Chapter IX: Tom Visits the Hatchery

Let us now return to Tom Bigden, whom we last saw paddling
disconsolately toward the camp where he had left his cousins, Ralph
and Loren Farnsworth, a short half hour before. Tom had expected to
spend a pleasant forenoon at the hatchery, taking lessons in
fish-culture; but his interview with Matt Coyle had knocked that in
the head. The squatter’s astounding proposition, taken in connection
with the dreadful things he had threatened to do in case his victim
failed to comply with his demands, had opened Tom’s eyes to the
disagreeable fact that he had over-reached himself by yielding to his
insane desire to take vengeance on Joe Waring. He knew he could not
enjoy himself at the hatchery with the fear of exposure and disgrace
hanging over him, so he started for camp at his best paddling pace to
ask Ralph and Loren what he should do about it.

“When a fellow like Matt Coyle can lay commands upon me and threaten
me with punishment if I do not obey them—by gracious! Is it possible
for me to get any lower down in the world? I wish I had never heard of
that Joe Wayring. Every thing seems to go smoothly with him without an
effort on his part, but, no matter how hard I try, every thing goes
wrong with me. Did any body ever hear of such luck?”

Tom was angry now as well as frightened, and, what seemed strange to
me when I heard of it, he blamed Joe Wayring, and not himself, for the
troubles he had got into. He must have brought a very black face into
camp with him, for when he ran the bow of his canoe upon the beach in
front of the grove where Loren and Ralph were idling away the time in
their hammocks the former called out:

“Hallo! who are you mad at now?”

“Everybody,” snarled Tom. “Say, Ralph, you remember that after our
interview with the squatter, on the day the constable drove him out of
Mount Airy, you declared that you wouldn’t have had it happen for any
thing, don’t you?”

“I remember it perfectly,” replied Ralph. “I was afraid that trouble
of some sort would grow out of it, and judging from the looks of your
face my fears have been realized. What’s up?”

“That was the first interview I held with Matt Coyle, but I am sorry
to say it wasn’t the last,” continued Tom.

“Have you seen him to-day?” exclaimed Loren.

“I have, and I tell you he’s got me in a box. But hold on a minute. I
want to let you into a secret. It was I who put it into his head to
steal Joe Wayring’s canvas canoe.”

“There,” said Ralph, shaking his finger at his brother. “What did I
tell you?”

“That’s no secret at all,” answered Loren. “We were satisfied from the
first that you knew all about it. You looked very surprised and
innocent, and I know you were mad when you discovered that Matt had
robbed you as well as the rest of us; but you didn’t play your part
well enough to ward off all suspicion.”

These words added to Tom’s fears. “Do you think Joe suspected me?” he
inquired.

“If he did, he made no sign,” replied Loren. “Perhaps one reason why
Ralph and I suspected you was because we could read you better than
Joe could. Well, what of it?”

“Well,” said Tom, desperately, “Matt Coyle tells me that, as an
accessory before the fact, I am liable to punishment at the hands of
the law. That is what he is working on. You have heard that he stole a
couple of valuable guns from an unguarded camp a few weeks ago. There
has been a reward of one hundred dollars offered for the recovery of
those guns, and, as Matt dare not take them up to the Sportsman’s Home
himself, he demands that I shall act as his agent, and share the
reward with him.”

“Demands?” repeated Loren.

“But before he will give the guns into my possession, I must pay him
fifty dollars, cash in hand,” added Tom. “Yes, sir; he _demands_ that
I shall do this under penalty of being denounced to the officers of
the law.”

“Whew!” whistled Ralph. “Here _is_ a go!”

“That Matt Coyle has more cheek than you showed on the day of the
canoe meet, when you purposely capsized Prank Noble and claimed foul
on it,” said Loren. “Are you going to give him the money?”

“He’ll have to; he can’t get out of it. But here’s where the trouble
is going to come in,” said Ralph, who was by no means thick-headed if
he did hate books. “The minute Tom gives him fifty dollars for those
guns, that minute he puts himself completely in the villain’s power.”

“That was the way I looked at it,” said Tom. “But what can I do? What
would you do if you were in my place?”

