CHAPTER XII
OLD SAM TO THE RESCUE
As Bob stood there, desperately casting about in his mind for some way to help poor Ben, now up to his armpits in the black mud, he heard, or fancied he heard, a twig snap in the forest. Did that sound exist only in his imagination, or had he really heard it? While he was still in doubt, the underbrush parted, and he saw the best sight in the world for him just then. There, framed by the bushes, was the picturesque figure of Old Sam, the snake hunter, and in his hand he held his two-pronged snake pole.
At a glance he took in the situation and, springing forward lightly, extended the pole to Ben.
“Ketch a hold o’ the pole, an’ hang on to it, lad, an’ I’ll pull ye out! Got a good grip? That’s right—now steady! Never mind! Ye’ll keep it next time,” as the pole slipped from Ben’s nerveless fingers, and let him down a little deeper in the muck.
“Here, lad,” he said to Bob, “ketch on to this here and help me pull!” Then encouragingly to Ben, “Now ye got it? Hang on tight this time! Good boy! Now once more—steady—steady! Ye’re comin’, boy, ye’re comin’! Hang on another minnit and ye’ll be on solid groun’! Steady! Now—steady! There ye be!” he cried, exultingly, as they landed poor Ben, mud from head to foot, on the soft, dry grass, where he lay exhausted.
“It’s durn good I happened ’long jest as I did,” Old Sam hurried on to keep the boys from thanking him. “I nearly turned down t’other road for the village, but I sez to myself, ‘Sam, old boy, p’raps ye may meet some o’ them camp boys if ye goes by this here road,’ and so jest on the chanct o’ meetin’ ye, I come this way. I never reckoned I’d meet ye the way I done, though,” he added, chuckling to himself.
Here Ben, who had been trying desperately during this monologue to get a word in, thanked the old man heartily for the great service he had done him.
“I surely would have gone under in another minute if you hadn’t come along!” he said. “I never was so glad of anything in my life as I was to see you standing there with your long pole. I really don’t know how to thank you!”
“Tut, tut,” said old Sam, who always hated to be thanked for his kind deeds. “’Twan’t nothin’ ’t all! No more’n any Christian would hev done ef he’d found a friend o’ his’n in a tight place. I reckon ye must feel durned sticky with that there mud all over ye, lad,” he added, to change the subject. “S’pose ye come up to my cabin—’taint so very far from here, and scrape some o’ it off.”
The boys readily consented, for they had learned to think a lot of this quaint old man of the woods. Therefore, as soon as Ben had recovered his strength and felt rested enough, the three started out for Sam’s cabin. In a very short time they came upon the little place nestling in the very heart of the forest.
Sam told Bob to make himself comfortable while he took Ben around to a brook that ran back of the cabin and told him that if he wanted to take a plunge, he (Sam) would scrape the muck off his suit. And soon Ben, wonderfully refreshed by his dip in the cold water, and wearing his khaki suit, from which Old Sam had scraped the worst of the mud, came around the corner of the cabin and joined Bob.
The two Scouts were in a very subdued mood. The terrible experience they had just passed through brought with it a reaction. There was something very restful and soothing in sitting on the grass, with their backs against a log, while Old Sam moved cheerily around inside the little cabin, frying bacon and eggs.
When everything was ready, Sam called them and seated them in two very comfortable chairs of his own making.
“Aye,” said the old man, as he began serving the simple meal, “there’s been many footsteps leadin’ up to them bogs as has never come out o’ them. I remember once, when I was only a young feller, how two o’ the ugliest villains I ever see got their deserts. Ye see, these here rascals was tryin’ to steal some pow’ful val’ble trees here’bouts. They had it all fixed up fine how they were goin’ to git away with ’em. Wall, they wuz hard to work one night loadin’ the logs on a wagon so’s they could get ’em away before mornin’, when all a sudden they hears a voice and, lookin’ up, sees two great big, green eyes a glarin’ right at ’em. With a yell they runs off through the woods as fast as their legs could carry ’em, and never stops to look where they’s goin’. All a sudden, the first man slips an’ falls, ketchin’ hold o’ t’other and draggin’ him with him. With a blood-curdlin’ cry, they found they was bein’ pulled under. In a little while there was nothin’ to show they’d been there, ’ceptin’ their footprints leadin’ up to the edge o’ the bog. Me and a friend o’ mine was jest in time to see the last o’ ’em disappear.”
The boys had listened in horrified silence to this story and, as Old Sam stopped, Bob broke in breathlessly to ask, “But where did the green eyes come from?”
“Why, seems them belonged to a bobcat,” Old Sam began, but was again interrupted, this time by Ben.
“A bobcat?” he exclaimed. “I’ve heard there are some around here, but I haven’t seen any yet.”
“Waal, ye will! They ain’t so pow’ful plentiful, but once in a while ye ketch sight o’ one. Me an’ me friend, after we seen the finish o’ the rascals, we went back to see what mischief they’d been up to, and then, all o’ a sudden, my friend sez, sez he, ‘Look a-there, Sam, I reckon that’s what skeered them durned thieves!’
