Chapter 16

“There is something weird about this whole proceeding,” I observed to the pretty stenographer next morning.

“These pies will be weird if you don’t stop talking to me,” she said, opening the doors of Professor Farrago’s portable camping-oven and peeping in at the fragrant pastry.

The professor had gone off somewhere into the woods early that morning. As he was not in the habit of talking to himself, the services of Miss Barrison were not required. Before he started, however, he came to her with a request for a dozen pies, the construction of which he asked if she understood. She had been to cooking-school in more prosperous days, and she mentioned it; so at his earnest solicitation she undertook to bake for him twelve apple-pies; and she was now attempting it, assisted by advice from me.

“Are they burned?” I asked, sniffing the air.

“No, they are not burned, Mr. Gilland, but my finger is,” she retorted, stepping back to examine the damage.

I offered sympathy and witch-hazel, but she would have none of my offerings, and presently returned to her pies.

“We can’t eat all that pastry,” I protested.

“Professor Farrago said they were not for us to eat,” she said, dusting each pie with powdered sugar.

“Well, what are they for? The dog? Or are they simply objets d’art to adorn the shanty—”

“You annoy me,” she said.

“The pies annoy me; won’t you tell me what they’re for?”

“I have a pretty fair idea what they’re for,” she observed, tossing her head. “Haven’t you?”

“No. What?”

“These pies are for bait.”

“To bait hooks with?” I exclaimed.

“Hooks! No, you silly man. They’re for baiting the cage. He means to trap these transparent creatures in a cage baited with pie.”

She laughed scornfully; inserted the burned tip of her finger in her mouth and stood looking at me defiantly like a flushed and bright-eyed school-girl.

“You think you’re teasing me,” she said; “but you do not realize what a singularly slow-minded young man you are.”

I stopped laughing. “How did you come to the conclusion that pies were to be used for such a purpose?” I asked.

“I deduce,” she observed, with an airy wave of her disengaged hand.

“Your deductions are weird—like everything else in this vicinity. Pies to catch invisible monsters? Pooh!”

“You’re not particularly complimentary, are you?” she said.

“Not particularly; but I could be, with you for my inspiration. I could even be enthusiastic—”

“About my pies?”

“No—about your eyes.”

“You are very frivolous—for a scientist,” she said, scornfully; “please subdue your enthusiasm and bring me some wood. This fire is almost out.”

When I had brought the wood, she presented me with a pail of hot water and pointed at the dishes on the breakfast-table.

“Never!” I cried, revolted.

“Then I suppose I must do them—”

She looked pensively at her scorched finger-tip, and, pursing up her red lips, blew a gentle breath to cool it.

“I’ll do the dishes,” I said.

Splashing and slushing the cups and saucers about in the hot water, I reflected upon the events of the last few days. The dog, stupefied by unwonted abundance of food, lay in the sunshine, sleeping the sleep of repletion; the pretty stenographer, all rosy from her culinary exertions, was removing the pies and setting them in neat rows to cool.

“There,” she said, with a sigh; “now I will dry the dishes for you ... You didn’t mention the fact, when you engaged me, that I was also expected to do general housework.”

“I didn’t engage you,” I said, maliciously; “you engaged me, you know.”

She regarded me disdainfully, nose uptilted.

“How thoroughly disagreeable you can be!” she said. “Dry your own dishes. I’m going for a stroll.”

“May I join—”

“You may not! I shall go so far that you cannot possibly discover me.”

I watched her forestward progress; she sauntered for about thirty yards along the lake and presently sat down in plain sight under a huge live-oak.

A few moments later I had completed my task as general bottle-washer, and I cast about for something to occupy me.

First I approached and politely caressed the satiated dog. He woke up, regarded me with dully meditative eyes, yawned, and went to sleep again. Never a flop of tail to indicate gratitude for blandishments, never the faintest symptom of canine appreciation.

Chilled by my reception, I moused about for a while, poking into boxes and bundles; then raised my head and inspected the landscape. Through the vista of trees the pink shirt-waist of the pretty stenographer glimmered like a rose blooming in the wilderness.

From whatever point I viewed the prospect that pink spot seemed to intrude; I turned my back and examined the jungle, but there it was repeated in a hundred pink blossoms among the massed thickets; I looked up into the tree-tops, where pink mosses spotted the palms; I looked out over the lake, and I saw it in my mind’s eye pinker than ever. It was certainly a case of pink-eye.

“I’ll go for a stroll, too; it’s a free country,” I muttered.

After I had strolled in a complete circle I found myself within three feet of a pink shirt-waist.

“I beg your pardon,” I said; “I had no inten—”

“I thought you were never coming,” she said, amiably.

“How is your finger?” I asked.

She held it up. I took it gingerly; it was smooth and faintly rosy at the tip.

“Does it hurt?” I inquired.

“Dreadfully. Your hands feel so cool—”

After a silence she said, “Thank you, that has cooled the burning.”

“I am determined,” said I, “to expel the fire from your finger if it takes hours and hours.” And I seated myself with that intention.

For a while she talked, making innocent observations concerning the tropical foliage surrounding us. Then silence crept in between us, accentuated by the brooding stillness of the forest.

