The Happy Mariners Read online

  Meanwhile he was making good speed through the forest; and in about half an hour—if time could be measured at all in a region where everything seemed to stand luminously still—he found himself in open country at the foot of a steep grass-grown hill. He was tired with running, and while he paused to get breath he suddenly remembered the map, and it seemed to him that he must be standing very near the place where the treasure was buried. Perhaps this had been in his mind when in addition to arming himself with pistols and a cutlass he had snatched up a spade on his way out of the log-cabin. For now the temptation came to him to dig for the treasure. He thought how splendid it would be to go back and tell the others about it. So he flung his cutlass down and began digging. The ground was hard, but he did not rest until he had made a hole three feet deep. The hole rapidly filled with water, and this discouraged him, and he began to feel uneasy in his conscience again. ‘I’ll have another go at it on my way back,’ he said to himself; and, leaving the spade sticking up in the earth, he turned to ascend Look-out Hill.

  The climb taxed all his strength, so sharp was the pace he had set himself; but at last, very hot and out of breath, he reached the top, a little flat space upon which not more than five people could have stood with ease or safety. The air at this height was fresh and invigorating; and Guy, his dreaming fancies forgotten, gazed about him with clear eyes, moving round and round until he became a little dizzy and was in danger of falling from his high place. To the east (for he had been careful to bring his pocket compass with him) he saw the forest at his feet, a mass of colour behind which stretched that range of giant mountains which the Robinsons, you will remember, had named after the Crystal Palace. Between forest and mountains, glimpses of a fern-fringed river spangled the distance with silver; and the whole island, he thought as he stared down at it, was like a rich and lovely carpet spread out for him to look at. Better still—for this is what pleased him most—it was like the map itself, thought of by Elizabeth and drawn by Rex with certain features suggested by himself and Martin; it was the map itself come beautifully and marvellously true. Somewhere hidden in the forest, towards the south-east, was the log-cabin to which he must presently return, armed, as he hoped, with information of immense stragetical (or was it strategical?) importance. To the north, and to the west, and to the south-west, lay the live quivering ocean, reflecting the blue and gold of the sky, washing with a slow lazy rhythm upon the shore far below. Guy listened to this music crashing and echoing round the coast, and stared in delight, forgetful of danger, at the rippling water, which, though near at hand crested with tiny waves, in the distance seemed so smooth and so blue that he could scarcely tell where sea ended and sky began.

  His attention at length became drawn to a little black speck on the horizon. With growing curiosity he watched it. He took bearings. The speck, which was already a trifle bigger, was moving towards the island from the north-west. Was it a bird in the sky or a boat in the sea? He soon decided that it was in the sea; and presently he observed that it was not alone. Behind that first speck came others—two, three, four of them. He could not at this distance detect any movement among them, but he noticed that every minute brought them a fraction nearer. They advanced, slowly as it seemed, but steadily, in diamond formation with a tail to the diamond…. A quarter of an hour passed, and now they looked like crawling centipedes, but Guy, with thumping heart, realized that the centipedes’ legs were, in fact, oars worked, and worked swiftly, by human hands. Still he waited and watched, for it was desperately important to know whether the strangers intended to land on the island, and if so at what point. Already he had a shrewd idea of what they were, and very soon his eyes were able to confirm his guess—five long wicked-looking canoes, each manned by a score of black-headed naked savages, whose grinning teeth flashed white in the morning sunlight. They were pulling with a will, and smacking their lips (thought Guy) at the prospect of a day’s good hunting on the island, crowned with a cannibal feast. Guy had read a lot about savages and was something of an authority on their habits; he guessed that these hungry hordes were counting on bagging four or five brace of plump missionaries before nightfall. But he was not at all cast down. At the moment, filled as he was with the courage of a glorious morning, there was nothing he relished so much as a good fight against impossible odds. He would have liked to rush upon the savages there and then, swimming out to meet them with a cutlass held pirate-fashion between his teeth, and slay them one by one, the whole exhilarating job occupying perhaps as much as ten minutes (since there were probably a full hundred of them). He felt more than ready for anything. This mood, however, lasted only a moment; for when he remembered Elizabeth and Martin his heart sank, and he had a sudden chilly sensation in the pit of his stomach; for he could not help realizing that he and old Rex would be hard put to it to protect those youngsters—his twin-sister being a youngster by virtue of her sex. He turned to examine the coastline so far as he could see it. Convinced now that the savages were bent on landing, he was eager to see where they were likely to put in, so that he might race back to the log-cabin and give the alarm. Not many minutes did he lose in speculation, for there to the north-east stretched a big bay which he instantly recognized. ‘Of course,’ he said to himself. ‘It’s Cannibal Bay! However did I come to forget it!’ The savages were now near enough for him to observe them more clearly, and what he did not observe his imagination was quick to supply. Their lithe naked bodies, glistening with oil, were as bright and brown and sleek as ripe conkers fresh from the green sheath. Their faces had been rendered the more ferocious by savage self-mutilation: their noses transfixed by bone-skewers, their cheeks gaudily tattooed, their ears weighed down by barbaric brass ornament. They seemed, nevertheless, uncommonly pleased with themselves; for while they moved to and fro over their oars they grinned and chattered like monkeys, perhaps recalling the savour of their last meal and hoping that the next would prove equally succulent.

