11
A Ride in a Truck
WHEN THE TIME came, loading Crusoe was easy.
There was a rough track that led down to the lochan from the road, and Father had reversed the cattle truck along it, stopping just short of the water where the ground grew soggy. Of Crusoe there was naturally no sign, since he had not been called.
Now, that spring morning, on April the 14th, 1933, everything was ready. The children sat safely inside the cab of the truck, while Father and Grumble stood by the end of the lowered tail ramp. Mother was staying at home, but she had provided a parting present for the Water Horse, a gift of food with which to lure him out of the lochan, up the ramp, and into the body of the truck.
There had been much discussion about what this lure should be. Chocolate chip cookies? Herring? Or the very first food that had ever passed Crusoe’s infant lips—sardines?
“Trouble is,” said Father, “that if I lay a trail of any of those, he’s liable to find it difficult to pick them up off the ground. It’ll slow him up and maybe he won’t make the effort. What we need is something tasty that I can drag along in front of him, just out of his reach, something long enough to keep me clear of becoming an accidental meal myself.”
“A string of sausages!” said Mother.
“A wonderful idea!” said Father. Now he paused a moment, looking and listening carefully, but he could see no one and hear nothing, so he walked to the brink and called “Crusoe!” and Crusoe came surging in.
Father and Grumble had feared that perhaps by now the Water Horse might be unwilling to leave the element in which, except for his move from goldfish pond to lochan, he had lived for over three years. But their fears were unfounded.
As Father walked slowly backward trailing the string of sausages, Crusoe, with an action like that of a giant caterpillar, humped himself out of the water and over the intervening ground toward the cattle truck. Up the slatted ramp he hauled himself, neck outstretched in his effort to catch the end of the long sausage string, and into the body of the truck, while the springs creaked and groaned under his weight. Dropping the lure at the far end, Father nipped smartly out by the little side door, and ran around to the back. Then, as Crusoe was wolfing down the sausages with grunts of contentment, Father and Grumble each took hold of one side of the tail ramp and heaved it up and screwed the locking clamps tight. The Water Horse was loaded!
The journey itself was also uneventful. Southward they went at first to Glenfinnan, then due east along the north shore of Loch Eil, till they came to Fort William. They stopped by the banks of Loch Lochy. Father was a little worried that the Water Horse might become uncomfortably dried out, so here, at about the halfway mark of the journey, he and Grumble filled buckets and sloshed the contents through the slits in the side of the cattle truck. Crusoe bellowed quietly in appreciation.
By the side of Loch Oich they stopped again and repeated the operation. Kirstie and Angus got out to stretch their legs while Father and Grumble filled the buckets. Just as Father was about to toss in the last bucketful, they heard the noise of an approaching car.
“Off the road, children,” said Father, for the way was narrow, and they all stood and waited for the vehicle to round the bend ahead. Tourists, they thought. But it was a police car. They watched as it came closer, willing it to go by without stopping, but it slowed and drew to a halt.
“Quickly,” said Father to Grumble. “Lift the hood!”
A lone police officer got out of the police car. “Are you in trouble?” he asked.
Yes, we are, thought Father, but “No, we’re not,” he said in a cheerful voice. “Just going to top off the radiator. There’s maybe a wee bit of a leak somewhere—she needs a drop of water now and again.” He started to unscrew the radiator cap, gingerly, as though it were hot, and began to lift the bucket of water.
Fortunately, the policeman did not closely watch Father’s attempts to fill an already full radiator, but turned to Grumble.
“Where are you bound?” he asked.
“Fort Augustus,” said Grumble, truthfully. “A load of fat cattle for the slaughterhouse,” he added, untruthfully.
“Your own stock?” asked the policeman.
“Oh, aye!” said Grumble, truthful once more.
“There’s a good bit of rustling goes on in these parts, would you believe it?” said the policeman.
“Never!” said Grumble in an astonished voice.
“It’s a fact,” said the policeman. He looked at the old man and the two small children.
