The Monkey That Would Not Kill

CHAPTER I

I suppose you thought the monkey I told you about before was dead. But my opinion is that he is still alive. At least, I am pretty sure it is the same monkey that I have now to tell you about, though I cannot be quite sure. In the first place this new monkey was very like Tricky, and in the second place it was a monkey that would not kill. Now, I never heard before of any monkey that would not kill except one, and that was Tricky.

Another thing that makes me think it is the same monkey, is that Tricky disappeared from the island where we saw him last. No one knows how it happened, but there was a coincidence about the time which I must relate. One morning a boat's crew landed on the island where Tricky lived with the lighthouse-keeper, to fill their water-kegs. The lighthouse-keeper was kind to them, for they were foreigners, and showed them all over the lighthouse, and when they got to the very top they found the monkey dusting the lamps just like a human being. The sailors were much astonished, and one of them, who could speak a little English, wanted to buy Tricky for two pounds. When the lighthouse-keeper heard this he was very angry, and ordered them all down the ladder. This made the men angry in turn, for they did not know the reason why the lighthouse-keeper loved the monkey, and they told him they would not forget the way he had insulted them. Of course he had not insulted them at all, but foreign sailors are sometimes quick-tempered, and these men came from a country where slights are easily felt. The sailors spent the whole day on shore, as the wind was unfavourable for getting out to sea, but no one saw them enter the lighthouse again. Next morning, all that the lighthouse-keeper saw of the sailors and their ship was the tips of their top-gallants dipping over the horizon edge. And all that he saw of the monkey that – would – not – kill, after searching night and day for a week was – nothing.

CHAPTER II

Mr. Donald MacAlsh, gold-miner from Silver Creek, California, happening to be in San Francisco, read one morning the following paragraph in the San Francisco Herald: —

'Curious Tale of The Sea. – Captain J. E. Dawkins of the Mermaid, which has just arrived in this port from Liverpool, reports a singular occurrence. About ten days' out from home the look-out observed what he took to be a great sea-serpent, but which, on further inspection, turned out to be a quantity of wreckage. On approaching the spot the figure of a boy was distinctly observed clinging to the broken portion of a mast, and obviously still alive. A small boat was instantly lowered, the ship's crew meantime making signals to the boy to inform him that he was being rescued. After a suspense of some half-hour the boat returned with the extraordinary intelligence that the figure seen was not that of a boy, but of a monkey. Search among the wreckage for human remains proved unavailing, and it is feared that a serious catastrophe has occurred. The only clue to the nationality of the vessel, which, it is only too plain, has met with a disastrous fate, are the letters "vorni" on a portion of what had evidently formed the bow of one of the life-boats. Possibly these letters are part of "Livorni," the Italian word for Leghorn, and the list of recent sailings from that port is now being scrutinised with some anxiety.'

Now what interested Donald – 'Big Donald,' he was always called – in this story was not the monkey, but the arrival of the Mermaid. For the Captain was a friend of his, and was bringing him some tools from home in this very ship. Though 'Big Donald' was now a gold-miner, he came out from Scotland when quite a lad. His father was a small farmer in Skye, and, dying early, the family emigrated to America. As it was to get these tools that Donald came in to San Francisco he soon found his way to the harbour, and, finding out the Mermaid, walked on board. No one was visible on deck, so Donald sat down on a coil of rope to wait. He had not been there three minutes when a matted head and two very brilliant eyes suddenly shot up the companion, and a full-grown monkey sprang in front of him and stared into his face. Donald, much startled by this apparition, called out in a loud voice for the creature to go away; but the moment the words were spoken the monkey sprang on his back and clasped its long hairy arms about his neck. The miner shook it off in terror and tried to run ashore, but the monkey followed, frisking and gambolling round him, and chasing him all over the quay. Donald soon discovered, however, that the monkey meant no harm, and a few days later an explanation of this sudden outburst of interest in a stranger – the Captain told Donald that the monkey had never been known to behave like this before – broke in upon the miner's mind. He remembered that when he suddenly spoke to the monkey he had called to it in Gaelic. Under the impulse of a sudden fear, I suppose, the language of his boyhood had started to his lips, and the words came out unconsciously 'Imich air falbh,' which means 'Go away.' What made Donald remember the circumstance was this, that whenever afterwards he used the Highland tongue the monkey manifested peculiar signs of joy. The only way the miner could account for this singular fact was to suppose that somehow or other this monkey had once belonged to some one who used the Gaelic language – a suggestion, however, which people generally laughed at. The miner always maintained, nevertheless, that the monkey really knew Gaelic, and he seldom spoke to it in any other language. Of course, people said this was simply to show off that he knew two languages.

