The Black Dog Mystery (28 page)

But everything remained silent, and finally Djuna decided that he had been dreaming. “You’d better get down now, Champ,” he whispered. “Go on back to sleep.”

He lifted Champ down to the floor, but instead of going back under the bed Champ made a dash for the open door, turned the corner, and went rushing up the stairs to the attic, making all sorts of noise.

“Oh, dear!” groaned Djuna. “He’ll wake Aunt Patty!”

And he did. Djuna heard her stirring around in the next room, and the scratch of the match as she lighted an oil lamp.

Djuna found his sneakers, slipped them on and went out into the hallway.

“I’m awfully sorry, Aunt Patty,” he called out. “But we heard a noise up in the attic and I couldn’t stop Champ from going up there.”

“Well, I declare!” exclaimed Aunt Patty. “You probably heard some mice running around up there. But I guess you’d better keep your dog outdoors in the woodshed, after tonight. Here, take this lamp and get him out of the attic, and let a body get some sleep.”

“Yes, Aunt Patty,” said Djuna meekly, feeling very much ashamed of his dog’s noisiness. He took the lamp and started up the stairs.

As he reached the top, he could hear Champ scuffling around in the darkness, and then heard him bark. He sounded as though he were over by the window.

“Keep quiet, Champ!” he commanded. “Come here!”

Much to his relief, Champ obeyed at once and came trotting over to him, emerging from behind a pile of boxes near the window. His long whiskers almost hid something he was carrying in his mouth. At first glance, Djuna thought he had found an old bone.

“What have you got there?” asked Djuna, sharply. “Give that here, right away!”

He put the lamp on the floor and reached down to take the thing out of Champ’s mouth. Champ resisted a little, but finally let go.

It wasn’t a bone, at all. It was something that looked a little like a broken doorknob.

Djuna couldn’t imagine what it had been made for. It seemed to be a smooth roundish stone, not quite as big as a tennis ball. It was almost white, or very light brown, but it was spotted with blotches and specks of light cinnamon-brown and gray. Its whole surface was polished very smooth, and it glistened in the lamplight. It wasn’t exactly round, but was shaped more like a small football. To one end of it was fastened a thick blunt screw. But the queerest thing about it all was that on top of the other end of the spotted stone there was fastened what seemed to be a bird’s foot—a foot with four toes, each toe ending in an enormous claw. These claws, carved out of black stone, clutched the spotted white ball tightly.

Djuna turned the strange object over and over in his hands, wondering what it could be. It certainly wasn’t a doorknob, but, he decided, it might have been used for the knob of a bureau drawer.

“Oh, well,” he said at last, “I’ll ask Aunt Patty what it is, tomorrow. You go on back to bed, now, Champ!”

Champ led the way down, his stubby tail wagging.

“H
EAVENS TO
Betsy!” exclaimed Aunt Patty next morning, as she stood looking at the strange “doorknob” which Djuna had found in the attic, turning it over and over in her hand. “I don’t believe I’ve seen this thing since I was a little girl! But I remember it, all right. Seems to me my Ma told me it was part of Gramma’s umbrella—the head of it. Anyway, ’tain’t worth anything now. Might as well throw it away, Djuna.”

“May I have it?” asked Djuna eagerly.

“Why, certainly,” said Aunt Patty, smiling. “But what you want it for, goodness knows. The junk that boys collect beats all!”

Djuna looked at it again, thoughtfully, before he put it in his bureau drawer.

“Was your grandmother a very big woman?” he asked.

“Mercy sakes, what a question!” exclaimed Aunt Patty, startled. “No, she wasn’t, she was a little bit of a thing. I never saw her, she died long before I was born, but I remember my mother telling me that
her
mother hardly came up to her shoulder. That was Gramma Greene, of course. What made you ask?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” mumbled Djuna. “I just wondered. Look, may I go and mail my letter to Miss Ellery, and then go to Billy Reckless’ house? He said maybe we could go sailing together.”

“Go ahead,” said Aunt Patty. “You know where the post office is? It’s at the end of this street, next to the Harbor House. You’ll find Billy’s house right near there, down by the wharf. You can’t miss it.”

“What’s the Harbor House?” asked Djuna.

“Oh, that’s a sort of hotel, for summer folks mostly, and travelin’ men, but mighty few ever stops there. It don’t amount to much.”

