So soon as he was sure the jack had not noticed him, Mark drew softly
back, and with some difficulty forced a way between the bramble thickets
towards the stockade. He thus entered a part they had not before
visited, for as the trees and bushes were not so thick by the water,
their usual path followed the windings of the shore. Trampling over
some and going round others, Mark managed to penetrate between the
thickets, having taken his rod to pieces, as it constantly caught in the
branches.
Next he came to a place where scarcely anything grew, everything having
been strangled by those Thugs of the wood, the wild hops, except a few
scattered ash-poles, up which they wound, indenting the bark in spirals.
The ground was covered with them, for, having slain their supports,
they were forced to creep, so that he walked on hops; and from under a
bower of them, where they were smothering a bramble bush, a nightingale
“kurred” at him angrily.
He came near the nightingale’s young brood, safely reared. “Sweet
kur-r-r!” The bird did not like it. These wild hops are a favourite
cover with nightingales. A damp furrow or natural ditch, now dry, but
evidently a watercourse in rain, seemed to have stopped the march of
this creeping, twining plant, for over it he entered among hazel-bushes;
and then seeing daylight, fancied he was close to the stockade; but to
his surprise, stepped out into an open glade with a green knoll on one
side.
The knoll did not rise quite so high as the trees, and there was a
quantity of fern about the lower part, then an open lawn of grass, a
little meadow in the midst of the wood. He saw a white tail disappear
among the fern--there were then rabbits here.
“Bevis!” said Mark aloud. In his surprise he called to Bevis, as he
would have done had Bevis been present. He ran to the knoll, and as he
ran, more white tails--little ones--raced into the fern, where he saw
burries and sand-heaps thrown out.
On the top of the knoll there were numerous signs of rabbits--places
worn bare, and “runs,” or footpaths, leading down across the grass. He
looked round, but could see nothing but trees, which hid the New Sea and
the cliff at home.
Eager to tell Bevis of the discovery, and especially of the rabbits,
which would furnish them with food, and were, above all, something fresh
to shoot at, he ran down the hill so fast that he could not stop
himself, though he saw something white in the grass. He returned, and
found it was mushrooms, and he gathered between twenty and thirty in a
few minutes--“buttons,” full grown mushrooms, and overgrown ketchup
ones. How to carry them he did not know, having used his handkerchief
already, and left his coat at home, till he thought of his waistcoat,
and took it off and made a rough bundle of them in it. Then he heard
Bevis’s whistle, the well-known notes they always used to call each
other, and shouted in reply, but the shout did not penetrate so far as
the shrill sound had done.
The whistle came from a different direction to that in which he supposed
the cave to be, for in winding in and out the brambles he had lost the
true course and had forgotten to look at the sun. He found he could not
go straight home, for the brambles were succeeded by blackthorn, through
which nothing human can move, and hardly a spaniel, when thick as it was
here. He had to go all round by the opposite shore of the island, the
weed-grown side, and so to the fire under the teak-tree.
“Where’s the gun?” said Bevis, coming to meet him.
“I left it at home.”
“No, you had it.”
“I put it back as you were not coming.”
“I never saw it.”
“It’s in the hut.”
“Didn’t you really take it?”
“No--really. We’ll both go with the gun--”
“So we will.” Bevis regretted now that he had made any difficulty.
“No, it’s your turn; you shall have it.”
“I shan’t,” said Mark. “Look here,”--showing the mushrooms--“splendid
for supper, and I’ve found some rabbits!”
“Rabbits!”
“And a little green hill, and a kingfisher, and a jack. Come and get
the gun, and let’s shoot him. Quick.”
Mark began to run for the matchlock, and they left the duck to itself.
Bevis ran with him, and Mark told him all about it as they went.
They talked so much by sign and mere monosyllables in this short run to
the hut that I cannot transcribe it in words, though they understood
each other better than had they used set speech. For two people always
together know the exact meaning of a nod, the indication of a glance,
and a motion of the lip means a page of conversation.
