The Blue Herring Mystery (8 page)

“Ironwood, or hickory,” said Mr. Boots. “You got to have somethin’ that is tough and pliable and that you can season. Then,” he added, “we take the other end of the bows — you notice how they’re tapered — and fit ’em into the holes on the lower end of the block — that’s pine — makes the net lighter an’ easier to handle.”

After he had inserted the tapered ends of the bows into the block, the net sagged a trifle, but was taut along the edges. He then took the long fourteen-foot pole that was also notched at one end and took two turns around the notched end of the pole with a length of sturdy rope. The ends of the rope he ran through the three-eighths-inch hole in the top of the block, lashing the long pole to the block, but leaving about six inches of play between the top of the block and the pole.

“What do you call that long pole?” Djuna asked, as Mr. Boots directed him to hold the block and the end of the pole while he lashed them together — and yet six inches apart.

“That’s called a ‘hoister,’” said Mr. Boots. “It’s made of basswood, so it ain’t too heavy, an’ yet it’s mighty tough an’ sturdy. Naow,” he went on, as he lifted the cumbersome net and moved toward the edge of the water, “I got to get a ‘stool.’”

“What’s that?” Djuna and Bobby said in chorus.

“I don’t know where th’ word c’m fr’m,” Mr. Boots said. He put the net down for a moment and pulled up the long hip boots he was wearing. Then he waded out into the stream a few feet and lowered the net into the water. Only the block and the tops of the bows, on one of which was fastened the metal scapping license that was always supposed to be out of water, could be seen. In a moment Mr. Boots lifted the net, with the long hoister firmly placed between his legs, and there was a single herring flapping in the net.

“That,” Mr. Boots said, as he waded ashore, put the net down on the pebbles and took the herring out of the net, “is our stool, or lure. It’s a roe, which means it’s a female an’ full of eggs. Now, get me that other long pole, Djuna, the bamboo one; an’ you better pull up your boots now, because you’ve got to work the stool.”

Djuna quickly got the bamboo pole, which had about three feet of fishing line dangling from the end. On the end of the line was a little loop, and fastened to the loop was a safety pin.

Mr. Boots took the eight-inch herring, with its opalescent sides and silver belly flashing in the sunlight, unclasped the safety pin and ran it gently through the nose of the herring, and then secured the safety pin again. An instant later he put the herring back in the water.

“Naow,” Mr. Boots said. “I want you, Djuna, t’ wade out here about three feet an’ hold this pole. Leave the herrin’ in the water, just as though you’d caught him an’ didn’t want t’ pull him in — only, I guess, it’s
her
in this case — until I get my net set.”

Djuna waded out into the stream, holding the long bamboo pole, while Mr. Boots lifted the scapping net by the hoister and put it in the creek, in virtually the same position it had been in before.

“Okay,” said Mr. Boots. “Now, move th’ pole toward the net, kinda slow like, until it’s right over the net.”

Djuna, trembling all over, followed Mr. Boots’s instructions. When the end of the bamboo pole was over the net, between the bows, Mr. Boots wrapped his hands more $$ around the long hoister and brought the net to the surface.

In the bottom of the net, their beautiful scales gleaming with different colors in the sunlight, were a dozen herring, wriggling and jumping!

Both Djuna and Bobby gasped with astonishment, and then they let out a cheer that bounced off the high cliff across the stream and went echoing up the valley.

“You see,” Mr. Boots said, and anyone could have told that he was pretty pleased, too, “the stool is what does it.”

“How?” asked Bobby.

“Why?” asked Djuna at the same time.

“Well,” said Mr. Boots, “a ‘buck,’ that’s a male fish, will always follow a roe. You put that roe in there and lead it over to the net and a buck and maybe fifty or sixty other fish’ll follow it from the shoal going upstream. When they get over the net you h’ist it an’ you gottem!”

“Golly, I didn’t know they were such
beautiful
fish,” Bobby said as he helped Mr. Boots transfer the herring from the net to the bushel basket they had brought.

“Oh, they are, they are,” said Mr. Boots. “Folks use their scales to make artificial pearls, did ye know that? Notice all them diff’rent colors along their sides?”

“It seems a shame to eat’m,” Djuna said as he held a herring in his hand and admired the opalescent beauty of its sides.