I do not know whether the miner bought the monkey, or whether the Captain gave it to him, or whether it ran away, but it is certain that from this hour it belonged to Donald. When he left the ship with his tools, the monkey followed, trotting after him like a dog all the way till he reached his lodgings. The miner then went into the house and shut the door, leaving the monkey outside. In ten minutes it seemed as if all the boys in San Francisco had gathered in that street. They formed a crowd round the door which almost stopped the traffic; and when the policeman shortly appeared he was rather disgusted to find that it was only a monkey performing gymnastic exercises on a door-knocker. Roughly ringing the bell, he ordered Donald to take in his monkey. Donald replied meekly that he was not responsible for the monkey, but the officer said he would be summoned for 'obstructing the thoroughfare and causing a breach of the peace' if he did not take in his guest at once. So Donald had to submit, for he saw there would be no rest in San Francisco till this wayward creature had its will and was safe inside. That night Donald had a serious talk with the monkey as it sat upright in its chair at supper. He told it that if it would behave itself he would take it up to the Rocky Mountains to the gold diggings. The monkey seemed to understand, for it put down a lump of cheese it was about to eat, skipped off its chair, and nestled against Big Donald's side. Only one other thing happened that night: Donald gave the monkey its name. He called it 'Gum' – because it stuck to him.

CHAPTER III

Next morning Donald and Gum started from San Francisco by an early train on their way to Silver Creek. The appearance of the monkey in the railway carriage created much amusement among the passengers, and Donald had to stand a running-fire of questions as to whether it belonged to his great-grandfather or to a barrel-organ. The fun was stopped in a little while by the entrance of the conductor, who demanded Gum's ticket. Gum not having a ticket, an angry discussion arose on the subject of fare; but Donald said he would only pay when the conductor showed him the correct price for a monkey printed in black and white in the official books. There being no special mention in these volumes of monkeys on tour, Donald declined to pay a cent, and the conductor departed, vowing he would put Gum out of the train at the next station. When the next station came, however, Donald and the monkey were entrenched in a corner, the latter tightly grasped in the miner's great arms, and the conductor, after a glance at the situation, decided to wait for a more convenient season. In America the conductor, instead of entering the carriages only when the train stops, moves about all the time from one carriage to another, so that as the station for Silver Creek was still eleven hours' distant, he had little doubt his chance would come.

And come it did. It was a piping hot day, even for California, and late in the afternoon Donald fell asleep. His arms were still clasped round the monkey, and the conductor would never have succeeded in his object but for an accident. It happened that about that time the train was approaching an important junction, and part of every ticket had to be given up at that point. In America a railway ticket is sometimes half a yard in length, and pieces have to be torn off from point to point. To avoid the disturbance caused by this operation, miners, cowboys, and others are in the habit of wearing their tickets slipped into the band of their great wide-awake hats, and Donald was in this inviting position when the conductor came round. He snatched it out of the hat to tear off the necessary piece, when the monkey, thinking a theft was meant, sprang at the man and buried his teeth in his wrist. Roaring with pain, the conductor seized his assailant by the throat, and, before Donald could come to the rescue, tossed him out of the window. The train was dashing round a curve at thirty miles an hour, and when Donald stretched out his neck to find out whether Gum was killed, it was with small hope of ever seeing him more. For two minutes the miner gazed at the receding distance, then, without uttering a word, turned round and felled the conductor to the floor.

