Chapter Twenty Seven.
The crew have their own opinions.
The utter exhaustion produced by the struggle on the mountain slope and through the forest died away with Jack in the light of the terrible trouble which had come upon him; and as the afternoon wore on he just partook of such food as his father brought to him, for he would not leave the wounded man’s side; and at last sunset came as they lay about a couple of miles out softly rocking upon the calm sea. He had heard how the canoes had been watched till they disappeared below the horizon line, and that all danger from another attack had passed away, but that seemed nothing in the face of this great trouble.
The night was approaching fast, and Jack shuddered at the thought of the darkness, and what it would bring; and once more it seemed impossible that the strong, active fellow who had been his companion that morning should be passing away.
If he could only have done something besides kneel there, keeping the poor fellow’s head cool—something that would have helped him in his terrible fight with death—he would not have suffered so much; but to be so completely impotent seemed more than he could bear.
“You will go to bed early, Jack,” said his father that evening, when the cabin was almost dark from the lamp being turned low.
“No, father; I am going to stop here, please,” he replied.
“I will take your place, my boy. I feel too that we owe a great duty to the faithful fellow who has served us so long. You are tired out.”
“No, father, I don’t feel a bit tired now. Don’t ask me to leave him. It is so hard with no one who knows him here; and I feel as if he will come to his senses some time, and would like to speak to me. I never did anything for him, but he always seemed to like me.”
“Very well, Jack,” said Sir John quietly, “I will not press you to go. But you will take necessary refreshment from time to time?”
“I could not touch anything,” said the boy with a shudder.
“If you do not you will break down.”
“Tell the steward to bring me some tea, then, by and by. You will go to bed?”
“I? No, my boy. I could not sleep.”
Jack was left alone with the patient save when every half-hour or so the doctor and Sir John came down from the deck to minister in some way, and the long-drawn-out night slowly passed, with poor Ned breathing painfully, and lying nearly motionless, till a faint light began to come through the cabin windows, and the distant cries of birds floated to him over the sea.
Another day was at hand, and the solemnity of the hour seemed appalling to the watcher as he rose and went to the open window. A sense of the terrible loneliness of the sea oppressed him, and, exhausted now, he felt how helpless he was, how awful and strange was the change from night to the coming of another day.
There was not a sound to be heard on deck, though he knew that there were watchers there too, but not a footfall nor a whisper could be heard.
He stood there looking at the paling stars and the faint streaks of soft light low down in the east, till the black water stretching out to the horizon grew to be of a dull leaden grey, which gradually became silvery with a peculiar sheen, and then all at once there was the tiny fiery spot high up to the right above where the reef encircled the island, which was too distant now, after the night’s steady glide away upon the current, for the breakers to be heard.
“Will he live to see the sun rise once more?” thought the boy, as the silvery sheen grew brighter on the surface of the sea, and then he started, and a great dread came upon him, for he felt that the time had come, for a faint voice said—
“Is that you, Mr Jack?”
Jack’s first thought was to call the doctor from the deck, but he did not, he stepped quickly to the couch.
“I thought it was your back, sir. I’ve been watching you ever so long. I say, hadn’t you better have the lamp lit, and let some of ’em carry me to my berth?”
“The lamp lit, Ned?” faltered Jack, with his heart fluttering the while.
“Yes, sir; it’ll be quite dark directly.”
“Yes,” thought the lad, with a pang of misery shooting through him as he realised that after all this man was a friend that he could not afford to lose, “it will be quite dark directly.”
“I’d go and fetch one, sir, but I don’t feel up to it. I should go down on my nose if I tried to stand; and,” he continued, laughing weakly, “smash the glass shade.”
“Ned!” cried Jack, catching his hand, which closed upon it tightly.
“Have I been lying here all the afternoon, sir?”
“Yes—yes,” sighed Jack, and he tried to withdraw his hand so as to call for help; but Ned clung to it tightly.
“What a shame! Upsetting everybody, and turning the gentlemen out of their place. I say, you can’t have had dinner here, sir.”
“No, Ned.”
“’Shamed of myself. I don’t know how time’s gone. Been asleep. Dreaming like mad, and—Heigho! ha—hum! Hark at that, sir, for a yawn. Never put my hand before my mouth. I say, what about the niggers?”
“We are far out at sea, Ned,” whispered Jack.
“Good job. I don’t know though. I hope we shall go and give ’em an awful thrashing. We didn’t interfere with them. Coming and shotting their arrows at us behind our backs. I say, Mr Jack, don’t you get one in you. My word, how it does make you dream—all the awfullest nonsense you could imagine. I should like to tell you, but it’s all mixed up so. I say, I fainted, didn’t I?”
“Yes.”
“I remember; up there in the wood. I felt myself going like a great gal. Just as I did once when I was a boy. How rum! That was through an arrow. I used to make myself bows and arrows, and I was making a deal arrow, and smoothing it with a bit of glass, when the bit broke and I cut my finger awful, and turned sick, and down I went.—I say, Mr Jack.”
“Yes, Ned,” said the lad in a voice full of pity.
“I can’t recollect a bit after that. How did you yet me down to the boat?”
“The men carried you.”
“One to them. My turn next. Good lads. Then you rowed out to the yacht.”
“Yes, Ned.”
“Yacht! I wish I could spell yacht when I write a letter home ready for posting first chance. I always get the letters mixed up. But I say, Mr Jack, this won’t do! I say, would you mind giving me a bit of a pull? I could walk to my berth. This is luxurious, this is. Me on the cabin couch, and you waiting on me. Here, I feel like a rich lord. Now pull.”
“No, no, Ned; lie still.”
“I say, don’t you get taking on like that, Mr Jack, sir,” said the man earnestly. “That is being chicken-’arted. I’m all right. These two holes in my arm don’t burn so; don’t burn at all. Feel as if I hadn’t got no arm that side. But I say, what’s the matter?”
“Oh, Ned, my poor fellow!”