“The sight of those fifty dollars will show that lazy Matt how he can
make a very nice income without doing a stroke of work,” continued
Ralph. “He’ll go on stealing, and as fast as he accumulates property
he will make Tom buy it of him, no matter whether there is a reward
offered for it or not. There is only one thing you can do. You had
better start for home bright and early to-morrow morning, get fifty
dollars of your father, if he will give it to you, hand it over to
Matt as soon as you can find him, and then shake the dust of the
Indian Lake country from your feet forever, or at least until that
squatter has been placed behind prison bars.”

“But Matt says I need not hope to escape him by going home,” said Tom.
“He reminded me that a constable can catch me in Mount Airy as easily
as he can here.”

“That’s so,” assented Ralph, “but what other show have you? When you
give him the money you will put him in good humor, and I don’t think
he will denounce you until he has had some sort of a row with you. You
must keep him good-natured.”

“And the only way I can do that is by keeping his pockets full,” said
Tom, with a groan. “I won’t do it. I’ll give him the fifty dollars,
because I can’t help myself; and when I part from him he will never
see me again. My supply of spending money is not as generous as it
might be, and Matt shall not see a dollar of it.”

“Here’s another point,” said Loren, swinging himself from his hammock.
“Matt is going to be arrested some day, and what assurance have we
that he won’t tell all he knows?”

“We haven’t any,” said Tom, fiercely; and then, to the surprise of
both his cousins, he broke out into the wildest kind of a tirade
against Joe Wayring and every body who was a friend to him. Knowing
that they could not stop him, they let him go on and talk himself out
of breath.

“I’d like to see something happen to that boy, for if it hadn’t been
for him and his chums I never would have been in this fix,” said Tom,
at last. “Because we wouldn’t toady to them, they slammed the door of
the archery club in our faces, and went against us in every way they
knew how. Well, it is a long lane that has no turning, and we may come
out at the top of the heap yet. Will you fellows stand by me? I mean
will you go home with me, and come back when I get the money?”

Ralph and Loren gave it as their opinion that their cousin Tom ought
to know better than to ask such a question. Hadn’t they always stood
by him, through thick and thin, and made common cause with him against
every one he did not like? Of course they would stay with him until
his trouble with Matt Coyle was settled, and do all they could to help
him.

“I’m glad to hear it, for I should dreadfully hate to be left to
myself in an emergency like this,” said Tom. “But we haven’t a single
hour to lose. Matt said he would give me ten days to go to Mount Airy
and return, and we ought to start to-morrow. Which one of you will go
to the hotel with me after a supply of grub?”

“Let Ralph go,” said Loren. “He’s treasurer. I will stay here and look
out for things about the camp, and perhaps I shall be able to think up
some way for you to wriggle out of Matt Coyle’s clutches.”

Ralph, weary of loafing about the camp and glad of an opportunity to
stretch his arms, readily agreed to accompany his cousin to the
Sportsman’s Home and buy the provisions they would need while on their
way to Mount Airy. The two set out at once, and when they came back at
dark they had a startling story to tell the camp-keeper. The Irvington
bank had been robbed of six thousand dollars, and the thieves had been
traced to Indian Lake.

“I should think there were rascals enough here already,” said Loren,
after he had listened to all the particulars.

“They keep coming in all the while,” replied Ralph, “and the landlords
don’t like it very well. It’s hurting their business. The sportsmen,
especially those who have women and children with them, are leaving as
fast as they can pack up. We’ll be off to-morrow, and I hope we shall
never come here for another outing. Tom, are you sure you can take us
straight to the creek that leads from the pond to the Indian river?
You know we told you that, in the absence of a guide, we should depend
on you to show us the way home.”

“Don’t be uneasy,” was Tom’s confident answer. “I have a good many
landmarks to go by, and I’ll not take you an inch out of a direct
line.”

Of course there was but one thing talked about around that camp fire
between supper time and the hour for retiring, and that was the
attempt on the part of Matt Coyle to make a receiver of stolen
property out of Tom Bigden. The longer they dwelt upon it the darker
Tom’s prospects seemed to become. The fear of what the squatter could
do, if he made up his mind to be ugly, effectually banished sleep from
their eyes for the greater part of the night; and the consequence was
that when they arose from their beds of browse the next morning they
were too cross and snappish to be civil to one another. During the
time that was consumed in cooking and eating breakfast, packing the
canoes, and getting under way, they did not speak half a dozen words
aloud; but they all kept up a good deal of thinking, and no doubt it
was while Tom was in a fit of abstraction that he lost his way. At any
rate, he left the lake at least two miles below the point at which he
ought to have left it. He turned into the creek up which Matt Coyle
and his boys fled on the morning following their encounter with Joe
Wayring and his chums, and Ralph and Loren blindly followed his lead.
Not until they made a landing, about two o’clock in the afternoon, to
eat their lunch, did Tom begin to suspect that he was a little out of
his reckoning. If they had come there a few hours sooner, they would
have seen Mr. Swan and his party; for, as luck would have it, they had
landed within a short distance of Matt Coyle’s old camp.