  But Guy waited to see no more. He ran down the hill as fast as he could go, and through the mile or two of forest; and he did not pause to rest until he was within sight of the log-cabin. Then, being on the point of exhaustion, he slackened his pace. But—what was that! His heart jumped into his mouth. He started running again. There was a distance of fifty yards between him and the log-cabin, and he knew, by what he had just seen, that the lives of all four of them, to say nothing of Fandy, depended on his speed. He ran like a hare, his heart nearly bursting out of his body.

  ‘Where’s Rex?’ he gasped, plunging into the log-cabin.

  Elizabeth and Martin looked up, greatly surprised. ‘Hullo, Guy! What’s up?’

  ‘Where’s Rex?’

  Elizabeth jumped up quickly. ‘He’s not far. In the forest, I think. He was here a moment ago.’

  ‘Call him,’ said Guy. ‘Get him in at once. It’s life or death.’

  They all ran to the door and shouted, Martin loudest of all, and Guy, because he had no breath left, the most feebly: ‘Re-ex! Re-ex! Coo-ee!’

  There was a movement in the trees near by, and Rex appeared, running at top speed. When he came near enough he asked: ‘Anything wrong?’ He addressed himself to Guy, with a quiet, alert, ready-for-anything, man-to-man air.

  ‘Inside!’ said Guy. ‘All of us inside!’ And as the door was shut upon them: ‘A hundred savages landing at Cannibal Bay.’

  ‘Good man,’ said Rex. ‘We’ll see about them.’

  ‘And pirates,’ said Guy, impatient of the interruption, ‘not twenty yards away. I saw the glint of their blades through the trees just now, as I came up.’

  Chapter 17

  Attack on the Log-Cabin

  For two seconds Rex and Guy faced each other, the thought flashing between them without need of words that this was the very tightest corner they had ever been in. They were both rather pale, but their eyes were steadfast and unfaltering. If it had been only themselves they might not have taken the danger so seriously; it was the thought of the women and children that wo
rried them most, and it made matters no better that there was only one woman, aged ten and a half, and one child three and a half years younger. So far as anxiety was concerned, these two were more than enough. In the look that passed between the two boys, each read the other’s firm resolve to die, if need arose, in defence of Elizabeth and Martin; but behind this heroic impulse was the knowledge that by far the best way of protecting them was not to die at all but to slaughter as many pirates as came within range of their muskets. Out of the corner of his eye Guy had noticed, without having time to think about it, that the log-cabin seemed smaller; and now, as he glanced round in search of a weapon, he saw what had happened to make it so. The log-cabin, according to Rex’s plan of the night before, had been divided into two rooms, the new room, the one further from the door, being reserved for Elizabeth, who, though she had resigned command in Rex’s favour while on shore, was still entitled to full honours as captain of the cruise. Against this wall, in a neat row, stood no fewer than ten muskets.

  ‘Yes,’ said Rex, noticing his glance. ‘We’ve been working like billy-o while you’ve been gone. They’re all loaded, and what’s more, Elizabeth and Martin know how to load them.’