CHAPTER IV

When the train rolled into the junction, about an hour after, Donald went into the refreshment room to quiet his nerves with a cup of cocoa. He was about to take his seat again in the carriage when he observed a crowd on the platform opposite the brake-van at the rear end of the train. Making his way to the spot and looking over the heads of the crowd, what was his amazement to see Gum seated on the coupling apparatus, and looking about him with perfect serenity. One hand held an iron rod, and with the other he scratched his head; and, but for a great splash of brown earth on one side, the monkey seemed wholly untouched by his adventure. A single word in Gaelic from Donald made the monkey spring from its perch, and over the heads of the people into his arms, and in a few minutes the strange friends were pursuing their journey again, as if nothing had happened. A new conductor was now on the train, and Donald made friends with him by reciting the whole adventure, so that they were allowed to end the day in peace. About midnight the two got out at a roadside station, where they spent the night, and in the grey of the morning set out by coach for Silver Creek. From Silver Creek Donald's cabin was still thirty miles' walk over the mountains, and after another day's hard toiling they reached the spot.

CHAPTER V

After a long journey over the mountains Donald reached his log cabin on the Silver Creek. The monkey, however, did not find quite so immediate a welcome as himself from Donald's wife. The only pet her children had ever seen before was a baby puma, which the miner had picked out of the stream one day in a half-drowned state. Donald had mistaken it for a kitten of some new brand, and it was not until some weeks later, when it sprang upon his little girl and buried his claws in her neck, that he realised what sort of plaything – the puma is the lion of the Rocky Mountains – he had introduced into his family. So Donald's wife was suspicious of pets, and when she saw the monkey she was sure it was another lion, and would not allow it to enter the door. But Gum had other ways of entering houses than by doors, and finally he was received as a lawful member of the family, for the simple reason that he could not be kept out. The new guest gave little trouble. Most of the day the monkey spent with Donald at the mine. He went off with him when he went to work in the morning, and gambolled round him till he came home for supper. And very soon an incident happened which more than reconciled Donald's wife to her strange visitor. Donald's gold-mine was a poor one. He had to work very hard to get enough of the precious dust to keep his family in food, but his spirits were kept up by the constant hope that he would strike a richer bed and make his fortune. The way he got the gold was to take the sand and gravel from the banks of the river and wash it about in a pan till all the lighter particles passed off with the water, leaving the little spangles of gold at the bottom. Sometimes a week would pass without the miner getting more than a thimbleful, but occasionally he would find a few lumps as big as a pea. One day, however, just as Donald was getting discouraged, a piece of great good-luck befell him. He had been particularly depressed that day, for no gold at all had rewarded his search for a week, and the family were already in debt for flour and clothes. But, thanks to the monkey, he was able to go home to his wife with the largest gold nugget that had been seen in that valley for many years. Gum had been skirmishing about as usual on the gravel heaps, when some loose pebbles were dislodged by his paws, and, as they rolled down, he must have been attracted by the yellow glitter in one large lump, for the next moment he had picked up the nugget and laid it, with a wag of his tail, at Donald's feet. The miner almost wept for gladness, and, taking Gum up in his arms as if he were a child, hurried home to proclaim his fortune. That night the family had a great feast, and Gum's health was drunk in the strongest tea the mining camp could furnish. Perhaps if they had known what was shortly to happen they would not have slept quite so soundly.

CHAPTER VI

Two nights after the wheel of fortune gave an unlooked-for turn. Donald's wife was so proud of the nugget that she could not keep the news to herself, and, next morning, although Donald had carefully told her to keep it quiet, confided his good-luck to another miner's wife, who lived a few hundred yards off. This worthy woman told another, and in twenty-four hours the fame of Donald's nugget was spread from end to end of the valley. This would not have mattered in most places, but mining districts are peopled by criminals and adventurers of all kinds, and among these were some lawless characters whose chief business was to get gold in some other way than by working for it. Two of these men, brothers, who lived with their families at the lower end of the valley, determined that they should possess themselves of Donald's nugget. Covering their faces with black masks, and armed with revolvers, they set off about midnight for the miner's cabin. The family were fast asleep, and the robbers noiselessly pushed up the window, and entered the room where Donald slept. Pointing a loaded revolver at his head, one of the men roughly awoke him, and told him if he moved or cried out he would blow out his brains and murder every one in the house. Donald was too familiar with stories of camp crime to resist an attack so sudden, and, though a loaded revolver was under his own pillow, he saw his disadvantage and, for the sake of his wife and children, controlled himself with a great effort.

'I want that little bit of metal of yours,' said the robber. Donald lay perfectly quiet. 'Do you hear!' exclaimed the man, 'I want that gold.'

