CHAPTER III.
A VERY WIDE LAKE

"This is the coolest place there is in the house," remarked Ned, as he looked around the library that hot June afternoon. "Grandmother and the rest of them have gone out to the Sewing Society. What a fuss they made! As if a bit of a swim could hurt me!"

The shelves and cases were crowded with books, and at first he did nothing but lie in a big wickerwork chair, and stare at them.

"No," he said, aloud, "I won't do any reading, not in such a sweltering day as this is. I can get out that Norway book, though, and look at the pictures."

He pulled it out, and lugged it to the table, with a strong impression upon his mind that it was a book to be carried around in January rather than in June.

"It never will be a popular book for boys," he remarked of it. "Not for small boys."

Open it came, and he began with a study of the abundant illustrations. They were fine, and they stirred him up, by degrees, until he began to feel a growing interest in the reading matter scattered along among them. It was all in large type, so that the pages might be conquered easily, one after another. Before long he found himself entirely absorbed in the narrative of the old Norse times.

"Curious lot of men they were," he remarked, "those Vikings. How they did seem to enjoy killing their enemies and cutting each other's heads off! They'd steal anything, too. Tell you what, though, if I'd been wearing one o' their coats of mail when Nanny pitched me into the lake, I'd ha' gone to the bottom like a stone. I wonder if any of 'em could swim in their armour? I don't believe they could. Most likely they took it off if they were going to be wrecked anywhere. A fellow in a steel shirt ought to have some life-preservers handy."

More and more intense became his interest as he went on, and at about tea-time his grandfather came in.

"What, Ned?" asked the old gentleman. "Are you at it yet? That's all right, but I can't let you do too much of it. You must spend all the time you can in the open air. You may read this evening, but to-morrow morning you must go fishing. You may take a book with you."

"I'll take along this one, then," said Ned. "I can read between bites."

"That's what I do sometimes," said his grandfather. "I think it averages about two books to each fish, but a pike pulled a dictionary overboard for me, once."

"What did he want of a dictionary?" asked Ned. "Did you hook him?"

"Yes, I pulled him in," said the old gentleman, "but the book went out of sight. It's going to be too warm for trolling for pike."

"I guess so," said Ned. "I'm going to find some grasshoppers."

"They're the right bait," said Grandfather Webb. "Better than worms. The lake is full of bullheads. So is the wide, wide world. I've been out there, just now, talking to one of 'em. He's an Englishman. He's been beating me out of ten dollars, and he won't understand my explanation of it. He insists on keeping the ten."

"That's like 'em," said Ned. "I'd like to conquer England. Uncle Jack says that if I did they'd lock me up in the station-house."

"That's what they'd do," said his grandfather. "Anybody that invaded England would be arrested at once. They'd convict him, too, and make him buy something of 'em."

"I don't care," said Ned, "I'm going there, some day. It's about the greatest country in the world. I'm going to see London, and the forts, and the ships. The English soldiers and sailors can fight like anything. They can whip anybody but Americans."

"Come to supper!" commanded his grandfather; "then you may go on with your book. I'm afraid, though, that if you were in command of the Kentucky you'd try to steam her all over England, across lots, without minding the fences."

At the supper-table Ned was compelled to hear quite a number of remarks about swimming in Green Lake.

"He'd better try that colt in a buggy, next time," said Mrs. Emmons. "She's skittish."

"She likes a buggy," remarked Uncle Jack. "Pat lent her to one of his best friends, last week, to drive her a mile or so for exercise. She didn't stop short of Centreville Four Corners. The buggy's there, now, in the wagon-shop getting mended, and Nanny came home alone, quiet as a lamb."

"I guess Edward may drive one of the other horses," said his grandmother. "Pat'll pick out a quiet one."

"I'd want a buggy, or something," said Ned, "if I was to take that big book of grandfather's with me. I never saw such pictures, though. Loads of 'em."

"Read it! Read it!" said his grandfather. "When you get through with it, you'll know more'n you do now."

