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Nic Revel; A White Slave's Adventures in Alligator Land, a fiction by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 4. Nic Will Not Shake Hands |
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_ CHAPTER FOUR. NIC WILL NOT SHAKE HANDS History repeats itself, though the repetitions are not always recorded. A horrible feeling of remorse and despair came over the man. His anger had evaporated, and putting his hands to the sides of his mouth, he yelled out: "Ahoy, there! Help--help!" Again it was a mere whisper in the booming roar. "Oh, poor dear lad!" he muttered to himself. "Bother the zammon! Wish there waren't none. Hoi, Master Nic! Strike out! Zwim, lad, zwim! Oh, wheer be ye? I've drowned un. Oh, a mercy me! What have I done?-- Hah! there a be." There was a plunge, a splash, and a rush against the eddying water, with the man showing a better knowledge of the pool, from many a day's wading, than Nic had possessed. Pete Burge knew where the shallow shelves of polished stones lay out of sight, and he waded and struggled on to where the water was bearing Nic round in turn. Then, after wading, the man plunged into deep water, swam strongly, and seized his victim as a huge dog would, with his teeth, swung himself round, and let the fierce current bear him along as he fought his way into the shallow, regained his footing, and the next minute was back by the ledge. Here he rose to his feet, and rolled and thrust Nic ashore, climbed out after him, and knelt in turn by his side. "Bean't dead, be he?" said the man to himself. "Not in the water long enough. Worst o' these here noblemen and gentlemen--got no stuff in 'em." Pete Burge talked to himself, but he was busy the while. He acted like a man who had gained experience in connection with flooded rivers, torrents, and occasional trips in fishing-boats at sea; and according to old notions, supposing his victim not to be already dead, he did the best he could to smother out the tiny spark of life that might still be glowing. His fine old-fashioned notion of a man being drowned was that it was because he was full of water. The proper thing, then, according to his lights, must be to empty it out, and the sooner the better. The sea-going custom was to lay a man face downward across a barrel, and to roll the barrel gently to and fro. "And I aren't got no barrel," muttered Pete. To make up for it he rolled Nic from side to side, and then, as his treatment produced no effect, he seized him by the ankles, stood up, and raised the poor fellow till he was upside down, and shook him violently again and again. Wonderful to relate, that did no good, his patient looking obstinately lifeless; so he laid him in the position he should have tried at first-- extended upon his back; and, apostrophising him all the time as a poor, weakly, helpless creature, punched and rubbed and worked him about, muttering the while. "Oh, poor lad! poor dear lad!" he went on. "I had no spite again' him. I didn't want to drownd him. It weer only tit for tat; he chucked me in, and I chucked him in, and it's all on account o' they zammon.--There goes another. Always a-temptin' a man to come and catch 'em--lyin' in the pools as if askin' of ye.--Oh, I say, do open your eyes, lad, and speak! They'll zay I murdered ye, and if I don't get aboard ship and zail away to foreign abroad, they'll hang me, and the crows'll come and pick out my eyes.--I zay.--I zay lad, don't ye be a vool. It was on'y a drop o' watter ye zwallowed. Do ye come to, and I'll never meddle with the zammon again.--I zay, ye aren't dead now. Don't ye be a vool. It aren't worth dying for, lad. Coom, coom, coom, open your eyes and zit up like a man. You're a gentleman, and ought to know better. I aren't no scholard, and I didn't do zo.--Oh, look at him! I shall be hanged for it, and put on the gibbet, and all for a bit o' vish.--Zay, look here, if you don't come to I'll pitch you back again, and they'll think you tumbled in, and never know no better. It's voolish of ye, lad. Don't give up till ye're ninety-nine or a hundred. It's time enough to die then. Don't die now, with the sun shining and the fish running up the valls, and ye might be so happy and well." And all the while Pete kept on thumping and rubbing and banging his patient about in the most vigorous way. "It's spite, that's what it is," growled the man. "You hit me i' th' mouth and tried to drownd me, and because you couldn't you're trying to get me hanged; and you shan't, for if you don't come-to soon, sure as you're alive I'll pitch you back to be carried out to zea.--Nay, nay, I wouldn't, lad. Ye'd coom back and harnt me. I never meant to do more than duck you, and Hooray!" For Nic's nature had at last risen against the treatment he was receiving. It was more than any one could stand; so, in the midst of a furious bout of rubbing, the poor fellow suddenly yawned and opened his eyes, to stare blankly up at the bright sun-rays streaming down through the overhanging boughs of the gnarled oaks. He dropped his lids again, but another vigorous rubbing made him open them once more; and as he stared now at his rough doctor his lips moved to utter the word "Don't!" but it was not heard, and after one or two more appeals he caught the man's wrists and tried to struggle up into a sitting position, Pete helping him, and then, as he knelt there, grinning in his face. Nic sat staring at him and beginning to think more clearly, so that in a few minutes he had fully grasped the