“Here, I say, Mr Jack, sir! Don’t—don’t, please. I say, I have upset you; but— Here, what does that mean? am I a bit off my head?”
“No, Ned, you are quite sensible now.”
“No, I ain’t, sir; I can’t be, because things seem to be going backward. ’Tain’t the moon, is it? because it’s getting light instead of dark.”
“Yes, Ned, the sun will soon rise.”
“What! Don’t play— No, you wouldn’t do that. Sun rise? Why, I ain’t been lying here all night, sir?”
“Yes, Ned.”
“Well, my lad, how are you?” said Doctor Instow. “I thought I heard you speaking.”
“Morning, sir. You’re up early, sir. Won’t want calling.”
“No, I shall not want calling this morning, Ned. How are you?”
“About all right, sir, only I don’t seem to have no arm. Oh, Mr Jack— Sir John!” cried the man wildly as his master entered the cabin, and he turned his head with a shiver from his injured limb, “you ain’t let him do that, have you, while I’ve been asleep?”
“Do what, Ned?” said Jack in a soothing voice.
“Take a fellow’s arm off, sir.”
“No, no, Ned, my lad,” said the doctor, laying his hand upon his patient’s forehead. “It feels numb and dead from the wound.”
“Then—then it isn’t off?” cried the poor fellow with a gasp. “Oh, thank goodness! It give me quite a turn, sir, and I was afraid to look.”
“You’re better, Ned, and coming round fast,” said the doctor, as a warm glow of light began to illumine the cabin, driving away the shadows of that terrible night.
“Oh yes, sir, I’m all right,” said the wounded man, speaking more strongly now. Then in quite an apologetic tone, “Not quite all right, Sir John; you see, there’s my arm. Sorry to have give so much trouble, Sir John; but you see, it wasn’t quite my fault.”
“Ah, lie still, you rascal!” said the doctor, as the man made an attempt to rise.
“Yes, don’t move, Edward,” said Sir John warmly. “I am very very thankful to see you so much better.”
“Thankye, Sir John. It’s very good of you to say so. But I can’t stop here in your way. Seems as if I was shamming ill like so as to get waited on: and if there’s anything I hate it’s that. Don’t seem nat’ral, Mr Jack, sir.”
“Now lie still and be silent,” said the doctor sharply. “Your tongue’s running nineteen to the dozen, and it will not do your arm any good.”
“But really, sir,” protested Ned, “if you’d put on a couple of good round pieces of sticking-plaster, and let me wear it in a sling for a day or two, it would be all right.”
“Will you hold your tongue, sir, hang you!” cried the doctor sharply. “I’d better put a bit of sticking-plaster on that. Do you think I want you to teach me my profession as a surgeon?”
“No, sir; beg pardon, sir.”
“Silence, sir!”
Ned screwed up his mouth and his eyes as well. “Now, Jack, my lad,” said the doctor, “I can’t afford to have you ill too. Go to your room, undress and get into bed.”
“Doctor! Now?”
“Yes, my lad, now. You went through a terrible day of excitement yesterday, and you have not stirred from this poor fellow’s side all night.”
“Mr Jack, sir! Oh!” cried Ned in a voice full of reproach.
“Look here, Ned,” said the doctor, “if you say another word I’ll give you a draught that will send you to sleep for twelve hours.—Now, Jack, my lad, do as I advise. Believe it is for your good. Go and sleep as long as you can. Never mind about it’s being daylight. Ned is quite out of danger, and in a few days, when the poison is quite eliminated, he will be himself again.”
At the words “danger” and “poison” the man’s eyes opened wonderingly, and he looked at Sir John and his young master in turn.
“Yes, Jack, my lad, go.”
“But if—”
“There is no if in the case, my boy,” said the doctor. “It was a battle between the poor fellow’s strength and the poison on that wretched arrow, and Ned has won.”
“Oh!” ejaculated the man softly.
At that moment the captain and Mr Bartlett entered the cabin.
“We have heard all you said,” exclaimed the former, as he came to the side of the couch and took the patient’s hand, to give it a firm grip. “Good lad: well done.”
“And I am very glad, Ned,” said the mate warmly.
“There, that will do,” said the doctor sharply. “He is forbidden to speak, but he says through me, that he is very grateful to you all, and glad to find that his manly, straightforward, willing ways have won him so many friends. Nod your head to that, Ned.”
The man gave him a comically pitiful look, which seemed to Jack to mean, “Oh, I say, doctor, you’re pitching that last too strong,” but he remained quiet after giving every one an attempt at a nod.
“Now then,” said, the doctor, “I want this cabin cleared, for he is going to sleep for a few hours, to get cool and calm. Yes, you are,” said the doctor, in answer to a look full of protest. “And as soon as you wake I’ll have you carried to your own berth. There, behave yourself, and you’ll be all right in a few days.”
Half-an-hour later both patient and Jack were sleeping soundly, and that evening, thoroughly out of danger, Ned was resting again in his own berth, and Jack was dining with the rest in the cabin as if nothing whatever had occurred; the yacht many miles now from the island, which stood in the evening light like a blunted cone of perfect regularity resting upon the placid sea.
That night the regular watch was kept, and the sea was steadily swept in search of danger in the shape of canoes stealthily approaching to try and take the yacht by surprise. But no danger came near, and at last, after lying awake for some time, thinking of the account his father had given him of the attack made by the enemy, and the terrible anxiety about the little shooting party, Jack fell into a deep and dreamless sleep, to rise refreshed and find the doctor’s prognostic was correct, the patient having also had a quiet night, with the steward and Lenny to keep watch by his pillow, and there was no sign of fever to check a rapid recovery.
That day, with his mind at ease, Jack sat listening to a discussion held under the awning, as the yacht softly rose and fell upon the long pulsations of the calm sunlit sea, with the island lying ten or a dozen miles away.
“Of course, gentlemen,” said the captain, “it is for you to decide. We are your servants, and your wish is our law.”