“I looked where he wuz pintin’ an’ I see them terr’ble glarin’ eyes. I tell ye, lads, they made my hair jest raise itself right up on my head, an’ I hadn’t no guilty conscience, nuther! Wall, quick as a flash my friend, he up with his rifle an’ popped that there pesky crittur right through the eyes!”
Just then a menacing rattle came from one corner of the cabin that made the boys jump from their seats in alarm.
“Don’t be skeered!” Old Sam chuckled. “That there is one o’ my rattlers as is waitin’ fur the man to come an’ take ’em to the museem. If ye like, I’ll show ye my c’lection.”
On the boys expressing an earnest desire to see the collection, Old Sam led the way to a couple of glass-covered boxes that stood in a corner of the cabin. In each box were two snakes; in one two rattlers were writhing and twisting, and in the other two unusually large and beautifully marked copperheads were lodged.
As the boys pressed forward eagerly to examine them, one of the rattlesnakes coiled itself and gave forth an ominous warning. Instinctively the boys drew back with a shudder of repulsion.
“They’re awfully treacherous creatures—those snakes!” Bob remarked.
“Wall, yes, they be!” Old Sam drawled, “but they has one thing to recommend ’em, anyway. They always gives warnin’ afore they strikes, so ye kin get out o’ the way.”
“That’s so,” Ben agreed, then added, “Haven’t you ever been bitten, Sam?”
“Not yet,” he replied. “Come pretty nigh it, sometimes, though. Many a time I’ve found the critters hangin’ on to my boots. I had a cat once what used to ketch a pow’ful lot o’ snakes fur me. He could do it a durned sight better’n I could myself!”
“I never knew that cats could catch snakes,” said Bob, incredulously.
“Wall, that there one o’ mine could. Every day he used to go with me when I hunted the critters.”
“Tell us how he did it,” the two boys said in the same breath, and Sam, delighted by the interest they showed, willingly complied.
“Wall, it wuz this way,” he began. “Tommy—that wuz what I called him—would hunt around till he found a good big rattler. Then he’d creep on him on them soft paws o’ his’n, then all a sudden, when he wuz just in front o’ him, he’d make a little noise and hold up his paw. At the noise the snake would coil hisself up into a ball and rattle somethin’ turr’ble. But Tommy, he’d never stir an inch. That would make the reptile awful mad, and he’d strike out at that raised paw o’ Tommy’s with all the strength he had in him. That’s just what the cat had been countin’ on, an’ when the rattler struck, he would jump aside quick as lightnin’. Then when the snake would go past him, Tommy, he’d jump and land right on the critter’s neck, just below his head. Yes, he wuz great on ketchin’ snakes, old Tommy wuz!”
“What became of the cat?” Ben asked, eagerly.
“Why, he lived to be sixteen years old, Tommy did, and at the end o’ that time passed off quiet and peaceful like. He lived a happy life and a durn useful one, too, which is more’n you kin say fur most cats,” he added.
Although the boys would gladly have stayed longer with this old man who knew so many interesting tales, they knew Scout-Master Durland would be anxious about them. They urged Old Sam to go with them back to camp and stay to dinner, but he refused on the plea that the “museem man” was coming to take away “them durned reptiles,” and he had to be on hand to receive him.
“I’ll go with ye a little ways through the woods, though,” he said, “and see that ye don’t get stuck in no more bogs.”
So they started merrily for the camp. Old Sam’s bacon and strange stories had had a good effect on the two boys and they felt themselves again.
The snake hunter gave all the bogs a wide berth, and beguiled the way so pleasantly with his interesting talk that before they knew it they were almost on top of the camp.
Bob and Ben tried their best then to persuade Old Sam to go in with them, if only for a few minutes, but again he begged off, saying, “Ef I once git in there, lads, I couldn’t pull myself away, an’ then what would the poor museem man say?”
The boys didn’t know and didn’t care, but as they saw he could not be moved from his determination, they reluctantly let him go. Before they parted, however, the boys overwhelmed him with thanks and gratitude.
“Tut, tut!” he said, for the second time that day. “’Twan’t no more’n any Christian would hev done.”
But although this was true to some extent, the boys looked after his disappearing figure with no lessening of their respect and love. With a sigh they finally turned away and started toward camp once more.
In a few minutes they found themselves surrounded by the Scouts, who were greatly relieved to have the two runaways with them again.
“Where are those raspberries, Ben, that you were going to bring for the dumplings?” Dick cried.
Then Ben told the excited boys all about this mishap and how loyally Bob had come to his rescue. When he spoke of the snake hunter’s timely arrival and how he and Bob together had pulled him out of the bog, the Scouts sent up three cheers that set Don barking.
Reserving the snake hunter’s stories to tell around the campfire that night, Ben concluded: “I’m sorry, fellows, that I wasn’t able to get you those raspberries! My intentions were good, I assure you, but I was prevented by ‘circumstances over which I had no control,’ as contracts say.”
“Don’t you worry about that, Ben,” said Jack, “you look better to us than all the raspberry dumplings going!” and that he voiced the general feeling was shown by the boys’ hearty, “You bet your life!”