“That’s what they was put here f’r, I guess,” said Mr. Boots philosophically. “Now let’s get busy an’ fill up this bushel basket and then I got t’ be gittin’ back home. Wanted to show you boys how scappin’ is done, but I got to help Mr. Pindler do a little work over at his store this evenin’.”

“Oh, sure,” the boys said and Djuna moved out into the stream with his stool again while Mr. Boots lowered his net and got ready to hoist as Djuna played the stool back. They got nearly two dozen of the shining little beauties this time, running from six to ten inches in length.

“You know,” Mr. Boots said, while they were taking the herring out of the net and putting them in the basket, “they sell a lot of the
littler
herrin’ as sardines. Of course, a sardine is one of the herrin’ family, but a small herrin’
ain’t
a sardine. I done quite a lot a readin’ on the matter at one time ’n another.”

A half dozen groups, with two or three men in each, had arrived at the scapping grounds by now and their shouts and laughter rolled off the cliff across the Kill and echoed up the stream.

And as the tide was now high it seemed that there were millions of herring in the shoals, going upstream into the rapids. They filled the stream from bank to bank and Bobby was picking them out of the water with his hands, they were so thick. They could see the blue backs along the surface of the water; now and again a silver streak would shoot high in the air, a fish jumping clear out of the water.

“W’al,” said Mr. Boots when their bushel basket was filled to overflowing, “I guess it’s time to call it a day, boys. You had enough?”

“‘Enough’?” Bobby groaned. “I don’t think I could
ever
get enough! But I guess we had better stop, because we don’t have any place to put any more. I wouldn’t have missed this for anything in the world! We
can
come back again, can’t we, Mr. Boots?”

“Surest thing you know!” Mr. Boots promised. “Everybody will be here next Thursday, Scapping Day. We’ll come over then, if we don’t get here before. That’s quite a day around these parts!”

He took the net apart with sure deft hands and lashed all of the parts together with the rope he had used to lash the block to the hoister. Djuna and Bobby carried the bushel of glistening herring up the steep incline to the parking place, while Mr. Boots carried the net.

Twenty minutes later Mr. Boots pulled up in front of Miss Annie’s house and said, “Tell Miss Annie I’ll pack these herrin’ down in brine an’ later on I’ll smoke ’em and marinate some an’ give ’em to her.”

“Thanks, Mr. Boots,” they said in chorus. “It — it was a swell afternoon!”

“Glad you had a nice time, boys,” Mr. Boots said with a smile and shoved his truck into gear.

Miss Annie had evidently gone calling during their absence, because she did not answer their shouts. As soon as Djuna was sure that she was not at home, he turned to Bobby and said, suddenly, “You know all about the Bible. How can I find out what book of the Bible Captain Jonas meant when he wrote ‘Chapter 13, Verse 46,’ in his log?”

“Jeepers, what do you want to know
that
for?” Bobby asked.

“I’ve been thinking about it ever since this morning,” Djuna said slowly. “I’m not sure
why
I want to know, though.”

“Well,” Bobby said, thoughtfully, “if Miss Annie has a cy — cyclo — cyclopedic concor — concordance — jeepers, that’s hard to say — in the back of her Bible we might be able to find it.”

“I don’t know whether her Bible has that in it or not,” Djuna said. “It’s in here, in the parlor. Come on in and look.”

They went into the parlor. Djuna took Miss Annie’s well-thumbed Bible from a shelf under the table and handed it to Bobby. In just a moment Bobby exclaimed, “Sure, it has! But you have to have a subject. Is there anything special that you think might fit the verses?”

“Pearls!” Djuna said promptly. “At least, let’s try that.”

Bobby hastily turned the pages of the cyclopedic concordance in the back of Miss Annie’s Bible until he came to the P’s and then leafed along slowly until he found the word
pearl
. A moment later he gasped.

“Here!” he said, “‘Pearl, parable of, Matthew, 13, 45.’ That’s it, Djuna, the first book in the New Testament! Matthew, thirteenth chapter, forty-fifth verse!”

He hurriedly turned to the index at the front of the book and found the number of the page on which St. Matthew began. He hastily found it and then turned to Chapter 13. An instant later he said, breathlessly, “Here’s verse 46! It’s about a merchant, ‘Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it.’”

Bobby looked up at Djuna in utter bewilderment and whispered, “How did you know?”