Having got the gun as they came back, Mark said perhaps Pan would eat
the duck. Bevis called him, but he did not need the call. Gluttonous
epicure as he was, Pan, at a whistle from Bevis, would have left the
most marrowy bone in the world; but Bevis with a gun! why, Polly with a
broom-stick could not have stopped him.
Before they got to the willow bush it had been settled that Mark should
shoot at the jack, as the matchlock was loaded with shot, and Bevis
wanted to shoot with ball, and reserved his turn for the time when he
had made the new sight. Bevis held Pan while Mark went forward. The
jack was there, but Mark could not get the rest in a position to take a
steady aim, because the willow boughs interfered so.
So Bevis knelt down, still holding Pan, and Mark rested the long heavy
barrel on his shoulder. The shot plunged into the water, and the jack
floated, blown a yard away, dead on his back; his head shattered, but
the long body untouched. Pan fetched him out, and they laughed at the
spaniel, he looked so odd with the fish in his mouth. Bevis wanted to
see the glade and the rabbit’s burries, but Mark said, if the duck was
done, it would burn to a cinder, so they went home to their dinner. By
the time they reached the teak-tree, the duck was indeed burned one
side.
It was dry and hard for lack of basting, when they cut it up, but not
unsavoury; and what made it nicer was, that every now and then they
found shots--which their teeth had flattened--shots from their own gun.
These they saved, and Mark put them in his purse; there were six
altogether. Mark gloried in the number, as it was a long shot at the
duck, and they showed that he had aimed straight. The ale in the wooden
bottle was now stale, so they drank water, with a little sherry in it;
and then started to see the discovery Mark had made. Pan went with
them. The old spaniel had been there long before, for he found out the
rabbits the first stroll he took after landing from the Pinta, but could
not convey his knowledge to them.
Bevis marked out a tree, behind which they could wait in ambush to shoot
at the rabbits, as it was within easy range of their burries; and then,
as they felt it was now afternoon, they returned to the stockade, got
the telescope and went up on the cliff to watch for Charlie’s signal.
The shadow of the gnomon on the dial had moved a good way since Bevis
set it up. They had not the least idea of the hour, but somehow they
felt that it was afternoon.
Long habit makes us clocks, if we pause, or are forced to consult
ourselves. Slow changes in the frame proceed till they are recognised
by the mind, or rather by the subtle connexion between the mind and the
body; for there seems a nexus, or medium, which conveys this kind of
eighth sense from the flesh to the mental consciousness. Birds and
animals know the time without a clock or dial, and the months or seasons
almost to a day; and so, too, the human animal, if driven from the
conveniences of civilisation, which save him the trouble of thinking
soon reverts to these original and indefinable indications.
For instance (though in a different way), you can set the clock of your
senses to awake exactly at any hour you choose in the morning. If you
put your watch aside, reversing the process, and listen to the senses,
they will tell you when it is afternoon.
The sandy summit of the cliff was very warm, and the bramble bushes were
not high enough to give them any shade; so that, to escape the sun, they
reclined on the ground in front of the young oak-tree, and between it
and the edge. Bevis looked through the telescope, and could see the
sand-martins going in and out of their holes in the distant quarry.
Charlie was not on the hill, or, if so, he was behind a sycamore and out
of sight; but they knew he had not yet made the signal, because the herd
of cows was down by the hollow oak, some standing in the water. They
had not yet been called by the milkers. Sweeping the shore of Fir-Tree
Gulf, and down the Mozambique to the projecting bluff which prevented
farther view, he saw a crow on the sand, and another perched on a rail;
another sign that there was no one about.
“Any savages?” said Mark.
“Not one.”
“Proas hauled up somewhere out of sight.”
Mark carefully felt his way to the very verge, and there sat with his
legs dangling over. He said the cliff was quite safe; and Bevis joined
him. Underneath they could see deep into the water; but though so
still, they could not distinguish the bottom. Clear at the surface, the
water seemed to thicken to a dense shadow, which could not be seen
through. It was deep there; they thought they should like a dive, only
it was too far for them to plunge. There was a ball of thistledown on
the surface, floating on the tips of its delicate threads; the spokes
with which it flies as a wheel rolls.