They let him alone after that, and talked of other affairs. He was quite willing to keep still, and he got away from the table before anybody else. There was a growing fever upon him to dive into that folio and to find out how the story fitted the pictures. No one happened to go into the library until about eleven o'clock, and he was there alone. Then old Mrs. Emmons herself was hunting everywhere for a ball of yarn she had lost, and she tried the library. Ned was not reading when she came in. He was lying stretched half-way across the table, sound asleep, with his head on the open book, and the cat curled up beside it.

"I had to shake him awake," she reported afterward, "and the cat followed him when he went up-stairs to his room."

Nevertheless, he was awake again not long after sunrise, next morning, and hurried out on a bait hunt. Before breakfast he had done well as to angleworms, but not so well as to grasshoppers. Of these he had captured only six, shutting them up in a little tin match-box.

"Now, then," said his grandfather, when they came out of the house together, after breakfast, "here's your rod. Three good lines. Plenty of hooks and sinkers. The boat's down there at the landing."

"I saw it when I swam ashore," said Ned. "It's a scow-punt and it isn't much bigger'n a wash-tub."

"It's better than it looks," replied the old gentleman. "I saw four men in it once, and they went half-way across the lake before it upset with them."

"Did any of 'em get drowned?" asked Ned.

"No," said Mr. Webb, "not more'n half drowned. I was out in another boat with Pat McCarty, trolling, and we fished in all four of 'em. You needn't get upset unless you try to carry Nanny or some of the boys. I'd rather you'd not have any company. Safer!"

"I don't want any of 'em along," said Ned. "I'd rather be alone. Then I can read while I'm waiting for fish. You said I could take that big book."

"All right, you may," said his grandfather. "Put it into your bait-box. Be sure you bring it home with you."

Away went Ned, and his grandfather turned back into the house, laughing.

"He'll think twice," he said, "before he lugs that folio to Green Lake, this hot day. He won't take it."

He was only half right, for Ned had already thought twice, at least, and had decided what to do.

He had found a small, lightly made garden hand-cart, two-wheeled, and when he set out for Green Lake all his baggage was in the cart, including the book, the angleworms, and the grasshoppers. He succeeded in getting away quietly, too, without giving Pat or anybody else a chance to ask him if he expected to need a wagon to bring home his fish.

It was getting very warm before he was half a mile from the house, for June days always grow warmer, rapidly, if you are shoving a hand-cart.

"It was a good lift to get the book in," thought Ned. "I wish I'd greased the wheels."

The boat lay idly at the shore when he reached the landing-place. A pair of oars lay in it, but he saw also something which pleased him much more.

"Mast and sail!" he shouted. "Who'd ha' thought of that! Hurrah!"

There they lay, a short mast, truly, and a mere rag of sail, with a boom and sprit all ready for use.

"I know how," thought Ned. "I can step the mast and hoist the sail, myself. Then I can tack all over the lake, without any hard work a-rowing."

His first undertaking, however, was to get his huge folio volume into the boat and not into the water. He succeeded perfectly, with some effort. Then he stepped his bit of a mainmast, as he called it, through the hole bored for it in the forward seat of the punt. It was plain that he knew something about naval affairs, for he spoke of his snub-nosed cruiser as a "catboat," and regretted that she had no "tiller."

"She hasn't any anchor, either," he said, "except a rope and a crooked stone. She has a keel, though, and there are thole-pins in her bulwarks, starboard and port. She's higher at the stern than she is at the prow, and I'm afraid she'd be a little cranky in a ten-knot breeze. She isn't ballasted to speak of, and I'd better keep her well before the wind. That's a little nor'west by north, just now."

However that might be, he pushed his gallant bark out from the shore, sitting in the stern, and shoving the land away with the rudder, – that is to say, with one of the oars.

The sail was already up, but it was a question to be answered how he could have told the direction from which the wind was coming or where it was going. To any ordinary observer, not an old salt nor the commander of a line-of-battle ironclad, it looked as if the wind had not yet reached Green Lake. It had very likely paused somewhere, in the village or over among the woods.