“Well,” said Sir John, “I am ready to speak apologetically to you, Bradleigh, for you cannot feel the interest in the place that we as naturalists do.”
“Don’t apologise, Sir John. Speak out and say what you feel.”
“It is Doctor Instow’s feeling too. We think that now we have reached here—thanks to you—”
“Only done what you wished, sir,” said the captain bluntly.
“Well then, now that we have reached a place which teems with objects of interest, and which we have not half explored, it is a pity to leave it. What do you say, Jack? Shall we give it up?”
“Because a pack of senseless savages come and attack us? No, it would be cowardly,” cried the lad.
“Poisoned arrows, spears, war canoes,” said the doctor, with a queer look at Jack.
“Of course they are horrible,” said the lad, flushing; “but perhaps we shall see no more of the blacks. Don’t give it up, father.”
“I should regret to have to do so, my boy, but mine is a very responsible position. I feel that I have to study others. I have no right to keep the officers and crew of this vessel where they are likely to encounter great risks.”
“For the matter of that, sir,” said the captain dryly, “those who go to sea look upon risks as a matter of course, and are rather disposed to think you landsmen run the most; eh, Bartlett? What do you say?”
“What, about the risk of staying here? Oh, I don’t see any particular risk if we keep our eyes open, and are not sparing of the coal.”
“Thank you, Mr Bartlett; but there are the men to study.”
“Oh, you need not study about the men, Sir John,” said the captain bluffly. “What do you say to that, Bartlett?”
“Study them, sir, no. They like it. They thoroughly enjoy the bit of excitement. If you put it to them you’ll soon find which way they go.”
“I should like to put it to them,” said Sir John quietly.
“Have the lads all on deck,” said the captain.
The hands were piped aft, and the captain waited for Sir John to speak, but he remained silent and looked at his son.
“Ask the men which they would prefer to do—stay here, or sail farther on account of the risks from the blacks.”
Jack flushed a little, but he acquitted himself pretty well, and a hurried conversation went on for a few moments, ending in Lenny being put forward to answer, amidst a burst of cheering, which kept on breaking out again and again whenever the man essayed to speak, and at last he turned round angrily.
“Lookye here, mates,” he cried, “hadn’t you better come and say it yourselves? You’ve about cheered it out o’ me, and made me forget what I meant to say.”
“All right, matey,” cried one of the men merrily, “let ’em have it; we’ve done now.”
“Well, gentlemen,” said Lenny, taking off his straw hat and looking in it as if the lost words had come through his skull to get hidden in the lining. “We all on us feels like this—as it wouldn’t be English to let a lot o’ lubbers o’ niggers, who arn’t got half a trouser to a whole hunderd on ’em, lick us out of the place. ’Sides, we arn’t half seen the island yet, and ’bout ten on us has got a sort o’ wager on as to who shall get up atop o’ the mountain first and look down into the fire.”
“Hear, hear, hear!” cried the men, and encouraged by this, Lenny began to wave his arm about and behave like a semaphore signalling to distant crews in his excitement.
“You see, gentlemen, we say it seems foolishness to come all this way to find what you wants, and then let these black warmint scare us off; when we arn’t scared a bit, are we, mates?”
“No,” came in a roar.
“So that’s about all, gentlemen. We like the place and we’re very comfor’ble, and if it’s all the same to you, we’d like to stop and go fishing and shooting and storing; and—and—and—that’s all, arn’t it, mates?”
“Hooray! Well done, Billy,” shouted the man who had tried to be funny before.
“Thank you, my lads,” said Sir John, “and I hope you will have to run no more risks.”
“Don’t you say that, sir,” cried Lenny; “we likes a bit o’ fun sometimes; it’s like pickles and hot sauce to our reg’lar meat.”
“Ay, ay, mate, that’s so,” cried another, and there was another cheer, followed by the joking man stepping out before his companions to say quite seriously—
“And some on us, sir, think as you might hoist the British colours atop o’ the mountain, and when we go back for you to go and give the island to the Queen.”
“We’ll think about all that,” said Sir John. “Then my son and I understand that you are quite willing to stay in spite of the risk?”
“O’ course, sir,” said Lenny. “We’ll go with you anywheres; won’t we, mates?”
A burst of cheers greeted this speech, and Sir John said that they would stay in spite of all the canoes which might come.
Chapter Twenty Eight.
Taken by surprise.
It was the next day, when the yacht was just beginning to glide over the water again to pass through the opening in the reef, that Jack was sitting by Ned’s berth.
“Here, I call it foolishness, Mr Jack, sir, I do really. What is the good of my lying here?”
“To get strong and well. Doctor Instow knows best.”
“Well, he thinks he knows best, sir; but he can’t know so well as I do how I feel.”
“You lie still and be patient.”
“But I can’t, sir. Here’s Mr Bob Murray, who’s a good enough steward, valeting you and Sir John, and of course he can’t do it properly.”
“Nonsense. He is very good and attentive.”
“Pooh, sir! So could any chap in the ship be good and attentive, but what’s the use of that if he don’t understand his work?”
“Why, there’s nothing to understand.”
“Oho! Isn’t there, sir! Don’t you run away with that idea. There’s a lot. It seems nothing to you because things go so easy with you and the guv’nor. You find your clean shirts and fresh socks all ready laid out at the proper time, and you put ’em on just as you do your clothes, and think it’s nothing; but all the time there’s some one been there thinking it out first. Cold and dull morning; these trousers and that silk shirt won’t do, and warmer ones are there. Going to be a scorching hot day, and it’s the thinnest things in the bunks. Then don’t I manage the buttons the same? and when did you ever find a button off anywhere?”
“No, I never did, Ned.”
“There! I suppose you think, sir, that when a button’s knocked off another one comes up like a mushroom in the night; but you take my word for it, sir, buttons don’t come up so how, and it’s never having no troubles like that to a gentleman that means having a good valet. I don’t say nothing about holes in socks or stockings, because when it gets to that a gentleman ought to give ’em away. No, sir, it won’t do. Every man to his trade, and I’m fretting to get back to my work, for it wherrits me to have other people meddling with my jobs. I don’t believe I shall find a thing in its place.”