“I didn’t,” Djuna said. “I just guessed. It said in Captain Jonas’s log that he exchanged all his trade-goods for two little baskets; and then Aunt Candy told us about the old story that he had brought back a fortune in pearls. And, don’t you see, that’s what Captain Jonas really was, you know — a merchant! Leastways, a whaling ship was really a merchant ship, and he was a merchant mariner!”

“That’s what he must have done!” Bobby whispered. “Bought pearls from some native chief with his trade-goods! But what happened to them?”

“I don’t know,” said Djuna, looking very puzzled and very unhappy. “There’s something funny going on around here, Bobby. I promised Miss Annie I wouldn’t get mixed up in anything, but I couldn’t help it. And now I’ve got
you
mixed up in it, too! I — I —”

“Golly, don’t mind
me!
” Bobby said, whispering again. “It looks to me as though we were going to have a wonderful time!”

A
MOMENT LATER
the two boys heard the kitchen door open and Miss Annie’s cheerful voice called, “Yoo hoo! Are you home?”

Djuna put one finger over his lips to warn Bobby and then quickly slipped Miss Annie’s Bible back on the shelf where she always kept it. “We’re in here, Miss Annie,” he called.

“I do declare!” Miss Annie said as she appeared in the doorway, and Djuna rose, respectfully, from the chair in which he was sitting. Bobby was already standing. “I went over to Ned Pindler’s store to get a couple of things almost an hour ago. It only took me a few minutes to get them, but just when I was leaving, Grace, Ned’s wife, came down the stairs from the apartment over the store where they live and she —”

“Pounced on you and talked your ear off!” Djuna interrupted to say.

“That’s just what she did!” Miss Annie said with a sigh. “I like Grace. She’s a sweet, generous person,
but
how she can talk! Why, she never even seems to take a breath. She told me everything about everyone within fifteen miles of here. You just can’t get away from her! She’s an awful gossip, but I will say she isn’t malicious.” Miss Annie paused and then said, “I’m going to get supper ready right away, and I’ve got a surprise for you!”

“Oh, boy!” Bobby said, and licked his lips.

Miss Annie went back into the kitchen and the boys followed her and went up the stairs to their room. Djuna closed the door carefully after them and they sat down on their cots, facing each other.

“Golly!” Bobby said with admiration shining in his eyes, “I still don’t see how you figured out about looking up pearls, to find the book in the Bible that fitted that chapter and verse!”

“It was only logi — logical,” Djuna stammered, and he didn’t look at all happy.

“But think of all the other people who have looked at that logbook and must have heard the story about the pearls Captain Jonas brought back from the South Seas,” Bobby said. “None of
them
ever figured it out.”

“Maybe they did,” Djuna said, “but it didn’t do them any good, because they couldn’t find the pearls.”

“Do you think he did bring back some pearls?” Bobby asked eagerly.

“Jeepers, I don’t know,” Djuna confessed, and added in a warning whisper, “Keep your voice down so that Miss Annie doesn’t hear us. She’d skin me alive if she knew I was getting mixed up in something again. She warned me yesterday, before you got here, to mind my P’s and Q’s and not get you tangled up in something.”

“Golly,
we
haven’t done anything!” Bobby said. “You said you thought there was something funny going on around here. What made you say that?”

Djuna looked at Bobby unhappily for a moment. Whatever happened, Bobby was his guest and he
mustn’t
let him be exposed to anything that might be dangerous! He knew that Bobby’s father and mother and Miss Annie would never forgive him if he did.

“I don’t exactly know what I do mean,” Djuna said. “But cross your heart and hope to die, you won’t tell anyone?”

“I do,” Bobby said solemnly.

“Well, first,” Djuna said, his brown eyes gleaming, “you remember yesterday, when Mr. Boots took us to see Professor Kloop and he was so long in answering our knock? Remember Kloop said that he came
up
from the cellar, when we
knew
he came
down
from upstairs? Of course, that doesn’t amount to anything. He may have forgotten where he did come from. At least, that’s the way I figured it out yesterday.

“But this morning, when we went over to Aunt Candy’s — you didn’t notice it — I saw Professor Kloop coming out of Aunt Candy’s front room, right after we put our bikes against the shed and were looking at the barns. I just happened to turn my head and see him come out. I looked away quick, so he wouldn’t know I’d seen him, and out of the corner of my eye I saw him lock the door and put the key in his pocket!”