“I am afraid your hands are growing tired,” she said, considerately.

I denied it.

Through the vista of palms we could see the lake, blue as a violet, sparkling with silvery sunshine. In the intense quiet the splash of leaping mullet sounded distinctly.

Once a tall crane stalked into view among the sedges; once an unseen alligator shook the silence with his deep, hollow roaring. Then the stillness of the wilderness grew more intense.

We had been sitting there for a long while without exchanging a word, dreamily watching the ripple of the azure water, when all at once there came a scurrying patter of feet through the forest, and, looking up, I beheld the hound-dog, tail between his legs, bearing down on us at lightning speed. I rose instantly.

“What is the matter with the dog?” cried the pretty stenographer. “Is he going mad, Mr. Gilland?”

“Something has scared him,” I exclaimed, as the dog, eyes like lighted candles, rushed frantically between my legs and buried his head in Miss Barrison’s lap.

“Poor doggy!” she said, smoothing the collapsed pup; “poor, p-oor little beast! Did anything scare him? Tell aunty all about it.”

When a dog flees without yelping he’s a badly frightened creature. I instinctively started back towards the camp whence the beast had fled, and before I had taken a dozen steps Miss Barrison was beside me, carrying the dog in her arms.

“I’ve an idea,” she said, under her breath.

“What?” I asked, keeping my eyes on the camp.

“It’s this: I’ll wager that we find those pies gone!”

“Pies gone?” I repeated, perplexed; “what makes you think—”

“They are gone!” she exclaimed. “Look!”

I gaped stupidly at the rough pine table where the pies had stood in three neat rows of four each. And then, in a moment, the purport of this robbery flashed upon my senses.

“The transparent creatures!” I gasped.

“Hush!” she whispered, clinging to the trembling dog in her arms.

I listened. I could hear nothing, see nothing, yet slowly I became convinced of the presence of something unseen—something in the forest close by, watching us out of invisible eyes.

A chill, settling along my spine, crept upward to my scalp, until every separate hair wiggled to the roots. Miss Barrison was pale, but perfectly calm and self-possessed.

“Let us go in-doors,” I said, as steadily as I could.

“Very well,” she replied.

I held the door open; she entered with the dog; I followed, closing and barring the door, and then took my station at the window, rifle in hand.

There was not a sound in the forest. Miss Barrison laid the dog on the floor and quietly picked up her pad and pencil. Presently she was deep in a report of the phenomena, her pencil flying, leaf after leaf from the pad fluttering to the floor.

Nor did I at the window change my position of scared alertness, until I was aware of her hand gently touching my elbow to attract my attention, and her soft voice at my ear—

“You don’t suppose by any chance that the dog ate those pies?”

I collected my tumultuous thoughts and turned to stare at the dog.

“Twelve pies, twelve inches each in diameter,” she reflected, musingly. “One dog, twenty inches in diameter. How many times will the pies go into the dog? Let me see.” She made a few figures on her pad, thought awhile, produced a tape-measure from her pocket, and, kneeling down, measured the dog.

“No,” she said, looking up at me, “he couldn’t contain them.”

Inspired by her coolness and perfect composure, I set the rifle in the corner and opened the door. Sunlight fell in bars through the quiet woods; nothing stirred on land or water save the great, yellow-striped butterflies that fluttered and soared and floated above the flowering thickets bordering the jungle.

The heat became intense; Miss Barrison went to her room to change her gown for a lighter one; I sat down under a live-oak, eyes and ears strained for any sign of our invisible neighbors.

When she emerged in the lightest and filmiest of summer gowns, she brought the camera with her; and for a while we took pictures of each other, until we had used up all but one film.

Desiring to possess a picture of Miss Barrison and myself seated together, I tied a string to the shutter-lever and attached the other end of the string to the dog, who had resumed his interrupted slumbers. At my whistle he jumped up nervously, snapping the lever, and the picture was taken.

With such innocent and harmless pastime we whiled away the afternoon. She made twelve more apple-pies. I mounted guard over them. And we were just beginning to feel a trifle uneasy about Professor Farrago, when he appeared, tramping sturdily through the forest, green umbrella and butterfly-net under one arm, shot-gun and cyanide-jar under the other, and his breast all criss-crossed with straps, from which dangled field-glasses, collecting-boxes, and botanizing-tins—an inspiring figure indeed—the embodied symbol of science indomitable, triumphant!

We hailed him with three guilty cheers; the dog woke up with a perfunctory bark—the first sound I had heard from him since he yelped his disapproval of me on the lagoon.

Miss Barrison produced three bowls full of boiling water and dropped three pellets of concentrated soup-meat into them, while I prepared coffee. And in a few moments our simple dinner was ready—the red ants had been dusted from the biscuits, the spiders chased off the baked beans, the scorpions shaken from the napkins, and we sat down at the rough, improvised table under the palms.

The professor gave us a brief but modest account of his short tour of exploration. He had brought back a new species of orchid, several undescribed beetles, and a pocketful of coontie seed. He appeared, however, to be tired and singularly depressed, and presently we learned why.