“Never mind all that, Ned. I’ve got something to tell you.”
“Have you, sir? Let’s have it.”
“I don’t know what you’ll say to it.”
“More do I, sir. Let’s hear what it is.”
Ned told him of what had passed on deck concerning the stay at the island.
“Glad of it, Mr Jack,” said Ned excitedly. “I should have been wild if you’d give it up because of me getting that arrow in my arm. But look here, I ain’t a grudger, but if I do get a chance at the chap as shot at me—well, I’m sorry for him, that’s all.”
“What would you do to him, Ned?” said Jack, smiling.
“What would I do to him, sir? What wouldn’t I do to him, sir!”
“You don’t mean to say you’d kill him?”
“Kill him, sir?” cried Ned, in a tone full of disgust; “now do I look the sort of chap to go killing any one?”
“Well, no, Ned, you do not.”
“Of course not, sir. Murder ain’t in my way. I ain’t a madman. Of course if one’s in a sort o’ battle, and there’s shooting and some of the enemy’s killed, that’s another thing. I don’t call that murder; that’s killing, no murder. But in a case like this: oh no, I wouldn’t kill him, I’d civilise him.”
“What, and forgive him?” said Jack, who felt amused.
“Not till I’d done with him.”
“And what would you do?”
“Do, sir! Why, what I say, sir; I’d civilise him, and show him something different to hitting a man behind his back. There’d be no call for him to strip, he’d be all ready; but I’d just have off my jacket and weskit, and some of the lads to see fair, and I’d show him the way Englishmen fight. I’d give him such a civilising as should make him respect the British nation to the end of his days. That’s what I’d do with him. Fists!”
“Very well, Ned, look sharp and get strong so as to do it.”
“Strong, sir? Why, I could do it now if you’d let me get up instead of making me bask about like a pig in a sty. I just feel, sir, as we used to say at school, as if I could let him have it, though it would hardly be fair. He’d have the greatest advantage.”
“Yes, I should say he would,” said Jack, laughing.
“Ah, you mean about muscle, sir. I don’t. I mean that if he managed to get home with his fists in my face—not as I think he would—he’d make me look disgraceful, and not fit to appear before the guvnor for a fortnight. And all the time I might pound away for an hour and make no difference in him. Whoever heard of a nigger with a black eye?”
“Well, no, Ned, I never did,” said Jack, laughing. “Nature ain’t been fair over that, sir. Black chaps’ eyes ought to go white after a fight; but I suppose it’s because they don’t fight fair. Hitting a man in the back, and with a poisoned arrow too! It makes me feel wild; it’s so cowardly. But there, they don’t know any better. I say though, Mr Jack, I am glad we’re going to stay, and it makes me feel proud of our crew. I’ll shake hands with the lot as soon as I may go on deck.”
“That’s right enough, Ned, and as soon as you’re fit Doctor Instow will let you go.”
“Tell you I’m fit as a fiddle now, sir,” said the mate testily. “Why, nothing would do me more good than to stretch myself by having a set-to with that nigger as shot me.”
“With one hand,” said Jack dryly.
“Eh? With one hand, sir?” said the man, beginning to feel his closely-bandaged arm.
“Yes; how could you fight with one hand?”
“I forgot all about that,” said Ned thoughtfully. “Would be rather awkward, wouldn’t it?”
“Yes, I should think it would.”
“Like fighting with one hand tied behind you, same as you did at school.”
“I never did have a fight at school,” said Jack, quietly.
“No, of course not, sir; I remember you said so once before. Seems rum, though. I used to have lots. But you were different, sir. My word though, Mr Jack, how you have altered since we left home!”
“Think so, Ned? Have I?”
“Wonderful, sir. Don’t you be offended, sir, at what I say.”
“Not I, Ned.”
“You would have been then, Mr Jack. Seems to me that you were quite an old gentleman then, and now you’ve got to be quite a boy.”
“Then I’m going backwards, Ned?”
“Not you, sir. You make me feel quite proud of you. Why, Bob Murray told me yesterday that you’d been right up all three masts as high as the sailors can get.”
“Yes, I went up with my glass to look out for canoes. What of that?”
“What of that, sir? Well, fancy you trying to do such a thing a few months ago!”
“Perhaps I am a little stronger now,” said Jack thoughtfully.
“Stronger, sir! I should just think you are. But I say, Mr Jack.”
“Yes?”
“About my arm. I should get licked now. Think it will ever come right again?”
“Doctor Instow says it will, only it must have time. Do you feel any sensation in it now?”
“Not a bit, sir. Doctor asked me if he hurt me when he altered the bandages this morning, but I had to tell him he might do anything and I should not feel it. Just as if it was quite dead. Rum, ain’t it, sir?”
“It’s very sad, Ned.”
“Oh, I don’t know, sir. It’s a nuisance; but the doctor says it will come right in time, so one’s got to wait. He says he’ll get the wound healed up, and then we can talk to the nerves and muscles with some good friction. Treat it like a lucifer, sir; give it a sharp rub and make it go off. But I shall be glad when he’ll let me come on deck. Might do a bit o’ fishing, sir.”
“You shall, Ned, as soon as you can.”
There were no signs of the savages’ visit when they passed inside the lagoon again, and, in the hope that they might remain now unmolested, the yacht steamed right away from the entrance and cast anchor nearly on the opposite side of the island, where the lagoon was at its widest, so as to give ample room for manoeuvring in case of attack, where the shore was more beautiful than in any part they had yet seen.
One of the tiny rivers ran down a precipitous gully in a series of fern-hung falls, to lose itself in the golden sands, and close at hand the sheltering trees were of the grandest in size and loveliness, overhung as they were with festoons of flowers, each tree affording ample study for Sir John and his friend; and the collecting went on apace from morn to eve, so that the boxes they had brought began to fill up and smell strongly of the aromatic gums and spices used to keep ants at a distance.