“How did the rabbits--I mean the kangaroos--get here?” said Bevis
presently. “I don’t think they could swim so far.”
“Savages might bring them,” said Mark. “But they don’t very often carry
pets with them: they eat everything so.”
“Nibbling men like goats nibbling hedges,” said Bevis. “We must take
care: but how did the kangaroos get on the island?”
“It is curious,” said Mark. “Perhaps it wasn’t always an island--joined
to the mainland and the river cut a way through the isthmus.”
“Or a volcano blew it up,” said Bevis. “We will see if we can find the
volcano.”
“But it will be gone out now.”
“O! yes. All those sort of things happened when there was no one to see
them.”
“Before we lived.”
“Or anybody else.”
A large green dragon-fly darted to and fro now under their feet and
between them and the water; now overhead, now up to the top of the oak,
and now round the cliff and back again; weaving across and across a warp
and weft in the air. As they sat still he came close, and they saw his
wings revolving, and the sunlight reflected from the membrane. Every
now and then there was a slight snap, as he seized a fly, and ate it as
he flew: so eager was he that when a speck of wood-dust fell from the
oak, though he was yards away, he rushed at it and intercepted it before
it could reach the ground. It was rejected, and he had returned whence
he started in a moment.
“The buffaloes are moving,” said Mark. “They’re going up the hill. Get
ready. Here, put it on my shoulder.”
The herd had begun to ascend the green slope from the water’s edge,
doubtless in response to the milker’s halloo which they could not hear
on the island. Bevis rested the telescope on Mark’s shoulder, and
watched. In point of fact it was not so far but that they could have
seen any one by the quarry without a glass, but the telescope was
proper.
“There he is,” said Mark.
Bevis, looking through the telescope, saw Charlie come out from behind a
sycamore, where he had been lying in the shadow, and standing on the
edge of the quarry, wave his white handkerchief three times, with an
interval between.
“It’s all right. White flag,” said Bevis. “He’s looking. He can’t see
us, can he?”
“No, there are bushes behind us. If we stood up against the sky perhaps
he might.”
“I’ll crawl to the dial,” said Bevis, and he went on hands and knees to
the sundial, where he could stand up without being seen, as there were
brambles and the oak between him and the cliff. He drew a line with his
pencil where the shadow of the gnomon fell on the circle, that was four
o’clock. Mark came after, creeping too.
“We won’t sit there again,” said Mark, “when it’s signal-time. He keeps
staring. You can see his face through the telescope. We will keep
behind the tree.”
“There ought to be a crow’s nest up in it,” said Bevis. “Suppose we
make one. Lash a stout stick across two boughs, or tie cords across and
half round, so as to be able to sit and watch up there nicely.”
“So we will. Then we can see if the savages are prowling round.”
“The sedges are very thick that side,” said Bevis, pointing to the
eastern shore where they had had such a struggle through them. “They
would hide five thousand savages.”
They went down to the hut, and Bevis made the sight for the matchlock.
The short spiral of copper wire answered perfectly, and he could now
take accurate aim. But after he had put the powder in, and was just
going to put a bullet, he recollected the kangaroos. If he shot off
much at a target with bullets at that time in the afternoon it would
alarm everything on the island, for the report would be heard all over
it. Kangaroos and water-fowl are generally about more in the evening
than the morning, so he put off the trial with ball and loaded with
shot.
It was of no use going into ambush till the shadows lengthened, so he
set about getting the tea while Mark sawed off two posts, and drove them
into the ground at one side of the doorway of the hut. Each post had a
cross-piece at the top, and the two boards were placed on these, forming
a table. Bevis made four dampers, and at Mark’s suggestion buried a
number of potatoes in the embers of the fire, so as to have them baked
for supper, and save more cooking.
The mushrooms were saved for breakfast, and the jack, which was about
two pounds’ weight, would do for dinner. When he had finished the
table, Mark went to the teak-tree, and fetched the two poles that had
been set up there for the awning. These he erected by the table, and
stretched the rug from them over the table, fastening the other two
edges to the posts of the hut.