Djuna whistled to Champ, who had been waiting for him at the kitchen door, and they set off. As they went around the corner of the house, Djuna noticed a long ladder lying on the ground, close to the house and right under the open window in the attic. He stopped, looked at it closely, and then went on down the street.

Near the end of the street of little white houses he found a store with the words “Post Office” in the window, and mailed his letter there. As he came out, he noticed three men talking to each other at the door of a shabby-looking building. Over the door was a sign reading, “Harbor House,” but the paint had peeled off so much that it was hard to read it. He recognized one of the men as the man he had seen in Mr. Truelove’s store, the day before, and who had called himself Mr. Patina. But to Djuna’s surprise Mr. Patina was now dressed in overalls, instead of the neat gray suit he had worn before. Djuna had never seen the other two men. Their faces, which were sunburned, looked a good deal alike, and both were dressed in wrinkled blue canvas trousers and blue shirts. Mr. Patina was standing with his back to Djuna, and was bareheaded, and Djuna was sure he had never seen such glossy black hair as he had.

Just as Djuna passed them, on his way to Billy’s, he heard Mr. Patina say, “Well, suppose we sit down and talk this over.”

One of the two other men said eagerly, “Okay, mister,” and took a step backward toward the wall of the hotel. Without looking around, he began to sit down. Djuna was utterly surprised, because there wasn’t any chair there. But he wasn’t as surprised as the man was. A look of complete astonishment spread over his face as he kept on going down, and landed on the ground with a bump. The other man said angrily, “Watch yourself, Bonehead!” but it was too late. He had already landed.

He scrambled to his feet, still looking bewildered “My gosh!” he said, rubbing himself, “there’s allus been a bench there!”

Djuna hurried around the corner, trying hard not to laugh. The last thing he heard was the reproachful voice of the man who had sat down on nothing. “Why didn’t you
tell
me they moved it, Harvey?” he was saying.

Billy Reckless waved to Djuna as soon as he came in sight. He was standing on the little wharf by his house. Several rowboats were moored alongside the dock, and three or four more were pulled up on the gravelly beach. At the end of the dock was a small motor fishing boat, not much larger than Aunt Patty’s and much dirtier. No one was on board it. Farther out, two small sloops were moored to buoys, their noses pointed toward the incoming tide.

“Hi, Djuna!” yelled Billy. “You’re just in time! I was just coming up to your house to look for you! Want to go sailing?”

Djuna quickened his steps. “Oh, boy!” he said as he reached the dock, “you should have seen what
I
just saw!”

Billy grinned when Djuna told him about the man who had sat down on a bench that wasn’t there. When Billy heard that the other man had called the first one a bonehead, he said:

“Oh, I know who that was! That’s Harry Bohnett, only everybody calls him Bonehead, because he’s always doing dumb things like that. The other one is his brother Harvey. That’s their boat out at the end of the dock. They don’t live in Stony Harbor, but they come over here once in a while. I don’t like them, either of them.”

“Why not?” asked Djuna.

“Oh, they’re always too fresh. But, look, I don’t know whether we ought to take your dog along with us or not. Maybe you’d better take him home before we start, don’t you think?”

Djuna’s face fell. He didn’t want to leave Champ behind again, as he had had to do the day before. He thought fast.

“You’re going to take Alberto along, aren’t you?” he asked. “Champ won’t take up any more room than
he
does.”

Billy laughed. “You win!” he said. “Get him into the boat, but watch out and don’t let him fall overboard. Make him stay up in the bow, along with Alberto.”

But Champ objected to climbing down the short ladder that led to the landing float, and Billy finally had to go down first, and take Champ when Djuna lifted the dog down into his upstretched hands.

“Aren’t you going to put up the sail now?” asked Djuna after they had all settled themselves in the boat. He was crouched in the bow, keeping one hand on Champ’s collar.

“No, not till I push her out from all these other boats,” said Billy, picking up the oars. “It’s easier, if we wait till we get out where there’s more room.”

Pushing away from the float, he rowed the boat out to the outermost of the two anchored sloops and came up close beside it, in the lee of the sloop. He carefully put the oars in the bottom of the boat, while Djuna held onto the side of the sloop. Then Billy put a rope through a ringbolt on the afterdeck of the sloop and handed the loose end of it to Djuna.