The sailors took the keenest delight in the birds, and were eager to learn to skin, and carefully laid them in the hot sunshine till they dried. They gloried too in the pickle-tub, as they called the spirit-cask, to which the abundant snakes and lizards were consigned. Then of an evening they were always waiting for Jack to give the word for fishing, partly as an interesting sport, but after the first few times, for the sake of what Lenny called the pot, though in almost every case the capture was fried.
It needed a good deal of care and discrimination though, and the doctor’s natural history knowledge was often called upon to decide whether some gorgeously-armoured creature would be wholesome or no, some of the tropic fish being poisonous in the extreme.
Then in addition there were the handsome birds which were collected; these, especially the fruit-pigeons, being very toothsome, though the larger parrots and cockatoos were, as Wrensler the cook said, not to be sneezed at, though he declared that they would have been far better if plucked instead of skinned.
So beautiful was the shore by the stream that the temptation was very great to erect a tent and live on the land, but it was considered too risky.
“Only fancy, Jack,” said the doctor with a queer look, “our meeting with the same trouble out in this solitary island as we should in London.”
“What trouble?” said Jack, laughing. “You don’t mean the noise?”
“No, but I mean the blacks,” said the doctor.
“Oh, I see,” cried Jack; “but it does seem such a pity. I should like to have a tent ashore.”
“It would be delightful under one of those big trees, but canvas is a poor safeguard against the point of a spear. It wouldn’t do.”
“No,” said Jack with a sigh, “it would not do.”
Many excursions into the interior were made—the interior meaning a climb up the slope of the great mountain—and in all cases a grand selection of beautifully-plumaged birds was secured. Many of these were the tiny sun-birds, glittering in scales of ruby, amethyst, sapphire, and topaz; then too at the sides of the streams vivid blue-and-white kingfishers with orange bills were shot, many of them with two of the tail-feathers produced in a long shaft ending in a racket-like flat, giving the birds a most graceful aspect.
Then there were plenty of paroquets, rich in green, orange, and vermilion; rain-birds as the Malays call them, in claret and white, with blue and orange beaks; parrots without number, and finches, swallows, and starlings of lovely metallic hues; but the greatest prizes were the birds of paradise, of which several kinds were secured, from the grandly-plumaged great bird of paradise to the tiny king. Whenever one of these was shot in some great grove at daybreak, Jack hesitated to have it skinned for fear of injuring the lovely feathers, over which adornments Nature seemed to have done her best. Now it was one of the first-named, a largish bird, with its feathers standing out to curve over in a dry fountain of golden buff, ornamented with their beautifully flowing; wave-like shafts; and this would be of a prevailing tint of soft cinnamon red; while the smaller kinds were lavishly adorned with crests and tippets and sprays of feathers brighter than burnished metal.
“I don’t know how it is,” said Jack one day, “but every bird we find seems more beautiful than the last.”
He had just picked up a fresh specimen which had fallen to the doctor’s gun.
“Well, it is more novel than beautiful, Jack,” said the doctor, as they turned over and re-arranged the dark purple, or dark-brown, or claret, or black, or green metallic plumage, for it might have been called either according to the angle at which it was viewed. “Come, this will help to make them believe that birds of paradise are of the crow family.”
“No one ever saw a crow half as beautiful as that,” cried the lad.
“At home—no. But look at the shape of this bird—its wings, claws, and build altogether; doesn’t he look as if he could be a crow?”
“There is a slight resemblance, certainly,” said Jack; “but this isn’t a bird of paradise.”
“It is next door to one, my lad, and I am surprised to find it here.”
“You know what it is then?”
“I know there’s a northern Australian bird almost like it, if not quite. I think it is the rifle bird. We’ll have a good look when we get back. Take special care of that one, Lenny.”
“Ay, ay, sir. I takes special care of all of ’em, when the bushes and thorns ’ll let me.”
They were well up the gully through which the stream off which the yacht was anchored ran, for, finding the place rich in specimens, they had toiled up higher and higher that morning.
Ned was for the first time of the party, on the condition that he would be very careful, for his arm was still stiff and numb, though otherwise he was much better; but he kept pretty close to his young master, and let the men with him carry the guns and ammunition, and in several ways made silent confession that he was not so strong as he was.
Jack noticed it, and made some allusion to the fact.
“Oh, don’t you fidget about me, Mr Jack, I’m getting on glorious,” said the man quietly. “I feel as if the sun and wind up here were doing me no end of good, drinking ’em in like. Doctor said I was to take it coolly; so coolly I take it, as the sun ’ll let me, so as to get strong again as soon as I can. But, my word, what a place it is!”
“Lovely,” said Jack. “It grows upon one.”
“Ah, I should like to grow upon it,” said Ned, grinning. “I don’t feel as if I should like to go away again.”
“There’s no place like home, Ned,” said Jack, who had stopped to watch a pair of vivid sun-birds probing the tiny trumpet blossoms of a white creeper with their beaks.
“They say so, sir; but I say there’s no place like this. When are we going right up to the top?”
“When you are quite well, Ned. We should have started before now, but I asked my father to put it off till you were strong enough to carry my gun and wallet.”
Ned said nothing, but he looked as if he thought a great deal, and when he next spoke as they went on mounting the gully, it was directly after the doctor had added a lovely kingfisher to the bag.
“I say, Mr Jack, sir, of course the doctor knows a deal, but do you think he is always right?”
“I suppose no one is always right, Ned. Why?”
“About that bird—bird he shot. He said it was a kingfisher.”
“Well, so it is. You heard him explain about its habits?”
“Yes; and that’s what bothers me. How can it be a kingfisher if it don’t fish?”
“You might just as well say, how can it be a kingfisher if it don’t fish for kings.”
“No, I mightn’t, sir,” replied Ned, whose illness seemed to have developed a kind of argumentative obstinacy. “Nobody nor nothing does fish for kings, sir, so that’s nonsense. But what I say is, how can that bird be a kingfisher if it don’t fish?”