“I am obliged to confess that I am any thing but a trustworthy guide
for this neck of the woods,” said Tom, after he had looked in vain for
some of the landmarks of which he had spoken the day before. “I don’t
think I ever saw this place until this moment.”

“Well, I am sure I have,” said Loren. “On our way down we camped
within sight of that leaning tree over there. Didn’t we, Ralph?”

“I think so. I am quite sure I shot at an eagle on that same leaning
tree. You fellows fix the lunch, and I will very soon find out whether
I am right or wrong,” said Ralph, getting upon his feet and shoving a
cartridge into each barrel of his gun. “If this is the place I think
it is, I shall find a little clearing back here about a hundred yards,
grown up to briers. Don’t you remember we picked a few berries there
on the way down?”

“I haven’t forgotten about the berries, but I don’t think you will
find that or any other clearing in these thick woods,” answered Tom.
“But go ahead and look, and we will have the lunch ready by the time
you get back.”

Ralph shouldered his gun and disappeared among the evergreens. He was
gone about ten minutes, and then Tom and Loren heard him calling to
them in an excited voice.

“Oh, fellows! Oh, fellows!” shouted Ralph. “Come here. Come as quick
as you know how.”

Tom and his cousin were in no hurry to obey this peremptory summons.
They did not know what they might find back there in the bushes. Their
faces turned white, and the hands with which they pushed the
cartridges into their guns trembled visibly.

“Are you coming?” cried Ralph, impatiently.

“What have you found?” Loren managed to ask, in reply.

“Something that will make you open your eyes,” was the answer. “But it
won’t hurt you. Why don’t you come on?”

These reassuring words brought Tom and Loren to their feet and took
them into the evergreens; but it was not without fear and trembling
that they slowly worked their way toward the place from which Ralph’s
voice sounded, nor did they neglect to hold themselves in readiness to
take to their heels the instant they saw any thing alarming. They
reached Ralph’s side at last, and were astonished beyond measure to
find him holding a Victoria gun-case in one hand and an elegant
double-barrel hammerless in the other. As they came up he raised the
hand that held the case, directing their attention to a finely
finished Winchester rifle that rested against a log near by.

“What’s the meaning of this? Where did you find them?” exclaimed Tom,
as soon as he had found his tongue.

Before speaking Ralph stepped to the end of the log and pointed to the
hollow in it. Then he picked up a bush that appeared to have been
lately cut, and laid it across the opening.

“That’s the way it was when I came along here a few minutes ago,” said
he. “I stumbled against something, and when I looked to see what it
was I found that I had kicked this bush away and exposed the opening.
As I was searching for that blackberry-patch, and nothing else, I was
about to pass on, when something glittering caught my eye. It was the
buckle on this gun-case. That’s my answer to your second question,
Tom. In reply to your first, I say: It means that you need have no
further trouble with Matt Coyle, and you needn’t ask your father for
that money.”

“Do—do you think these are the stolen guns?” stammered Tom.

“Of course they are,” said Loren, confidently. “That one by the log is
a Winchester, and I see the name Lefever on this. I tell you, old
fellow, you are in luck.”

“For once in my life I believe I am,” said Tom, taking the
double-barrel from his cousin’s hand and giving it a good looking
over. “Seen any signs of the berry-patch, Ralph?”

“Never a sign.”

“And you won’t see any in this part of the country, either,” answered
Tom. “We missed our way, and that was a very fortunate thing for me.
I’ve got the weather-gauge of Matt Coyle now. Let’s eat our lunch and
start back for our old camp.”

So saying Tom shouldered the Lefever hammerless and turned his face
toward the creek, Loren following with the Victoria case in his hand,
and Ralph bringing up the rear with the Winchester. They had many a
hearty laugh at Matt Coyle’s expense, but when they sat down to lunch
they began to look at the matter seriously.