"I'll have to row at first," he remarked. "I think I can see a ripple out yonder. Where there's a ripple, there's wind, or it may have been made by that pickerel when he jumped out after something. If he'll bite, I'll pull him in."

Rowing is, after all, easy enough work when there is no hurry and the boat is nearly empty. Ned pulled gently on his oars, and the boom and sail swung to and fro as she slipped along. Pretty soon she reached and went through the ripple made by the pickerel, leaving behind her others that were larger, but which did not indicate wind.

"I'd give something for a catspaw," he said, remembering another nautical term. "I needn't furl the mainsail. She can drift to looard, if she wants to, while I try for some fish. If it's true that this lake hasn't any bottom, it won't pay to cast anchor. There isn't cable enough in that coil to do any good."

He ceased rowing. He put his joint rod together, and fitted on his reel, ready for sport. The bait question was decided against worms and in favour of grasshoppers, with regret that he had so few.

"Now," he said, "I don't much care whether it's to be a bass or a pickerel."

No choice was given him, for in only a minute or so more a handsome yellow perch came over the side of the boat to account for one grasshopper.

"That fellow'll weigh a pound, more or less," he said. "I don't want any pumpkinseeds, though."

That, however, was the kind of fish he pulled in next. Shortly afterward he had the usual unpleasantness belonging to the unhooking of a large, fat, slippery-skinned bullhead. He was really making a very good beginning indeed, considering what was the established reputation of Green Lake.

"Uncle Jack said it was fished out," he said to himself. "I guess there are more shiners and pumpkinseeds than anything else. Hullo! Here comes a big one!"

What seemed to be a tremendous tug at his hook held on vigorously as he hauled in his line. The excitement of that strong bite made him tingle all over.

"Pickerel!" he shouted. "Or a big bass, or maybe it's a pike or a lake trout. What will Uncle Jack say, now?"

In a few moments more he was sadly replying, on behalf of his uncle, "Nothing but a cod-lamper eel!"

Soaked bush branches and pond weed are hard to pull in, and they are good for nothing in a frying-pan. A fisherman's gloomiest disappointments come to him in the landing of them.

Another grasshopper was put on, and another cast was made. The bullhead flopped discontentedly on the bottom of the boat. So did the perch, now and then, but there were no other signs of fish life during the next half-hour, with the sun all the while growing hotter.

"I'll stick my rod," thought Ned, "and throw out another line, with a worm. Then I'll read till I get a bite. I think it's coming on to blow a little. I can see signs of weather."

So he could, really. Hardly were his two hooks and lines in the water before what some people romantically term a zephyr came gently breathing along the placid lake. It soon grew even strong enough to make itself felt by the drooping sail, but Ned remarked, as he lifted his eyes from his book illustrations:

"That canvas doesn't bend worth a cent. I needn't take in any reef just now. Let her spin along. Hullo! The boat's beginning to move!"

He felt more and more sure of that while he again bent over the folio, opened out upon the middle seat, with an old starch box behind it for his accommodation. The breeze had come, what there was of it, but he shortly forgot all about winds and fishing, while he turned page after page of that book, and took in more and more of the meaning of the pictures. The sail was now filled well. There were larger and larger wavelets on the lake, but there came no fish-bites to interrupt Ned's reading. He had no idea for how long a time he had been sailing on, without noticing anything whatever around him. At last, however, the wind grew strong enough to turn one of his book-leaves for him, and he once more raised his head.

"I declare!" he exclaimed. "This bit of a gale is freshening. I'll haul on the main sheet, and bring her head to the wind. She's leaning over a little too much. If a gust or a squall should come on, she might turn turtle."

He evidently knew what it was best to do under such circumstances, and his next exclamation was uttered with even stronger emphasis. He was, of course, doing something in the steering line with his paddle-rudder, and he had taken occasion to look back along the wake of his dashing scow.

"What's this? Who ever knew that Green Lake was so wide? I can't see the other shore, toward our house. There isn't another boat in sight, either. If I expect to get home to-night, it's about time I went about, and headed southerly. This is a curious piece of business. I'll take in my lines, right away."