“But it does fish.”
“No, it don’t, sir; it flits about and catches butterflies, and moths, and beetles. Doctor said it never caught fish at all, and never dived down into the water. So what I say is, that it can’t be a kingfisher.”
“Well, but Doctor Instow says that far away back in the past its ancestors must have lived on fish; and then the land where they were changed, till perhaps it was one like this, with plenty of beautiful little rivers in it, but few fish, and so they had to take to living upon insects, which they capture on the wing, and they have gone on doing so ever since.”
“Seems rum,” said Ned thoughtfully. “Then I suppose if this island was to change, so that there were no more butterflies, moths, or beadles, and more fish took to living in the rivers—they’d take to fishing again?”
“Yes, I suppose so; all things adapt themselves to circumstances.”
“Do they now, sir?”
“Yes; but you don’t know what I mean.”
“No, sir, I’m blessed if I do.”
“How stupid! why don’t you ask then?”
“’Cause I don’t want to bother you, sir, when you’re getting tired.”
“What nonsense! Always ask if you don’t understand me. I meant that I have read about plants and animals altering in time to suit the place where they are. If dogs are taken up into the arctic regions they get in time to have a very thick fur under the hair; and if they are taken into a hot country like this, they have a very fine silky coat.”
“Do they now, sir?” said Ned. “Now I wouldn’t have thought that a dog would have so much gumption. But I don’t know, dogs are very knowing.”
“I don’t think the dog has anything to do with it, Ned; it is a natural law. Now, if a fir tree is in a sheltered place, where the soil is deep and sandy, it grows to a tremendous size; but if the seed falls in a rocky place, where it has to get its roots down cracks to find food, and cling tightly against the cold freezing winds, it keeps down close to the ground, and gets to be a poor scrubby bush a few feet high, or less.”
“Then the trees have got gumption too, sir. That’s better than being blown down.”
“I don’t know about gumption, Ned; but it’s the same with flowers. They grow thin and poor on rocks and stones, and rich and luxuriant on good moist soils, and— Hallo! where are the others? we mustn’t be left behind.”
“Oh, we’re all right, sir. They’re only just ahead, and we can’t lose ourselves, because all we’ve got to do is to go back along by the trickling water here. I’ll shout if you like.”
“Oh no; I could blow my whistle, but I don’t want to, because it would startle the doctor. He’d think there was something wrong.”
“Don’t whistle him, sir. Here’s a nice comfortable bit o’ rock here; would you like to sit down?”
“You’re tired, Ned,” said Jack quickly.
“Am I, sir? Well, I dunno—p’r’aps you’re right. I s’pose I am a bit fagged. Legs don’t seem to go quite so well as they used. If you wouldn’t mind, I think I should like just ten minutes’ rest to freshen me up a bit.”
“Sit down then.”
“After you, sir.”
“Very well: there. No, sit down—or, better still, lie down on your back.”
“Make the things about puzzled, and want to know what I am. I shall be having snakes and lizards going for a walk up my arms and legs, sir. But I don’t know as I mind for a bit—I’ll risk it.”
Jack had halted at the foot of a perpendicular wall of moss-grown rock, and set the example, after disturbing the grass and ferns at the foot, of sitting down, and Ned lay at full length.
“Lovely, sir,” he said. “It’s worth while to get regular tired so as to enjoy a rest like this. I don’t s’pose they’ll go much farther, and they must come back this way, I suppose.”
“I think so, Ned. They couldn’t come back through the forest, and they would not as soon as they missed us, they’d be sure to come this way so as to pick us up.”
He was silent for a few moments, and then went on softly, as his eyes wandered over the trees and creepers about them—
“How lovely it all is, with the sun sprinkling light through the leaves. It looks just like silver rain. Look at that great flapping moth. That must be an Atlas, I suppose. I ought to try and catch it, but it seems such a pity to go out and destroy every beautiful thing one sees, so as to turn it into a specimen. Look at those orchid clusters growing out of the stump where the tree branches. Shall I pick it, Ned? Say yes, and I won’t. I haven’t forgotten the little snake which crept out on to my hand that time. Hallo! What bird’s that? What a chance for a shot!”
As he sat there with a gun across his knees, first one and then half-a-dozen large birds, emboldened by the silence, came stalking out from beneath the bushes, looking something like so many farmyard hens as they began to peck and scratch about.
“What a chance!” thought Jack. “I might get a couple for roasting, but we’ve killed enough things for one day.”
He sat perfectly still, watching the birds till they had crossed a little opening in front and slowly began to make their way up the slope in the direction taken by the doctor, Lenny, and the four men with them.
Then all at once one of the birds uttered a low clucking sound, and stood up with outstretched neck gazing in Jack’s direction.
The bird was absolutely motionless for a few moments, then it ducked down its neck and ran off beneath the undergrowth.
“Birds are beginning to know that we’re dangerous,” he said aloud. “Did you see those, Ned?”
There was no answer, and Jack turned to gaze down at his companion, who was fast asleep and breathing heavily.
“Poor fellow, he is not so strong as he thinks,” said Jack to himself, “or else he will not own to his weakness for fear of being a trouble to us. What a wonderful thing strength is! I suppose I’m a good deal sturdier than I was. Must help father to-night arranging and making notes of some of the insects we got yesterday. Why, we shall have a regular museum by the time we get back to England.”
And as he sat there in the calm silence, with the huge trees towering above his head, as if to filter the light and let it fall in streams and drops, it seemed to him that the best way to observe Nature was to sit down perfectly still as he had, and watch. For in different directions he saw next how animal and even insect stole out now to pursue its ordinary courses, and he sat watching till the whole place seemed alive.
Twice over he heard shots, but they were faint and distant, and once there was a peculiar bump as if a large stone had fallen from far up the mountain side. Then all was still again, and the birds he had seen pause in alarm resumed their pecking and climbing about.