“You’ve got the upper hand of him now, and you want to keep it,” said
Ralph. “I don’t think it would be quite safe for you to defy him.”

“By no means,” replied Tom. “I have no intention of doing any thing of
the sort. I shall have an interview with him at the earliest possible
moment, and tell him when he produces the guns I will give him his
money. I can’t be expected to fill my part of the contract until he
fills his; and that’s something he can’t do, thanks to Ralph. Why,
boys, I feel as if I had got rid of an awful load.”

For the first time since he came to Mount Airy to live Tom Bigden was
perfectly happy. According to his way of looking at it, he had turned
the tables on the squatter very neatly, and any sensible boy would
have said that the best thing he could do was to keep clear of that
low fellow in future. But he did not do it. Scarcely a week passed
away before his hatred for Joe Wayring led him into a worse scrape
than the one from which he had just been extricated by his cousin’s
lucky discovery.

I must not forget to say that while the boys were lounging about on
the bank of the creek, eating their bacon and cracker, there was
something going on in the woods behind them. Every thing they did
while they were standing beside that hollow log, examining the guns
that had been found in it, was seen, and every word they uttered had
been overheard by a young ragamuffin who was concealed within less
than a stone’s throw of them. Ralph Farnsworth had come upon him so
suddenly that he did not have time to run far. He shook both his fists
in the air and gnashed his teeth with rage when he saw Tom and his
cousins walk away with the guns in their possession, and as soon as
they were out of sight he came from his place of concealment and crept
toward the log on all-fours. But he did not stop there. He simply
glanced at the hollow as he passed and presently disappeared in a
thicket on the opposite side. When he came into view again he was
closely hugging two small valises, one under each arm. The angry scowl
was gone from his face, and he was grinning broadly and going through
a variety of uncouth antics, expressive, no doubt, of great
satisfaction and delight. He stopped and listened, and the sounds that
came to his ears told him that Tom Bigden and his companions were
shoving off in their canoes and heading down the creek toward the
lake. When their voices died away in the distance he bent himself
almost double, and moved off with long, noiseless strides.

The three canoeists reached their camp in the grove long before dark,
for the swift current in the creek helped them along at the rate of
three miles an hour. Tom’s first care was to make sure of the guns;
and these he at once proceeded to hide in the thick branches of an
evergreen, while his cousins cut wood, made the fire, and cooked the
supper. They had brought very light hearts back with them, but one of
their number, at least, did not sleep any the better for it. It was
Tom, who grew uneasy every time he thought of the coming interview
with the squatter, which he hoped to bring about on the following day.
How was it going to end? That was the question Tom kept asking
himself, and when he saw the day breaking, after an almost sleepless
night, he had not found a satisfactory answer to it.

“I suppose we ought to go to the Sportsman’s Home at once and give
those guns up,” said Loren, as he raked the coals together and threw
on an armful of fresh fuel. “We’ll not touch the reward, of course.”

“Certainly not,” replied Ralph. “But I would freely give a hundred
dollars, if I had it, to see Matt Coyle shut up for a long term of
years.”

“But he will have a trial before he is shut up, and there is no
knowing what secrets he may tell while that trial is in progress,”
said Loren.

“You don’t know how that thought worries me,” said Tom. “It is on my
mind continually. I wish you fellows wouldn’t give up the guns until I
have seen Matt.”

“What good will it do to keep them?” asked Loren.

“I don’t know that it will do any good; but I should like to be with
you when you hand them over to Mr. Hanson. I can’t go up to the
Sportsman’s Home to-day, for I have a most disagreeable piece of work
to do first. The sooner I get that off my hands, the sooner I shall
feel easy.”

Tom ate but little breakfast, for he seemed to have lost all desire
for food. He drank a cup of coffee, and then arose to his feet and
said good-by, adding, as he pushed his canoe from the beach and
stepped into it—

“I shall have something to tell you when I come back. I don’t know
whether it will be good or bad, but when I see you again I shall know
more than I do now.”

“Where are you going?”

“Down to the hatchery. It was while I was on my way there day before
yesterday that I met Matt. I have an idea that he hangs out somewhere
in that neighborhood.”