  ‘I know how to fire them too,’ said Elizabeth; and with an air of pale determination she took possession of a musket.

  Rex and Guy, with a musket apiece, stationed themselves one at the south and one at the east wall; for the walls of the log-cabin, though stouter and stronger than when the Robinsons had first found it, still afforded many gaps through which their eyes could spy and the muzzles of their muskets be thrust.

  ‘You take the west wall, Elizabeth,’ said Rex. ‘And Guy must look after the north side as well as his own. They won’t look for resistance, so I expect they’ll come to the door and pretend to be friendly. And I’ll be there, because I mean to have first bang at them. Young Martin had better stand by to reload for us.’

  For what seemed to the waiting children a very long while, though it could not in fact have been more than two or three minutes, there was silence in the log-cabin; and no unusual sound reached them from outside. But suddenly Rex whispered: ‘Here they come!’ And he raised his musket to his shoulder.

  Guy, from where he stood, watched the pirates, a devilish and dirty crew, emerge from the forest, marching four abreast, with the debonair, crooked-nosed, black-patched, ruddy-whiskered, dandiacal Captain Gory Jake Blackheart at their head. ‘Shall I fire, Rex?’ asked Guy. ‘They’re coming my way, and I could pick off that captain fellow with a bit of luck.’

  ‘Wait till I give the word,’ said Rex.

  The muzzle of Rex’s gun was resting in a little gap in the door; and towards this door Captain Blackheart, having halted his men in a whisper, tiptoed his way. His eyes were rolling and his whiskers quivering in a wicked ecstasy. Blissfully unconscious that the muzzle of a gun was pointing, at a distance of six inches, straight at his stomach, he lifted his skinny claw of a hand and tapped gently. Obtaining no answer, and hearing no sound, he tapped again.

  ‘Are the dear children within?’ cried Gory Jake Blackheart in a wheedling voice, throwing over his shoulder a cunning leer for the entertainment of his followers. ‘Are the sweet chicks at home? ’Tis gentle Gory Jake come a-visiting.’

  ‘We’re not at home to you, Gory Jake,’ said Rex, in a very high-and-mighty tone of voice. ‘And if you don’t go away at once, all the beastly lot of you, I shall shoot your head off, Captain. So sucks!’

  ‘Blood and botheration!’ exclaimed the pirate chief, stepping hastily back a pace or two. ‘Is this our proud English hospitality! By my skull and cross-bones, you puling brat, you shall eat those naughty words, and I’ll cut your liver out into the bargain. And that,’ he added, half to himself, ‘will make six hundred and thirty-four murders. And then there are your dear little brothers. Six hundred and thirty-five, six hundred and thirty-six. Oh, happy thought! But stay, art thou forgetting the pretty female, Gory Jake? Nay, nay! By all that’s good and gracious, she shall be number six hundred and thirty-seven. What say you to that, Master Rex Robinson? How like you my arithmetic? You do not answer. You are bashful. Say your prayers, boy, while there’s time, for at last, by blunderbuss, you are in my power.’

  ‘We’ll see about that,’ said Rex. ‘I’m going to shoot you now, so you’d better look out.’

  Rex pulled the trigger. There was a terrific bang, and the kick of the musket sent Rex staggering back into the cabin, but he recovered himself and rushed back to the spy-hole to see the effect of his shot. At first he thought that Gory Jake’s head had been blown off. But no, it was only his three-cornered hat. With his baldness exposed, his dignity shattered, the villain cut such a pitiful figure that Elizabeth, I am sure, could she but have seen him, would have spared him a pang of pity; would perhaps even have offered to work another skull-and-crossbones device in place of the one now destroyed for ever, together with the hat it had adorned.