“How soundly he sleeps!” thought Jack; and at last, when a good hour had passed away, he began to wish for the return of the doctor and the men, but there was no rustle of leaves, no sound of breaking strand or twig, everything was perfectly still, and the lad shifted his position a little so as to find a place to rest his back, and as he did so a peculiar sensation came over him. It was as if a mental shadow crossed his mind, begetting a shock of dread. The next moment a heavy blow from behind fell upon his head, and all was blank.
Chapter Twenty Nine.
The missing pair.
“Here! Hi! Jack! Where are you, lad?” There was no reply, and the doctor called the nearest of the men, who were slowly making their way through the dense growth, putting up some strange bird from time to time.
“Where’s Mr Jack, Lenny?”
“Mr Jack, sir? Arn’t seen him lately. ’Long o’ Ned, I think. See Mr Jack from where you are, mate?”
“No,” came back, and the fresh speaker hailed his nearest companion, and he his. But no one had seen the boy lately. They had all been too much occupied in looking out for rare birds.
“Let’s wait a bit,” said the doctor. “Give them time to come up. Here, Lenny—and you—let’s look at the sport.”
He sat down on a block of lava, and became so interested in the specimens he had obtained that he did not notice the lapse of time.
“Here,” he cried at last, “they must have knocked up, and are waiting for us to go back. Why, we must have come much farther than ever we came before.”
“That’s why we’ve got such good birds, sir,” said Lenny.
“Perhaps so. Well, back again now.—Oughtn’t to have left him behind like that,” muttered the doctor to himself.
He was hot and weary from his exertions, but his anxiety made him hurry back nearly in the path they had made in ascending, but that soon proved to be too difficult, the growth having sprung back after they had passed, and as they had gone up the steep slope well separated, the tracks were feebly marked, and not as they would have been had they followed in each other’s steps.
The consequence was that first one mark was found, then another, in the shape of a broken twig or crushed-down patch of grass, but the next minute the steps were lost, and everything looked so different in descent they in a short time found themselves ready to give up the laborious task of trying to follow in the steps taken when going up, and glad to go back wherever the way was easiest.
To make up for this the little party spread out as far as was reasonable, and at every few yards the doctor gave a loud whistle and waited for a reply.
None came, and they hurried on, rarely recognising anything to act as a guide, but steadily going down toward the shore; and as there was no reply to his calls, the doctor soon came to the conclusion that, tired of waiting, Jack had turned back, and in the full expectation of finding the missing ones down by the boat, the party was pressed on, but with their leader getting more annoyed at every step.
The boat was invisible till they were close upon it, lying in the mouth of the little river where the great trees spread their boughs right across, and at the first rustle of the bushes being heard the sailors in charge started up and began to draw her close in shore.
The doctor uttered an ejaculation full of annoyance, but began clinging directly after to the thought which struck him.
“How long have they gone on board?” he cried as soon as he was well within hearing.
Then his hopes were crushed, for the men addressed replied—
“Gone on board, sir? Who gone on board?”
“Mr Jack and his man.”
“Haven’t been down here, sir. Arn’t lost ’em, have you?”
The doctor made no reply.
“Here,” he cried, “take these birds, and you two who have been resting come back with me. Lenny, I want you, and you come too,” he continued to another of the men.
The other two who had come down from the mountain slope were eager to return, but the doctor ordered them to take charge of the boat, and without pausing a minute shouldered his gun and turned to follow the path they had taken that morning, with better hope of success.
“I dare say we came close by them somewhere,” he said to Lenny. “I hardly see though how we could have missed them.”
“Strikes me, sir, as I know how it was,” said the man.
“You think you know?”
“Yes, sir, but it’s only thinking, and mayn’t be right.”
“Tell me what you think,” cried the doctor impatiently.
“It was hot, sir, steamy hot under the trees, and Mr Jack is young and none too strong, and Ned arn’t quite got over his trouble.”
“Yes, of course. Well, go on.”
“Well, sir, they must have trudged after us till they were tired out, and then sat down to wait for us, and went to sleep.”
“I hope that’s it, Lenny,” said the doctor as they struggled on, up and up, amongst tree, bush, and rock, while, to add to their difficulty, a complete change came on with tropic rapidity, a black curtain of clouds swept across the sky, and in an incredibly short time the lightning flickered for a few minutes through the trees, and then came in blinding flashes, accompanied more than followed by peal upon peal of thunder which seemed to shake the island to its foundation.
Worse still was to follow. Just as the lightning was flashing and quivering among the trees, and the thunder was at its loudest, the rain came down. It had approached from the sea with, a dull hissing sound which grew louder and louder, till with startling force the wind which bore it on its wings flung it as it were with a tremendous force upon the mountain slope, whipping the boughs and tearing the leaves from the twigs, pouring away with terrific violence, and rushing downward into the gully, which soon became filled with a roaring torrent which swept all before it.
This was the first example the doctor had encountered of the power of a tropical storm, and he was glad to shelter himself and his four companions beneath an overhanging ledge of lava rock—a poor protection, but such as it was it saved them from much of the force of the storm.
The downpour ceased as suddenly as it had commenced, the tempest sweeping over the island to pass on to the ocean and be dissipated there, so that in little more than an hour the sun was shining down through the trees again, where the drenched earth was spangled as it were with jewels.
But the task of continuing the search was now made excessively difficult. The ground was slippery in the extreme, save where the lava had been washed bare, and at almost every step the water-laden boughs poured down a fresh shower upon them. The labour was terrible, for now it was as if they were forcing their way through a bath of hot vapour which was enervating in the extreme.
But they struggled on hour after hour, vainly seeking for some trace of the missing ones—a task which would have baffled the keenest-eyed Red Indian, for the rain had swept away every footprint, and when at rare intervals a broken branch or torn-off leaf-covered twig was found, it was as likely to have been the work of the storm as of any one passing through.
Faint with an exhaustion he would not own to, the doctor was still urging or cheering his men on, when the dull concussion of a gun and the following echoes announced that those on the yacht were impatient for their return.