Tom passed a very pleasant hour with the superintendent, who showed
him every thing of interest there was to be seen about the hatchery,
and took much pains to make all the little details of the science
clear to him, even going back to the time of the Romans, among whom,
it is stated by several writers, the art approached a remarkable
degree of perfection; but it is doubtful if Tom knew any more about
fishes when he went away than he did when he came. He was thinking of
Matt Coyle, to whom the superintendent incidentally referred daring
the progress of the conversation.

“When we first came here, of course we were empty-handed,” said he.
“We set the traps in the outlet to catch fish so that we could get
their eggs; but a few vagabonds of the Coyle stamp made it their
business to cut our nets almost as fast as we could put them in. When
we threatened to have them arrested, they replied that we had better
let them alone or they would set fire to the hatchery. They said they
would fish where they pleased, and nobody should stop them; but they
have thought better of it, and don’t bother us any now. Matt Coyle and
his boys are the worst of the lot. They steal every thing they eat and
wear, but so far they have not interfered with us. When they do, we
shall have them arrested, Hanson or no Hanson.”

“What has he to do with it?” inquired Tom. “Doesn’t he want them to be
arrested?”

“Not just yet; not until he has recovered two stolen guns Matt has in
his possession,” answered the superintendent. “That is a matter of
dollars and cents to both the hotels at the lake, for if those guns
are not restored to their owners the landlords will be ruined.”

“Perhaps if he were shut up for a while he would lose heart, and tell
where the guns could be found,” suggested Tom.

“Swan and the other guides who know him think differently. That was my
idea, and I urged it upon the guides, for I wanted that villain and
all his tribe out of my way. But Swan says Matt is a man who can’t be
driven. However, Rube has his eye on him, and perhaps he will discover
something one of these days.”

“Who is Rube?” asked Tom.

“Our watchman. He used to be one of Hanson’s guides; but he proved too
lazy for the business, so Hanson induced us to bring him down here to
watch the hatchery and act as spy upon Matt’s movements at the same
time. When Swan and his friends destroyed Matt’s camp Rube took him
into his house. He and his family are there now, and Rube is trying
the best he knows how to get into their confidence so that they will
tell him where these guns are concealed. I ought, perhaps, to say that
three members of the family are at Rube’s house now. Where the other
is no one seems to know. Yesterday morning the sheriff made an attempt
to arrest Jake, but the family got warning in time, took to the woods,
and Jake hasn’t come back yet.”

“What had he been doing?” inquired Tom, who was much more interested
in this than he was in the science of fish-culture.

“You heard about the Irvington bank robbery, didn’t you? Well, every
thing goes to prove that the six thousand dollars the thieves secured
is now in Jake Coyle’s hands.”

This was the most astounding piece of news that Tom Bigden had ever
listened to. “How did Jake get hold of it?” he asked.

“Well, the sheriff summoned a posse, caught the robbers after a short
chase, and they told him that the boy they hired to ferry them over
the lake, and who was robbing a cellar when they first spoke to him,
capsized them on purpose and spilled the money out into the water. You
see Jake caught a glimpse of the money when one of the robbers opened
his valise to pay him the five dollars he demanded for ferrying them
over, and made up his mind to have it for his own.”

“I had no idea Jake Coyle was smart enough to do a thing like that,”
said Tom, who could scarcely credit his ears. “Do you believe the
story?”

“Why, the guides tell me that the whole family are sharper than steel
traps. Of course I believe the story. On the way home the sheriff ran
upon a canvas canoe that Matt stole from Joe Wayring up in Sherwin’s
Pond, and the robbers recognized it the minute it was put together as
the one in which they had started to cross the lake. When the sheriff
heard this he knew at once that the ferryman was Jake Coyle, and
nobody else, for he is the one who steals all the grub for the family.
When they came here to be set across the outlet they surrounded Rube’s
house with the intention of arresting Jake, but he and the rest had
been warned, as I told you, and could not be found. After that the
sheriff took one of the robbers up the lake to point out the snag on
which Jake capsized the canvas canoe, but the money wasn’t there.”

“Have you any idea what had become of it?”

“I haven’t the least doubt that Jake went up there night before last,
dived for the valises and took them off in the woods and hid them.
That is what the sheriff thinks, and it is the plan he is working on.”

“I am glad I went to the hatchery this morning,” thought Tom, as he
pulled slowly toward camp after thanking the accommodating official
for the pains he had taken to teach him something. “I have had a good
time, and I have heard one or two things that may be of use to me.”