'Then you won't get it,' said Donald quietly.

'I believe he has sent it to the bank,' whispered the other man. 'Kill him if he has.'

'Look here!' thundered the first, 'do you mean to say that nugget is gone?'

Donald made no reply. If he said it was gone, the robbers would have simply sneaked home, for Donald was known in these parts as a man who never told a lie. Once more the robber asked him, but Donald remained silent. This was enough. If it had really been gone Donald would have certainly said so. So, while the first man stood with a revolver at his ear, the second proceeded to search the house. Drawers, boxes, and cupboards were opened and ransacked in quick succession; every corner of the two rooms was examined; the very dishes on the shelf were turned upside down, and the sugar-basin smashed to pieces with a blow, in case it should have been hidden there.

'Let me try,' said the man with the revolver; 'you watch the old bear, and see if I can't find it.'

Once more the house was ransacked from top to bottom, and the robber was about to abandon the search, when a sudden thought occurred to him. On the mantel-piece ticked a wooden American clock, about two feet high. The man opened the door in the case, and fumbled about with his finger. Next moment he had drawn out the nugget. He bent over the fire to get a better look at it, and then proceeded to weigh it in the palm of his hand, to see how much it was worth. The other robber, unable to restrain his curiosity, moved likewise toward the fire, when the first checked him with an angry cry, and sent him back to his victim's side to continue his guard. Another moment, and Donald would have had his revolver out, and the nugget would have been saved. But there was another spectator of this scene on whom the thieves had scarcely reckoned. In his usual berth, crouched at the side of the fireplace, sat Gum. The robber was weighing the gold in his hand, turning it round and round, and gloating over it, when the glitter from the precious metal attracted the monkey's eye. It seemed to feel some sense of property in this gold, for, quick as lightning, one hairy paw brushed the robber's hand, and the next moment the nugget was gone. With a great oath the robber turned on Gum, and dealt it a blow on the head which knocked it senseless to the other side of the room. But, before that blow fell, two things happened. With one hand held out to protect itself against this sudden onslaught, the monkey made a grab at its assailant's face, and tore off the black mask, so that Donald instantly recognised the man, in the glow of the firelight; with the other hand, which held the gold, the monkey swiftly transferred the nugget to its mouth.

The robber's eye followed this last movement, however, and he picked up Gum roughly, and proceeded to wrench open its jaws. He felt all round his mouth, but the nugget was not there. He held the senseless body up by the tail and shook it, but no gold appeared. He took his head between his knees, and sounded all over its throat, but the nugget was not to be found. As a matter of fact it was not there. The blow which had fallen upon the monkey's head had knocked it down its throat. Gum had swallowed the nugget!

What was to be done now? If the robber had had a knife in his pocket, Gum would have been a dead monkey in two seconds. But while he was unsuccessfully feeling for his knife, Gum suddenly came to, and with one violent wriggle shook itself free, and sprang on the highest shelf. The robber gave chase; then followed the most comical hunt you ever saw. The robber's face being now exposed (he had no idea that Donald had already recognised him), he was afraid to turn round, and he had to keep up the hunt without once facing in the direction where Donald lay, with the result that he was fairly baffled, and after a quarter of an hour's hard work, gave up the chase. All that remained now was to blind Donald. Roughly approaching the bed, the robber drew the blankets over Donald's face, and told him he would shoot him if he dared to stir. As an extra precaution, the miner's revolver was taken out of reach, and then both men started, with a piece of rope, to secure the monkey. Clever as Gum was, he was scarcely a match for two men, who, as noted horse-thieves, were experts in the use of the lasso, and in a short time the monkey was ignominiously driven from his perch on a rafter, tied up in Donald's pillow-case, and swung over the shoulder of one of the men. Then the robbers wished Donald a grim good-night, and marched off with their 'purse.' As they were going out of the door Donald called after them, 'Good-night, ye blackguards, and mark my words, if ye lay a hand on that monkey ye'll regret it as long as ye live!' This made the men a little frightened, for although they did not like to confess it to one another, there was something about Gum that was 'not canny.' Anyhow, whether it was fear of the monkey, or of their own consciences, instead of killing Gum as soon as they left the house they carried it all the way home with them, discussing which of them was to kill it, and how it was to be done.

