CHAPTER VI
BILLY FINDS NANNIE IN BAD HANDS
BUT when they reached the trysting-place, there was no Nannie. After waiting an hour, they decided something must have happened to her, as it was long past the time she should have been there. So they put their heads together and formed plans as to how to search for her.
Billy was to go to the right to a farmhouse whose chimneys he saw sticking up above the treetops to the right of the road. Stubby was to go round a big turn he saw to the left and Button was to stay there at the trysting-place in case Nannie came while they were away.
“I feel quite sure someone has caught her and tied her up somewhere,” said Billy.
“So do I,” replied Stubby. “But it won’t take us long to rescue her when we once find her.”
In the wiggle of a lamb’s tail Billy disappeared from sight down a ravine and Stubby under some bushes on the other side of the road. When they had gone Button climbed up into a tree and fell asleep.
It seemed to him he had been napping but a short time when he heard Billy and Nannie talking under the tree. Billy had gone straight to the stable yard of the farmhouse whose chimneys he had seen above the treetops and as he approached, he heard a goat moan as if in pain. He stopped short to listen. Could that be Nannie’s voice? If so, and someone was hurting her, it would not be well for them. Again the hurt cry reached his ears. Yes, surely that was Nannie’s voice! He redoubled his speed and arrived at the fence that enclosed the farmyard just as three boys were trying to hitch Nannie to a little milk wagon that had three cans of milk in it. When they buckled on the harness, they buckled in a piece of her flesh, but what cared they? This hurt so it made her moan. Then they struck her over the head for not standing still, and dear knows what else they would have done to her if Billy had not jumped over the fence with one bound and come to her rescue. One boy he butted into a watering trough and another over the garden fence where he landed in an asparagus bed. The last boy he butted straight through the open barn door, knocking over the hired man who was coming out with a pail of milk in his hand, upsetting it and spilling it all over the barn floor.
Then he turned to Nannie and said: “Now run for your life and jump the fence. When the wagon hits the fence it will break the traces and you will be free.”
Being a good jumper, especially when frightened, Nannie did exactly as Billy told her to do. And as the hired man and the boys were picking themselves up, they heard a crash. Looking in the direction from which the noise came, they saw Nannie and Billy jumping the four-rail fence as a steeplechase horse takes a fence. The traces broke and the little wagon, which had been pulled up on its hind wheels, toppled over and spilled out all the milk cans and the milk, while Nannie and Billy landed safely on the other side and ran for dear life to where Billy had left Button. Every once in a while Nannie would give a frightened look over her shoulder to see if the boys were following her, but she need have had no fear for the boys were too bruised to chance another butting.
The hired man was so angry that he called their bulldog and sent him after the goats. Billy heard him coming and told Nannie to run to Button and he would wait for the dog to overtake him, then he would give him the surprise of his life. This dog was used to frightening anything he ran after. Little did he know Billy or he would have tucked his tail between his legs and turned and ran home. Billy stood perfectly still and pretended he was eating grass. On came the dog, yelping and barking as if he were going to eat Billy alive. And he was a ferocious looking dog for he was a bulldog with undershot jaw. A few feet from Billy was a deep pond with steep sides so Billy thought, “I’ll just butt him into that pond and he will have a good time getting out for the sides will give way and crumble in the minute he touches them.”
“Bow-wow-wow!” barked the dog, showing his teeth as he jumped at Billy from a high bunch of long grass. Pang! went something flying through the air followed by a yowl of pain, and the dog landed in the middle of the pond and went straight down to the bottom.
When the hired man, leaning on the fence to watch his dog chew up Billy, saw this, he roared with rage, picked up a pitchfork which was handy and started for Billy. But when he reached the pond he found he had to give all his attention to his dog, else he would drown as the bank crumbled and gave way, carrying him back into the water every time he tried to climb out.
Billy ran on and soon the friends were all together for the man and his dog did not follow them. The Chums started on down the road that led away from the town and toward Chicago, for which place they were bound. They traveled straight down this road until midnight. Then they went into a woods beside the road to sleep and rest until morning, but Nannie scarcely closed her eyes, for she had become so frightened she could not sleep.
“My dear little wife,” said Billy, “don’t be afraid! I won’t allow anything to hurt you. Come over here and sleep close to me so I can protect you.”
