-spinners began another series devoted to the "tight sc.r.a.pes" in which they had found themselves occasionally in the Okefinokee. One young man told of a deadly hand-to-hand conflict with a wounded bear; another of a thrilling unarmed fight with a wild-cat; a third related how he had once sunk down suddenly to his armpits in the great marsh called the "prairie," how he had saved himself by grasping the growth on a small tussock, and how he was confronted there, before he could drag himself out, by an angry moccasin, which luckily he shot.

And so on.

When this yarn-spinning began to languish for lack of startling material, Buck Hardy asked Ted if he did not have something interesting to tell about his and Hubert's struggles on their way through the swamp to the island. In relating the Indian legend Ted had kept his seat on the gra.s.s, but now, as if accepting this invitation, he rose to his feet, his eye sweeping the faces of the eight a.s.sembled young "backwoods Crackers," all evidently more or less ignorant and uneducated, and--as Ted thought--sorely in need of instruction, especially on the subject of the great war. Some of them had read a weekly paper occasionally, but most of them had not even availed themselves of that limited source of information. This Ted knew from inquiries he had made. Did this not account, at least in part, for their indifference, and if they were told more about the war, might it not be possible to wake them up? Thus Ted had reasoned as he sat listening, observing and awaiting his opportunity.

"Gentlemen," he politely began, "what happened to us coming through the swamp is hardly worth telling about. I'd much rather talk about the greatest and most terrible war in history, and I hope you are willing.

For everything--the whole world's future as well as our own country's safety--depends on the way it ends. I don't think you know enough about it. If you did, you wouldn't be here to-night. You would be in the training camps wearing the soldier's uniform."

"Shut up!"

The voice was Sweet Jackson's, and his demand was echoed by several others.

"No, don't shut him up," shouted Buck Hardy. "Let him talk. _I'm_ not afraid to listen to him. I'm man enough to know my business and stick to it even if a boy who can talk fine does come along. Go on, kid."

This quelled the disturbance, and Ted continued:

"This war's got to end in complete victory for the United States and her allies, for if the Germans win, they will ride over us all rough-shod and make us no better than slaves, just as they have done in Belgium and wherever they have marched their armies. We must win, as the President says, so that the world can be made safe for Christian ideals and for democracy."

"Stop a minute, kid," said Buck. "You are handin' out some pretty big words. I reckon we all know what Christian means, but a bunch of us may not be quite so sure about 'de-mocracy.'"

"Democracy," explained Ted, "is free government by and for the people, instead of high-and-mighty government by one man like the German Kaiser.

You will see better what we'll be up against if the Germans get this country," the boy continued, "if I tell you about some of the things they have done and some of the things they want to do. After training for this war fifty years, they jumped on Europe, taking everybody by surprise. They have already conquered Belgium, Servia and Rumania, and they hold northern France, part of Russia and part of Italy. They want to take all the rest of Europe and then conquer the United States. They have said so. Some of 'em even say they ought to force the German language as well as German rule on the world, and they are so crazy with conceit that they say they have a right to do so because they are so much finer people than the people of other countries. Some of them even claim that the Germans have been divinely appointed to rule all nations."

"A little bit stuck on themselves, ain't they?" interjected Buck derisively.

"Why, I read," continued Ted, "of how one of their big preachers told his congregation: 'The German soul is G.o.d's soul; it shall and will rule over mankind.' And the Kaiser talks about 'the German G.o.d.'"

"You reckon they're such blame' fools as all that?" questioned Al Peters doubtfully.

"Germany is a fur ways and tales are pretty apt to grow as they travel,"

remarked a young man known as "Bud" Jones. "I know how a tale can grow in ten miles, let alone all the way across the ocean. It puts me in mind of the time Wash' Johnson was up before court."

Jones then related with humorous exaggerations how the story of a very small offense, on its eventful and roundabout journey "from Possum Trot to Crossways," became almost a murder in the first degree. "And when all the truth came out," he concluded, "there was jes' _nothin'_ to it."

Several others recalled amusing anecdotes ill.u.s.trating the powers of a rumor to expand enormously as it pa.s.sed from mouth to mouth, and the effect was such that poor Ted saw his opportunity disappear for the time. He was too inexperienced a speaker to find a way to regain command of the situation, but he made an effort. He was further embarra.s.sed as he took note that clumps of palmettos and scrub-oak thickets under the tall pines were becoming clearly outlined at a distance from the dying fires, showing that day had dawned and the time left him was short.