“Signal to come back, sir,” said Lenny despondently.
“Yes, but we can’t go back without finding them first,” said the doctor angrily. “Who is to face Sir John Meadows and tell him we have failed in our duty of protecting his son?”
No one answered, and the silence was broken by the dull thud of another gun.
“It is of no use, I can’t return while it is light, but the summons must be answered. Here, Lenny, go back and tell Sir John what has happened, and that we are searching in every direction.”
“Me, sir?” cried the man with a look of horror; “I couldn’t do it, sir.”
“You must. You have been out all day, and must be done up.”
“Me, sir! My mate’s ever so much worse nor me. Send him.”
“G’orn with you,” cried the other sailor who had been with them since the first start; “why I arn’t half so done as he is, sir.”
“I want you to go, Lenny,” said the doctor sternly. “I dare say you will find another boat waiting. Send the men up to help the search. But there is no need to send that message, Sir John is sure to have come himself.”
“Mean it, sir? I’m to go?” said Lenny.
“Yes, of course.”
“Well, sir, I’d sooner keep on hunting for the poor lad all night than face Sir John; but if you say I am to do it, why do it I must.”
“Go then,” said the doctor, “and mind, you are not to attempt to return.”
“Arks your pardon, sir, but it’ll be ’bout two hours ’fore I get down to the boat.”
“No, no; not half that time,” cried the doctor.
“We’ve come a long way, sir. What do you say, mates?”
“All two hours,” was the reply.
“Yes, sir, you’ve been so anxious ’bout it you arn’t noticed how the time goes, and as I was going to say, by the time I get down to the boat it will be black as the inside o’ one o’ the coal-bunkers.”
The doctor stood gazing at the man wildly.
“There won’t be no more searching then.”
“You’re right, you’re right,” groaned the doctor. “There, stop with us. Come what may the poor fellows must be found.”
Bang! went a signal gun again, and the echoes rolled away up the mountain, growing fainter and fainter, while the lovely grove, full of dazzling light and darkest shade, resplendent in its beauty, and with the air fragrant with the freshened odour of leaf and flower, seemed to Doctor Instow the most horrible solitude to which man had ever been condemned.
“There they go again,” said one of the men, as once more a gun was fired.
“Forward,” cried the doctor, rousing himself from his utter despondency.
“Which way, sir?” asked Lenny.
“Any way, my lads. System is of no use here. We must trust to chance.”
“Think he can have got over into the next gully, sir?” said Lenny.
“No, no, impossible. It would take a party of strong men to cut a way through, and they would not make the clearance in a week. Forward! Open out and keep on giving a hail from time to time.”
Another signal gun for their recall was fired.
“We can’t help it,” said the doctor. “Forward, my lads. We must find them now.”
It was not until the occasional glimpses of the sky they caught told him by their altered colour that the night was close at hand, that the doctor once more halted, and then gave the order for the party to return as well as they could upon their tracks.
And now as they staggered more than walked wearily back a shot was fired every few minutes, and a short halt made to listen for a response.
But none came, and they struggled on through the darkness, the rapidness of the descent of the ground and the roar of the torrent at their side being their only guides, for the darkness beneath the trees was now intense.
How long they had been going downward no one could have said, as they kept now in line, following each other closely, with Lenny first, when after stumble and fall at every few yards, as the doctor’s gun flashed and the report rang out, it was at length answered from higher up on their left.
“At last!” cried the doctor, rousing himself from the feeling of exhaustion which seemed to have deadened all his energies. “Bear to the left, Lenny, for a few minutes, and then I’ll fire again.”
“Ay, ay, sir!” said the man huskily, and in a very short time he stumbled and fell, rolling down a precipitous part.
“Hurt?” cried the doctor.
“Dunno, sir,” said the man with a groan. “Feels like it; but don’t you mind me, you fire again.”
The doctor cocked his piece and raised it to fire in the air, when a shot rang out again, apparently about a hundred yards away, the flash before the report being plainly seen.
“Ahoy!” yelled Lenny hoarsely, and this was answered faintly.
“That’s Ned,” growled Lenny. “No, no; not his voice,” cried the doctor. “Mind how you go down there.”
The words were useless, for the men were too much worn out to study anything, and they let themselves slide down, only too glad to get to the bottom.
“Ahoy!” came now, and as they answered there was a breaking and rustling heard among the trees, shouts and sharp orders could be heard, and in a few minutes the two parties encountered.
“Have you found him?” cried the doctor, for he had known for some moments that he was wrong.
“Found him!” came back in the voice of Sir John, full of agony. “Is not Jack with you?”
The doctor’s answer was a groan before he announced what had happened.
A few minutes’ conversation followed between Sir John and the mate, before the former said sharply, in a tone which cut the doctor to the heart—
“Can you give me no idea where you missed them first?”
“Not the slightest,” said the doctor bitterly. “We are completely lost.”
There was silence for a few moments before Sir John spoke again.
“Go on down to the mouth of the gully,” he said sharply, “and make the best of your way on board.”
“What are you going to do?” said the doctor.
“Stop here till daylight, and then continue the search. Better make a fire, my lads.”
“Yes,” cried the mate. “It may guide them to us.”
“I must stay,” said the doctor.
“I do not want you,” said Sir John coldly, “and you are too tired to be of any use.”
“I suppose so,” said the doctor bitterly, “but I must stay all the same.”
“Then back with you, my men,” said Sir John.
“Keep on downward near the stream, and you must come upon the boat.”
There was a dead silence.
“Well,” said the mate sharply, “why don’t you go?”
“Dunno ’bout the others,” said Lenny softly. “I’m ready to make a start, but I can’t. It’s my legs won’t go.”
“That’s about it with me,” said another of the men; and the result was that the mate told them to sit by the fire that was made, and rest for an hour before starting back. But when the hour had elapsed the poor fellows were plunged in a stupor-like sleep from which they could not be aroused.