CHAPTER VII

When the thieves reached home, after a hasty breakfast, they continued the discussion as to how the purse was to be opened and the nugget secured. Unfortunately for them the monkey had struggled out of the pillow-case, as soon as it reached the house, and the robbers' children at once seized upon it, and claimed it as their pet. When they were told it would have to be killed, the youngest child, a little girl so lovely that even a bad father could not help loving her, burst into tears, and, putting her arms round the robber's neck, prayed and entreated him to spare its life, and let her play with it. Now, wicked as this man was, this child had a mysterious influence over him, and though he was resolved to kill Gum, and that immediately, he determined that she should not see it done, nor even know that he had done it. Besides this, it would never do to let the people in the valley know that they had killed the monkey, for Donald would surely go in search of it; so after consulting together for some time, the robbers decided on a plan for killing Gum without anybody being any the wiser. They knew that if they shot it, or drowned it, or slew it with a knife, the children would be angry, and the story would certainly be told to their playmates and passed on in time to Donald's family. So a very diabolical scheme was hatched. The only way they could think of for killing Gum without any one seeing, or without either of them being actually present at the death, was to blow it up with gunpowder. This method had another advantage, which neither of the men liked to confess weighed with them, but in reality it was this more than anything else that made them think of the gunpowder. At the bottom of their hearts these men were cowards, and after the strange threat which Donald had uttered as they were leaving his house, they were secretly afraid 'to lay a hand' upon Gum. A monkey was a very mysterious creature. They had never had anything to do with one before. Gum's face had a curious human look, and to murder it in cold blood was almost like murdering a man. So the gunpowder idea seemed the very solution that was needed, and they set about their preparations at once. While one of the men remained at the kitchen fire with the family to allay suspicion, the other, after pocketing a little can of miners' blasting-powder, a couple of feet of fuse, and a piece of string, strolled out to the wood behind the cabin on the pretence of giving the monkey a walk. As soon as a low thicket screened the pair from view, the robber tied the monkey to the trunk of a tree. Then he lashed the can of gunpowder tightly to the monkey's tail, passed one end of the fuse into it through a small hole, struck a match, and lighted the other end. As soon as he saw the fuse was fairly lit, and the red fire slowly creeping upwards, he ran back as fast as he could to the house. Meantime the other man had got a concertina from the shelf, and was playing with all his might to drown the sound of the explosion. When the executioner arrived, out of breath though he was, he joined noisily in the dance which the children had set up the moment the concertina began to play, and presently such a stamping and shouting was going on in the cottage that the sound of an earthquake would have been quenched. Suddenly an awful interruption occurred. Through the open door the monkey bounded in, and taking up its place in the midst of the circle joined in the dance. From its neck dangled a piece of string, burnt at the point; but what made the children shriek with laughter was a small tin can tied to its tail, which clattered about with every turn of the body, and strange to say, had a sort of little tail of its own which appeared to be on fire, for little puffs of smoke were coming from it, and a red colour glowed at the tip. The moment the robbers caught sight of this apparition there was a yell of fear which paralysed the children into rigid statues. The men's faces were livid with terror, and some seconds passed before either had recovered his senses sufficiently to act. Then one man, with a great sweep of his arms, caught up all the children into one tumble bunch, and flung them screaming with pain and surprise under the bed of the adjoining room. The other, who was directly responsible for the mischief, seeing that the only chance to save his house and himself was to get Gum outside, clutched the smoking monkey in his arms and rushed to the door. Quick as the movement was, it was not quick enough. Those inside heard a deafening report; the house was filled with smoke; the doorway became a heap of fallen timber, and the blackened body of a man lay groaning among the charred ruins. One of the robbers, their wives, and all the children were safe. But when the smoke cleared away, and the body by the door was examined, life was all but extinct. For weeks the robber hung between life and death. It forms no part of this story to tell what pains he suffered, or what agonies of mind he passed through, or how, when months after he was able to crawl from his bed and go out into the air it was to see never more the sunlight or the flowers with his sightless eyes. Certainly Donald's words had come true. When the miner heard that evening what had happened, although he had already sent off word to the nearest police-station with the names of the guilty men, he took no further action in the matter. God's punishment was quicker than man's.