position and recalled all that had taken place. It was evident that there was to be a truce between them, for Pete Burge's rough countenance was quite smiling and triumphant, while on Nic's own part the back of his neck ached severely, and he felt as if he could not have injured a fly. At last Nic rose, shook himself after the fashion of a dog to get rid of some of the water which soaked his clothes, and looked round about him for his cap, feeling that he would be more dignified and look rather less like a drowned rat if he put it on. Pete came close to him, placed his lips nearly to his ear, and shouted, "Cap?" Nic nodded. "Gone down the river to try and catch mine for me," said the man, with a good-humoured grin, which made Nic frown at the insolent familiarity with which it was said. "You'll have to buy me another one, Master Nic," continued the man, "and get the smith to make me a noo steel hook. I'll let you off paying for the pole; I can cut a fresh one somewheres up yonder." "On our grounds?" cried Nic indignantly, speaking as loudly as he could. "Well, there's plenty, aren't there, master? And you've lost mine," shouted back the man, grinning again. "You scoundrel!" cried Nic, who was warming up again. "I shall have you up before the Justices for this." "For what?" said the man insolently. "For throwing me into the pool." "Zo shall I, then," shouted the man. "It was only tit for tat. You zent me in first." "Yes; and I caught you first hooking our salmon, sir." "Tchah! much my zammon as your own, master. Vish comes out of the zea for everybody as likes to catch them." "Not on my father's estate," cried Nic. "You've been warned times enough." "Ay, I've heerd a lot o' talk, master; but me and my mates mean to have a vish or two whenever we wants 'em. You'll never miss 'em." "Look here, Pete Burge," cried Nic; "I don't want to be too hard upon you, because I suppose you fished me out of the pool after throwing me in." "Well, you've no call to grumble, master," said the man, grinning good-humouredly. "You did just the zame." "And," continued Nic, shouting himself hoarse, so as to be heard, and paying no heed to the man's words, "if you faithfully promise me that you'll never come and poach on my father's part of the river again, I'll look over all this, and not have you before the Justices." "How are you going to get me avore the Justice, Master Nic?" said the man, with a merry laugh. "Send the constable, sir." "Tchah! he'd never vind me; and, if he did, he dursen't tackle me. There's a dozen o' my mates would break his head if he tried." "Never mind about that," cried Nic. "You promise me. My father warned you only yesterday." "So he did," said the man, showing his teeth. "In a regular wax he was." "And I will not have him annoyed," cried Nic. "So now then, you promise?" "Nay, I shan't promise." "Then I go straight to the constable, and if I do you'll be summoned and punished, and perhaps sent out of the country." "What vor?--pulling you out when you was drownding?" "For stealing our salmon and beating our two keepers." "Then I'd better have left you in yonder," said the man, laughing. "You mean I had better have left you in yonder, and rid the country of an idle, poaching scoundrel," cried Nic indignantly. "But there, you saved my life, and I want to give you a chance. Look here, Pete Burge, you had better go to sea." "Yes, when I like to try for some vish. Don't ketch me going for a zailor." "Will you give me your word that you will leave the fish alone?" "Nay; but I'll shake hands with you, master. You zaved my life, and I zaved yourn, so we're square over that business." "You insolent dog!" cried Nic. "Then I'll go straight to the Justice." "Nay; you go and put on zome dry clothes. It don't hurt me, but you'll ketch cold, my lad. Look here, you want me to zay I won't take no more zammon." "Yes." "Then I won't zay it. There's about twenty of us means to have as many fish out o' the river as we like, and if anybody, keepers or what not, comes and interveres with us we'll pitch 'em in the river; and they may get out themzelves, for I'm not going in after they. Understand that, master?" "Yes, sir, I do." "Then don't you set any one to meddle with us, or there may be mischief done, for my mates aren't such vools as me. Going to give me a noo steel hook?" "No, you scoundrel!" "Going to zhake hands?" "No, sir." "Just as you like, young master. I wanted to be vriends and you won't, so we'll be t'other. On'y mind, if there's mischief comes of it, you made it. Now then, I'm going to walk about in the sun to get dry, and then zee about getting myself a noo cap and a hook." "To try for our salmon again?" The fellow gave him a queer look, nodded, and climbed up the side of the ravine, followed by Nic. At the top the man turned and stared at him for a few moments, with a peculiar look in his eyes; and the trees between them and the falls shut off much of the deep, booming noise. "Well," said Nic sharply, "have you repented?" "Nothing to repent on," said the man stolidly. "On'y wanted to zay this here: If you zees lights some night among the trees and down by the watter, it means vishing." "I know that," said Nic sternly. "And there'll be a lot there--rough uns; so don't you come and meddle, my lad, for I shouldn't like to zee you hurt." The next minute the man had disappeared among the trees, leaving Nic to stand staring after him, thinking of what would be the result if the salmon-poachers met their match. _ |
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