"But I haven't told you _anything_ yet," he insisted, as soon as he was able to put in a word. "And it's all _true_. Our amba.s.sadors and consuls and big men who have come back from Europe say the Germans have said and done even worse things than have been reported. If you would just let me tell you some of the things I know----"

"Can't be done now, kid; it's daylight," interrupted Buck Hardy, moving to rise and looking around into the woods from which the darkness was rapidly lifting.

All the loungers about the fire now sprang to their feet, turning their eyes toward the top of the pine wherein the bear had taken refuge, and noisily proposing to be the first to bag the game. As soon as there was sufficient light to outline the black bulky form among the high branches, the men opened fire, one at a time, and at the thirteenth shot the big game came tumbling down, striking the ground with great force.

"I got him!" insisted several voices, but of course there was no means of determining which was the fatal shot.

The bear measured seven inches across the ball of the foot, three inches through the fat on the round, and the total weight was calculated at not less than four hundred pounds. The hide was carefully taken off and some pounds of the choicest meat were sliced to dry, but the bulk of the carca.s.s was left where it was for the buzzards.

"I wish it could be shipped to the starving Belgians," said Ted, as he looked on, sorrowing to think of such waste at a time when economy and careful conservation of all food were urged upon the whole nation.

But n.o.body paid any attention to him, merriment and care-free indifference being the dominant note of the moment. When the sun was an hour high all hands, in great good humor, returned to camp and, to the accompaniment of boastful hunting stories, partook heartily of the hot breakfast which by this time July had prepared.

IX

After breakfast had been eaten and the eight slackers had scattered, going about the day's business, Ted sat disconsolately by the camp fire, watching July as he "cleared up" and talking intermittently with Hubert about the incidents of the night.

"I'm afraid I can't do anything with those slackers," said Ted, his tone as well as his words indicating great discouragement. "I thought I might be able to wake them up, but----"

"Well, you put up a good talk anyhow," said Hubert, frankly outspoken, as usual, in his admiration of Ted's oratorical powers, adding, however, with his habitual pessimism: "But I knew it wouldn't do any good. What do _they_ care? All they want to do is to look out for number one."

At this moment Billy trotted out of the woods and called Hubert aside.

The half-witted young man leaned toward Hubert and said to him in a low voice, with the air of one conferring a priceless favor:

"Would you like to come now and see son?"

"Who is 'son'?" asked Hubert skeptically yet curiously. "Yes, I'd like to see him."'

"Come on, then."

Ted had fallen into troubled revery and July was engaged in vigorously sc.r.a.ping one of his pots, so neither took note of Hubert's departure in the company of the half-wit.

Billy, who had fished out of his pocket a small wriggling water frog and carried it in his hand, led the way through the woods about a quarter of a mile, halting at last near the clay-covered roots of a large pine that had fallen during a wind storm. At the base of this was a small round hole in the ground, beside which Billy fell on his knees and began repeating in a strange, monotonous, coaxing voice:

"Doodle, doodle, come out your hole! Doodle, doodle, come out your hole!"

As he heard the mystic words supposed to be potent to call forth from ambush the ant-lion, which crafty insect prepares over its nest a kind of pitfall for ants, Hubert stepped back, protesting:

"You know that's too big for a doodle-hole; that's a snake's hole."

Billy made no reply, continuing his recitation.

"I hear him a-comin'," he said softly, at last. Then, in a gentle, caressing voice, he called down the hole: "Come on, son; come on, son."

In a few moments a large rattlesnake glided out of the hole and seized the frog from Billy's fingers. Hubert backed rapidly away and sprang upon a log, but Billy did not move from his place and betrayed no fear whatever.

"Come away from there!" cried Hubert in amazement. "You Billy--that snake will bite you!"

"Son won't bite me," replied Billy, confidently. "Son knows me. Don't be a-scared, boy; son won't hurt you if I tell him not to."

So this was "son"--the great mystery which poor Billy had seemed so to delight in!

"If you don't come away, I won't stay here," cried Hubert urgently.

He was alarmed for Billy's safety, fearing that as soon as the frog had been swallowed the reckless half-wit would be bitten. He thought he ought to look for a big stick and try to kill the snake, but made no move to do so, fearing the consequences of resistance from Billy.