He shut up his book at once. There was even an anxious tone in his voice, and an exceedingly puzzled look upon his face. It was such, perhaps, as the captain of a line-of-battle-ship might wear upon finding his huge fighting machine in unknown or difficult navigation. Any experienced nautical man would have been able to comprehend Ned's unpleasant situation. That is, perhaps so, if it had been at all possible to know what was the precise nature of the circumstances.

The lines came in fast enough and Ned knew how to tack, if that were indeed the correct thing for him to do next. Now, however, came a second discovery, almost as perplexing as the first. Behind him was a wide waste of water without a visible shore, but he was by no means out of sight of land when he turned to look ahead. The northerly shore of the lake was near, and it was rapidly drawing nearer.

"This is tremendous!" he remarked, and he took a tin cup out of his tackle-box, expressing a hope that the lake water might not prove too warm to drink.

He leaned over the side of the boat, still gazing shoreward, scooped the cup full, and began to drink like a very thirsty fellow.

"Faugh! Phew!" he suddenly sputtered, and a vigorous, choking, coughing spell followed. "What's this? Salt water? How did Green Lake get salted!"

He tasted again, as if to make sure, and then he looked around him utterly bewildered. The shore was all the while drawing nearer, and the water in his cup was of the peculiar brackish flavour that belongs to the great seas.

"Mountains?" he murmured. "I knew there were high hills over this way, but I never was told of anything like this. Right along shore, too. Why, that cliff there's as high as a church steeple. Higher. That's an eagle, too, circling around over the top of it."

Was one side of Green Lake salt and the other fresh, or had it in some mysterious way broken through and become connected with the Atlantic? It even occurred to him to wonder, vaguely, if the lake had joined the ocean in such a way that ships, the Kentucky, for instance, could ever come steaming in, firing salutes and astonishing all the country people. His head was all a buzz of perplexing questions, but he managed to keep hold of his rudder, and speed onward toward the land. In fact, the wind was now very good, and the punt was running rapidly.

"Yonder," he remarked aloud, "is the mouth of a kind of inlet. Those cliffs on each side of it are awful. They're almost perpendicular. It makes a fellow think of some of those pictures of Norway fiords, in the book. The best thing I can do is to steer right in and find out what it is. Tell you what, though, I've sailed farther than I'd any idea of."

He still had some distance to go before reaching the opening between the tall cliffs, and his eyes were busy. He tried the water yet again, curiously.

"I know what sea water is," he thought. "I tried it once, out in New York Bay. This tastes salter than that did. Hullo! Those are porpoises, tumbling around out yonder. I've seen porpoises before, off Long Island, when I went bluefishing with Uncle Jack. I wish he were here to tell me what all this amounts to. He knows a heap."

Perfectly stupendous were those beetling promontories between which the boat sailed in. They must have been several hundreds of feet in height. Here and there, in the clefts and crevices of their rugged sides and along their summits, grew gigantic pines and fir-trees.

"I'll put away the book," he said, "in the locker under the back seat. I'm going ashore. I want to find somebody that can tell me what this means. I won't go home till I know all about it. This isn't any kind of cove, though. It runs away in."

So it did, narrow and deep, and it wound around a rock corner, shortly, so that all view of Green Lake behind him was cut off. It was almost cool in there, as well as shadowy, and Ned felt a kind of shudder going over him. He was not exactly afraid, but his heart was beating more quickly than usual. He had put away the folio with great care, and all of its four hundred and seventy-five splendid illustrations seemed to be running through his memory like a river in a flood-time, after a rousing rain-storm.

"There!" he exclaimed, at last. "There's a landing-place! I can see boats and men and women. Away off yonder, up the slope, houses enough for a village. Hullo! That's a ship at anchor."

Beyond the village, as far as his eyes could search, were more mountains, covered half-way up with forests, but right here before him the fiord widened so as to make a small cliff-guarded harbour of the safest kind. It was really a very beautiful place to visit, if Ned had been at all able, just then, to admire scenery.

"Who would have thought," he exclaimed, "that a fellow could get to such a thing as this is, just by crossing Green Lake!"