So at last Nannie fell asleep, but it was almost worse than being awake for she had terrible dreams of being chased by bulldogs that bit pieces right out of her side as she tried to run away from them.
In the morning she felt as tired as if she had not slept at all, and the long journey ahead of her made her feel ill at the very thoughts of it, with its hardships and adventures. She thought of it all the morning and at noon she said to Billy: “My dear, I hope you won’t be disappointed, but I have made up my mind that it will be better for all concerned if I return home and let you and Stubby and Button continue your trip without me.”
“Why, Nannie! What do you mean? Are you going to desert us at the very beginning of our journey?” asked Stubby.
“Yes, Stubby. I feel I am getting too old to enjoy leaving my peaceful, quiet home, my children and grandchildren, to go roaming all over the continent just for the excitement and adventure. It may be all right for you unmarried ones, but for a grandmother, NO! I believe my place is at home and I am going to start back to-night before we are so far away I can’t find my way.”
All this time Billy had kept still and was watching Nannie to see how much of this she meant, and he was surprised to find that every word of it was in earnest. Then the thought flashed through his mind: “Perhaps she is right. She always has been a home-loving body and very timid, and I believe with her that this trip would be too much for her. I will go back with her to within sight of the farm so I shall know she reaches there safely. Then I shall come back and join Stubby and Button and we can continue our journey.”
Nannie noticed Billy was very quiet and she was afraid to look at him for fear he would be angry at her for backing out. So she felt greatly relieved when she did look at him to find he was smiling at her and nodding his head for her to go.
“You certainly are a darling, Billy, to let me have my own way in everything, but you need not escort me back home. I can find the way, and if I can’t, I can call on the crows and blackbirds to show me the way.”
“No, my dear; I shall feel better if I see you home—at least the other side of the village where the boy captured you. If we travel fast, I can join Stubby and Button here by day after tomorrow. And what is two days lost when one is not in a hurry and going away for a year?”
So they rested all that afternoon and just before dark Billy and Nannie started back to the old farm. They traveled rapidly until they came to a high hill that looked down on the old farm and the rolling country around it with its placid lake and wooded slopes on one side and the equally pretty country through which they had just passed on the other.
“Billy,” said Nannie, “you need not come any farther with me. I can go on alone from here in perfect safety.”
“Oh, I might as well go all the way with you.”
“No, you need not, for it would only make you have to say good-by to everybody again, a thing you hate to do.”
“Very well, if you say so and if you feel all right about my leaving you here, I will. But I do so wish you were going with us! Every mile I have been traveling in bringing you back has made me feel more lonesome as it will be many months and perhaps a year before I see you again, and at our time of life we haven’t as many years to be together as we once had, you must remember.”
“Oh, Billy, don’t talk that way or I shall turn right around and go back with you no matter how afraid I am of the unknown dangers I will have to pass through.”
“No, no, dear! I would not have you go for worlds, if you were going to be afraid all the time. Now you start ahead and I will stand here and watch you out of sight.”
“No, indeed, that is what I am going to do. I am going to wait here until you disappear over that farther hilltop.”
“Oh, very well, if you wish it.”
And with many, many rubbings of noses and sides in lieu of kisses, the two old lovers parted. Billy ran as fast as he could down the hill and Nannie strained her eyes to see him come out of the grove of trees at the bottom and begin to climb the hill. She could easily locate him by the white spot he made on the green landscape.
But what was the matter with her? Every time he disappeared her heart fluttered so she felt she would suffocate and the tears sprang to her eyes in such numbers that for a minute or two she could not see him when he did emerge from the bushes and trees that had hid him. And all too quickly he was approaching the top of that terrible hill where, when he once stepped over the top, she would not see him for—what had he said?—weeks, months and perhaps a year!
No, it must not, could not be! She knew it now by the flutter of her heart that fear, children or grandchildren could not keep her from following her own darling lover-husband. And with a long jump she was down the side of the hill, baaing for Billy to wait for her.
Poor timid, loving Nannie! Her love had cast out fear as it always does in life if we love enough. Nannie ran so fast that she did not look where she was going and she had many falls and turned many somersaults before she reached the top of the hill over which Billy had disappeared. And when she at last stood on the brow of the hill she expected to see him miles ahead of her. But what was her joy on reaching the crest to see him quietly drinking out of a little stream at the bottom.