“Hang on to that until I get the sails hoisted,” he commanded, “and don’t let go till I yell, ‘Cast off!’ Just watch what I’m doing, this time, and next time you can help a lot.”

From the locker in the tiny forepeak, he pulled out two bundles of canvas, the sails.

“Now,” he said, “wait until I hoist the mainsail and get back to the tiller. When I yell, ‘Cast off!’ let go that rope and make sure it doesn’t get tangled up in that ringbolt on the sloop. Then grab
this
rope, the jib halyard, and hoist away on it until the jib is up as high as it will go; then fasten the halyard around this cleat, coil up the rest of it and stow it under the seat. We’ll be moving backwards by that time, because the wind is blowing toward us, but don’t worry. I’ll be swinging the boat’s bow around to starboard, so be sure to get your head over to the other side, to port—that’s to the left, you know. Think you remember all that?”

“I think so,” said Djuna, a little anxiously. “First I let go, when you say so, then hoist the jib, then keep over to port. Is that right?”

“Swell!” said Billy. “You’ve got it! Okay, let’s go!”

Standing close to the mast, he began hoisting the main halyard, and the mainsail began to rise, little by little shaking out its folds. As the wind filled it, it began to flutter, and the boat woke into life, tugging at the line by which Djuna held it tethered, as if it were a live colt trying to get free.

When the mainsail had risen to the top of the mast and had become a white fluttering triangle, Billy deftly made the halyard fast to a cleat, and hurried back to the stern seat. Glancing at the mainsheet to make sure that it would run free, without tangling, and that the jib-sheets were close at hand, he took a firm grip on the mainsheet and tucked the tiller under his right elbow.

“Cast off forward!” he yelled.

Djuna, who until that moment hadn’t taken his eyes from Billy, let go the rope as if it burned him, and watched it anxiously until its end slid through the ringbolt on the yacht’s deck and dropped into the water. He began to haul it in.

“Never mind that now!” yelled Billy. “Let it drag! Hoist your jib!”

Djuna, dimly remembering that he must stay on the lefthand side of that sail, did as he had been told, and reached for the jib halyard. He fumbled a little before he got the rope unfastened from the cleat, then began to haul on it. Up, up, went the fluttering little triangle. The wind filled it, and it began tugging to the right as Billy had said it would.

Djuna looked anxiously upward and saw that the jib had been hoisted as far as it would go. Breathlessly, he fastened the rope to the cleat, and to his surprise found that his hands were shaking with excitement. Looking toward Billy, he saw that Billy was working just as busily. He had already pulled the starboard jibsheet taut and made it fast, and now he was pulling the mainsheet in toward him, hand over hand, while he still held the tiller firmly under his right arm.

Djuna glanced over his shoulder. They had already drifted fifty feet backwards, away from the yacht. It seemed for a fraction of a second that the boat was standing still. Then, slowly, it began to move forward. Another moment, and Djuna heard the softest, merriest sound he had ever heard. It sounded as though the boat itself were chuckling, laughing to itself. “Glug, glug, glug!” it said. “Chuckle, chuckle, chuckle!” The sound was the sound of the little waves slapping against the bottom of the boat as it moved forward. Yes, they were moving!

He looked around, and burst out laughing. Champ had wiggled himself into the little sail locker, to get himself out of harm’s way! His hairy face looked out so mournfully that Djuna couldn’t help laughing.

Billy was pulling the end of the mainsail boom in closer to him. The boat leaned a little, with the growing push of the breeze on the sail. The chuckling noise under the bow grew louder as the boat moved faster.

“Haul in that bowline!” yelled Billy. “Coil it up, and then come back here, if you want to!”

Djuna stowed away the dripping rope that had been dragging in the water and then made his way cautiously back, to take a seat in the bottom of the boat beside Billy. It was a grand day. They were well out into the harbor now. The houses on shore were getting farther and farther away.

“Like it?” grinned Billy, as Djuna sat down beside him.

“
Do
I!” exclaimed Djuna. “Gee, this is swell!”

As the breeze grew stronger, the boat went faster, cutting its way swiftly through the rippled surface of the water. Djuna began to feel more confidence and to notice the direction in which the boat was sailing. It was heading southwest.

“Where are you going now, Billy?” he asked curiously. “Aren’t you going to go out to Aunt Patty’s islands right away?”