“Not that you’re my idea of rustlers,” he said, smiling. Then he put his eye to one of the slits in the side of the cattle truck.
Mercifully, he could see very little, for Crusoe’s bulk occupied all the available space, but he could just make out a great dark flank pressed against the trucks side. He poked it with a gloved finger, and Crusoe, thinking this to be a caress from his friends, gave a low bellow of pleasure.
“A fine big beastie that one seems to be,” said the policeman. He turned to Angus.
“A good size, is it, laddie?” he asked.
“A monster,” said Angus, solemnly.
The policeman laughed and ruffled Angus’s hair as Father now joined them, having completed his pantomime with the radiator.
“Topped her off, have you?” said the policeman.
“Yes.”
“Better get that leak seen to.”
“Yes,” said Father. “We must be getting along now.”
“And so must I,” said the policeman.
And, greatly to their relief, he did.
In the early afternoon they reached Fort Augustus, at the lower end of the great loch that they sought. A new road had recently been built along its northern shore, but Father chose the old southern road and drove steadily on, looking out all the while for a suitable place.
Just short of Dores, he found it. There was a rest area on the left, perched high above a steep bushy slope that fell directly into the loch. Here they stopped.
Crusoe himself did not exactly enjoy his journey. At first, when the tail ramp slammed shut on him, it felt strange for him to be confined. He was not afraid, for he did not know the meaning of fear, but he did not much care for the roar of the engine and the stink of gas fumes and the bumping and swaying motion of their progress. He started to feel a little sick.
After a while, however, he became used to things, and indeed, because it was the time of day when he always took his nap, he began to feel drowsy. He had almost dropped off when the bumping and swaying stopped and some water was splashed on him.
Nice giants, he thought to himself, and gave a little bellow of thanks. Then it was onward again, inside this strange cave in which, because of his great size, he had hardly room to move a muscle. A little later, the bumping stopped again, more water was thrown in, and Crusoe lowed in appreciation as someone prodded his side. But how cramped he felt, and what a relief it was when at last the roaring and the jolt-ing stopped for good, and the door behind him swung down and let in the light.
Painfully, for his limbs were cramped, Crusoe maneuvered himself backward and down the slope of the ramp and to the ground. And how pleasant it was to have the old familiar tickling, for the two small giants had each found a stick and enthusiastically went to work on him.
Then, as Crusoe squirmed pleasurably around, he suddenly saw, beneath and stretching away in either direction as far as the eye could see, an enormous expanse of water!
Get into it, every instinct told him, get under it. And he heaved his huge body to the edge of the rest area, and slithered over and crashed down through the bushes on the slope below, and fell with a mighty splash into the sun-dappled depths of the loch.
When he had gone, they all stood silently staring out over the still springtime waters.
Father felt pleasure and pride that the problem had been solved in a seamanlike manner.
Grumble felt relief that now at last the great beastie was in a safe place where he need worry about him no more.
Kirstie was remembering the time when Crusoe was only as long as the span of Grumble’s hand. Fifty or sixty feet, Grumble had said he would grow to, and now she no longer doubted it.
Angus was remembering that he had forgotten to bring any emergency supplies.
For all of them, there was a sense of deep contentment that now the Water Horse had everything that he could want. Forevermore he would have the freedom of this great deep fish-filled loch, safe from all dangers.
He will be happy ever after, thought Kirstie, and because of that, so am I.
Father looked at his watch.
“My!” he said. “Will you look at the time! It’s five to three already. We must be starting home or we’ll be late for that high tea Mother is getting ready for us.”
“Blow me down!” said Angus. “That would never do.” And they clambered into the cattle truck and drove away.
Down, down, down the Water Horse dived, scattering great schools of fish as he went, down into the cold black depths, and then turned and shot upward, faster and faster, proud of his strength. For a moment all his training was forgotten, all the giants’ teaching that he must not show himself unless summoned. He burst out into the sunshine in the middle of the loch and plunged and rolled around on the surface, so happy was he to be in this wonderful new watery world.
Then he came to his senses, and with a final great surge he sank from sight.