They had found the nights so warm that more than one rug was
unnecessary, and the other could be spared for a permanent awning under
which to sit at table. Some tea was put aside to be drunk cold, miner
fashion, and it was then time to go shooting. Mark was to have the gun,
but he would not go by himself, Bevis must accompany him.
They had to go some distance round to get at the glade, and made so much
noise pushing aside branches, and discussing as to whether they were
going the right way, that when they reached it if any kangaroos had been
out feeding, they had all disappeared.
“I will bring the axe,” said Bevis, “and blaze the trees, then we shall
know the way in a minute.”
Fixing the rest so that he could command the burries on that side of the
knoll, Mark sat down under the ash-tree they had previously selected,
and leaned the heavy matchlock on the staff. They chose this tree
because some brake fern grew in front of it and concealed them. Pan had
now come to understand this manner of hunting, and he lay down at once,
and needed no holding. Bevis extended himself at full length on his
back just behind Mark, and looked up at the sky through the ash
branches.
The flies would run over his face, though Mark handed him a frond of
fern to swish them with, so he partly covered himself with his
handkerchief. The handkerchief was stretched across his ear like the
top of a drum, and while he was lying so quiet a fly ran across the
handkerchief there, and he distinctly heard the sound of its feet. It
was a slight rustle, as if its feet caught a little of the surface of
the handkerchief. This happened several times.
The sun being now below the line of the tree-tops, the glade was in the
shadow, except the top of the knoll, up which the shadow slowly rose
like a tide as the sun declined. Now the edge of the shadow reached a
sand-heap thrown out from a burrow; now a thicker bunch of grass; then a
thistle; at last it slipped over the top in a second.
Mark could see three pairs of tiny, sharp-pointed ears in the grass. He
knew these were young rabbits, or kangaroos, too small for eating. They
were a difficulty, they were of no use, but pricked up and listened, if
he made the least movement, and if they ran in would stop larger ones
from coming out. There was something moving in the hazel stoles across
the glade which he could not make out, and he could not ask Bevis to
look and see because of these minute kangaroos.
Ten minutes afterwards a squirrel leaped out from the hazel, and began
to dart hither and thither along the sward, drawing his red tail softly
over the grass at each arching leap as lightly as Jack drew the tassel
of his whip over his mare’s shoulder when he wished to caress and soothe
her. Another followed, and the two played along the turf, often hidden
by bunches of grass.
Mark dared not touch Bevis or tell him, for he fancied a larger rabbit
was sitting on his haunches at the mouth of a hole fringed with fern.
Bevis under his handkerchief listened to Pan snapping his teeth at the
flies, and looked up at the sky till four parrots (wood-pigeons) came
over, and descended into an oak not far off. The oak was thick with
ivy, and was their roost-tree, though they did not intend to retire yet.
Presently he saw a heron floating over at an immense height. His wings
moved so slowly he seemed to fly without pressure on the air--as slowly
as a lady fans herself when there is no one to coquet with. The heron
did not mean to descend to the New Sea, he was bound on a voyage which
he did not wish to complete till the dusk began, hence his deliberation.
From his flight you might know that there was a mainland somewhere in
that direction.
Bang! Mark ran to the knoll, but Pan was there before him, and just in
time to seize a wounded kangaroo by the hindquarter as he was paddling
into a hole by the fore paws. Mark had seen the rabbit behind the
fringe of fern move, and so knew it really was one, and so gently had he
got the matchlock into position, moving it the sixteenth of an inch at a
time, that Bevis did not know he was aiming. By the new sight he
brought the gun to bear on a spot where he thought the rabbit’s shoulder
must be, for he could not see it, but the rabbit had moved, and was
struck in the haunch, and would have struggled out of reach had not Pan
had him.
The squirrel had disappeared, and the four parrots had flown at the
report.
“This island is full of things,” said Bevis, when Mark told him about
the squirrel. “You find something new every hour, and I don’t know what
we shan’t find at last. But you have had all the shooting and killed
everything.”
“Well, so I have,” said Mark. “The duck, and the jack, and the
kangaroo. You _must_ shoot something next.”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
End of Volume Two.
Volume Three, Chapter I.