“He has his back to me, so I will just creep up and surprise him,” she said to herself with joy in her heart that she had found him so soon, “and never, no, never will I leave him again of my own accord.”
After drinking all he cared to, Billy waded out into the middle of the stream where the water was deep, to let it wash over his back to clean his long hair. He was so busy with his bath that the first he knew of her presence was when he saw a shadow in the water beside him.
Can you appreciate his surprise when he looked up and saw his little Nannie whom he had thought so far away standing beside him?
“Why, Nannie, my darling, how you surprised me! When I saw your shadow I thought you were some animal that had waded into the stream for a drink. Whatever brought you back? Oh, I don’t care what it was, so you are here, for I was so lonesome without you that I was about to turn back and coax you to come with us or stay behind myself.”
“Were you really, Billy? How nice! Now I know you will feel all right when I tell you I have decided to go with you and never be separated from you again if I can help it.”
“Have you really decided to do that, Nannie, and not just come to tell me something you forgot to say to me?”
“Indeed I never was more in earnest in my life! My fears are all gone, or rather they are as nothing to the lonesomeness I felt when I saw you going from me and I realized how long it might be before I saw you again.”
HE SUCCEEDED IN LIFTING THE BRIDE INTO A CROTCH
OF THE TREE, BUT BEFORE HE COULD CLIMB UP
THE BULL WAS UPON HIM.
“Hurrah! Hurrah for you, you sweet little wife of mine!” and Billy began to prance around in the water so he nearly drowned her.
“My, but this water feels good and cool to me after my long hot run to catch up with you,” said Nannie.
“Won’t Stubby and Button be surprised when they see you come trotting back with me?”
“Yes, and they will think I am the biggest goose that ever lived.”
“But a fine one at that, for both Stub and Button are very fond of you.”
After Billy and Nannie left them, Button said to Stubby: “Well, what shall we do with ourselves while waiting for Billy’s return?”
“I don’t know,” said Stubby, “but when I went over to that big barn you see the other side of the road, looking for Nannie, I met the cutest, curliest Saint Bernard puppy you ever saw. I guess I will go back and play with it awhile. And by the way, Button, I saw a spotted cat over there too, so you better come along with me and probably we can manage to pass away the time happily until Billy’s return and get a good square meal or two besides.”
When they came within a short distance of the big barn they saw the haymow door was open and on the ledge basking in the sun lay the spotted cat Stubby had seen when he was there before. She seemed to be eating something nice and juicy. “It must be a mouse,” thought Button. When he got right under the door, he meowed: “Good-morning, Mrs. Spot!”
This so surprised the cat that she let fall from her mouth what she was eating and it fell at Button’s feet and he discovered immediately that it was the head of a squab.
“Excuse me,” meowed Button, “I did not mean to startle you. I thought you had seen me coming. Wait a minute and I will bring up to you this delicious morsel you have just dropped.”
Not to be outdone in politeness, the spotted cat meowed back:
“Oh, no! Don’t trouble yourself to bring it back. I have plenty more and if you would care to have some and will come up here, I can give you all you can eat.”
“I am sure that sounds most alluring. I’ll be right up if you will tell me how to get there.”
“Wait a minute and I will come down and show you the way.” And before Button expected her, the spotted cat crawled out of a hole from under the barn. Just then the cat saw Stubby for the first time and not knowing he was with Button, he spit and flew at him in a rage and would have scratched his eyes out before Stubby could have defended himself had not Button meowed:
“Don’t touch him. He is my friend and won’t hurt you. He only came over to visit the little puppy while I talked to you.”
The spotted cat apologized most profusely and invited Stubby to join them at their feast of squab up in the hayloft. But when Stubby tried to squeeze through the hole under the barn he could not, so he was forced to stay outside with thoughts of having a whole squab dropped down to him from the loft.
“But how comes it that you have so many squabs to eat at one time?” asked Button.
“It happened in this way. As you know, there is going to be a wedding here this afternoon and these squabs were raised to serve at the wedding feast. But the boxes their nests were made in, up in the pigeon loft just over our heads, broke loose and spilled out all the young squabs and no one knows it but me and the mother pigeons. Haven’t you observed how excited the old pigeons are and how they keep flying in and out of the loft looking for their babies? My, but there will be a terrible commotion at the house when they discover that the squabs are gone. So come ahead and follow me. We must hurry and eat our fill before the people at the house discover their loss.”