  Gory Jake, gazing ruefully at the remains of his hat, looked at first as though he were about to burst into tears. But he mastered his grief and began a-screaming: ‘I’ll slit you in strips! I’ll have you boiled in oil, you nasty ill-mannered child, and cod-liver oil to boot! Alas my poor hat, the one me dear mother gave me! Many a pretty murder hast thou witnessed, O hat, but now—never again. Ah bitter cry! Never again! Now must I fill my heart with thoughts of vengeance, lest womanish tears o’erwhelm me. Hark ye, children, and learn how Gory Jake and his jolly band of rascals have outwitted ye and planned your doom. ’Twas we that built this same log-cabin as a snare for ye. Like silly ninnies, like the shallow-pated landlubbers ye are, ye walked into the trap; and here are we, good pirates all, a score of pleasant-spoken gentlemen left of threescore-and-ten, come to skin ye alive and make mincemeat of ye, to take your map, your treasure, and your ship.’

  Martin, his eyes shining with excitement, his lips wearing the happy smile of dreams come true, stood in the middle of the floor forgetful of danger, eagerly drinking in every word the pirate uttered. The notion that these bloodthirsty men might carry out their threats hardly occurred to him, and he was a little surprised to see that Elizabeth and his brothers, vigilant at their posts, looked far from happy. Their faces were blanched, their eyes grimly intent, their lips set in a stiff line.

  ‘Guy,’ said Rex, ‘when I say “three” we’ll both fire. One, two, three.’

  Bang! bang!

  ‘Mine’s down!’ said Guy.

  ‘Mine’s hit,’ replied Rex. ‘Quick, Martin! Another musket! But only in the arm, I think. Did you kill yours, Guy?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Guy, ‘I think so. And I rather think,’ he added, ‘that I’m going to be sick.’

  ‘Oh, rats to that!’ Rex was taking aim again. ‘Get hold of another musket. Look out, Elizabeth, they’re trying to surround us.’

  Elizabeth’s reply was to pull her trigger, snatch another musket from Martin’s eager hands, and fire again.

  ‘Bag anything?’ said Rex.

  Elizabeth hardly knew. Six prowling rascals had come her way, and all six were now lying on their stomachs making neither sound nor movement. It seemed unlikely that she had killed them all. ‘I think they’re only shamming dead.’

  ‘Well, don’t let them sham any more,’ advised Rex, whose finer feelings were becoming frayed by the thought of what Mother would say if any harm came to her children. ‘Don’t let them sham dead. Dead ’em. Blaze away like a good un!’

  With these last words he himself blazed away, and another pirate fell.

  The rest of the enemy were advancing in open formation in a series of little sudden runs. Muskets they had none, for their escape from the sinking ship had been too desperate a business to admit of bringing fire-arms, but with two cutlasses apiece and their belts bristling with knives, they looked a dangerous lot. Now, however, finding themselves so nakedly exposed to the Robinsons’ fire, they began to waver; and finally, as if by common agreement and without consulting their leader, who still stood b
randishing his blade and urging them on with hideous oaths, they all fell flat on their faces.

  ‘Skin ye!’ roared Gory Jake. ‘Skin ye for a set of craven-hearted scallywags! Up and at ’em, ye lubbers! There’s a map in yonder cabin, and treasure maybe, and only four lily-livered babes to defend it from us. Pirates? Nay, ye’re no better than a pack of snivelling churchwardens. Ye’re a disgrace to your calling, every man jack of ye, and by blood and botheration, by skull and crossbones, I’ll have ye struck off the Pirates’ Register for unprofessional conduct while on active service.’

  The pirates lay in the grass and answered not a word. Gory Jake’s voice became less shrill. He tried what kindness would do. ‘Now, Timothy Prigg,’ said he, ‘it’s you I’m addressing, shipmate. You’ve rendered good service in your time, with your weepy creepy ways and your face like a lovesick choir-boy. Be a man, Timothy Prigg. Be a pirate! And belay sulking there like a slug and breaking your poor old captain’s heart.’

  But Timothy Prigg said nothing.

  ‘Come then,’ went on Gory Jake, ‘what of you, Albert Memorial Weeks?—And you, George Swearword? — And you, Horrible Horace? — And you, Honourable Spatt? Good lads all of ye, or so I thought till this minute. By blunderbuss, I’ll stop a shilling off your wages, so I will!’

  To this appeal only one pirate responded—a blear-eyed, blue-chinned fellow who jumped up suddenly and said: ‘I’m with you, Cap’n.’ But the next instant—bang, bang! He dropped like a stone, and Gory Jake cursed again.