Presently Wecanicut began to drop further away, and then the Sea
Monster loomed up suddenly right over us, and Jerry had to fend the
boat off with an oar. We had never guessed how big the thing really
was,--not big at all for an island, but very large for a bare,
off-shore rock. I should say that it was just about the bigness of
an ordinary house, and very black and beetling, with not a spear of
grass or anything on it. When Jerry said, "My stars, _what_ a weird
place!" his voice went booming and rumbling in among the rocks, and
a lot of gulls flew up suddenly, flapping and shrieking. He held the
boat up against the edge of a rock while Greg and I got out. We took
the kit-bag ashore, and Jerry made the boat fast by putting a big
piece of stone on top of the rope. There was nothing like a beach or
even a shelving rock to pull it up on, so that was the best we could
do. The boat backed away as far as it could, but the rope was firmly
wedged between the rock and the stone so it couldn't get away.
Of course we went first to look at the black cave-entrance. Sure
enough, a great flat slab had fallen down from it and lay half in
the water,--we could see scratchy marks and broken places where it
had slid. The cave itself was about six feet deep, and very dank and
dismal-looking. There was no sign of there ever having been
treasure, for nobody could possibly have buried it, unless they'd
hewn places in the living rock, like ancient Egyptians. We might
have thought of that before, but of course we didn't honestly
believe that there was treasure. Somehow the Sea Monster didn't seem
nearly so jolly and exciting as it had from Wecanicut. It was so
real and big, and whenever a wave came in, it boomed and echoed
under the hanging-over rocks. We climbed around to the other side
and went up on top of the highest place, which was about three times
as high as I am. From there we could see the Headland, very far
away and blue, and Wecanicut behind us, safe and green and
friendly-looking, but a long way off; and nothing else but a smeary
line of smoke from a steamer at sea.
"We named this place well," I said; "it _is_ a Monster."
"Brrrr, hear it roar!" Jerry said. "The waves must be bigger, or
something. There weren't any when we came out."
We looked down and saw that the water was behaving differently.
Instead of being smooth and rolling, there was a skitter of sharp
ripples all over it, and the waves went _slap_ and frothed white
when they hit the rock. The sky had changed, too. It was not so
blue, and there were switchy mares' tails across it, and the wind
was blowing from Wecanicut, instead of toward it.
"We'd better start back," I said. "I'm afraid we'll be late for the
next ferry, as it is, and Father and Mother will be home on the six
o'clock train."
"Whew!" said Jerry, "I'd forgotten that. It's latish already,
judging by the sun. Come along, Greg, and loop up your sash so you
won't fall off this beast."
It _was_ latish. The sun was quite low, and we saw that the Sea
Monster threw a long, queer shadow on the water, as if the sea had
been land. We hurried along to the boat, Jerry ahead.
"She's all right," he shouted, turning around.
When he turned back he made a sort of wild spring that I didn't
understand at first. Then I saw the stone we had put over the rope
rolling off the rock,--joggled off by the boat's pulling harder when
a wave lifted it. The stone rolled in cornery bounces, with a dull
noise, and the rope slipped after it slowly. I thought Jerry would
be in time. I couldn't believe that I really saw the rope floating
its whole length on the water, dry at first, then darkening wetly.
"Hang on, Chris!" Jerry said. "I can get it."
I caught his hand, and he snatched after the rope. But he plunged
wildly, nearly pulling me in, and scrambled up at once with one leg
wet to the hip.
"There's no bottom at all," he said queerly. "I believe the thing
rises straight out of the sea."
By that time the boat was ten feet away from the Monster. It circled
once, very quietly, as if it were trying to decide which way to go,
and then it drifted gently away toward the sea, with the rope
trailing along like a snake swimming beside it.
We stood there looking at the boat until it faded to a hazy speck,
and by that time the sun was really low. I don't think Greg
altogether realized what had happened. We'd played at being marooned
so often that I suppose he didn't quite see that this was different.
I hope that I shall never, never forget, as long as I live, what a
brick Jerry was through the whole of that nightmarish thing. I know
I never shall.
"Chris," he said, "you stay on this side. I'll go around to the
Headland side. Greg, you climb up on top. If any of us sees a boat
near enough to do any good, call the others, and we'll all yell and
wave things."
I'd never heard his voice so commanding, even in plays. He still had
on the cocked hat, and it looked very strange indeed. We scattered
as he ordered, and when the others had gone, I remembered that Greg
had on slippery-soled shoes instead of sneakers, which we usually
wear. I thought of calling after him to be careful, but he never was
a falling-down sort of person, even as a baby. I hoped, too, that he
would have sense enough to loop up that sash or take it off
entirely.
I sat on the Wecanicut side and stared at the shore and the water
till my eyes ached. More and more wind was blowing all the time,
straight from Wecanicut. It blew so hard in my face that my eyes
watered and I couldn't be sure whether or not I did see boats. In
books, people think of all their past sins when they're in perilous
positions, but all I could think of was that a boat _must_ come
before dark. I did think of how much it all was my fault, but that
was not far enough in the past to count. Presently Jerry came back
and said that if we moved a little toward each other we could see
just as much of the bay and consult at the same time. So we did, and
sat down not very far apart. _I_ said that I supposed we ought to
change off with Greg, because it was horrid lonely up there, but
Jerry said:
"Nonsense; he likes to be alone. He's probably pretending he's the
King of the Cannibal Isle, or something, and not worrying a bit."
"I was looking us up in the dictionary the other day," I said,
trying to forget the Sea Monster for a minute, "and _Gregory_ means
'watchful, vigilant'."
"Now's the first time he's ever lived up to his name, then," said
Jerry. "Keep looking, Chris, and don't moon about."
We sat there for quite a long time without saying anything, and the
last little golden sliver of sun disappeared behind the point, and
the lighthouse on the Headland came out suddenly, though it was
still quite light, and began to wink--two long flashes and two short
ones.
"Isn't it queer," Jerry said, "to think that people are there and we
can't possibly tell them."
"It's worse than queer," I said.
Then we were still again, till presently Jerry said:
"Do you hear that funny noise, Chris?"
I had been listening to it just then, and said "Yes" and that I
supposed it was the horrid noise the water made around on the other
side. For quite a time we didn't hear it, and then Jerry said:
"There it is again! The water must suck into those echoey hollows.
It sounds almost like a person groaning."
"Don't!" I said.
All at once he turned toward me and said in a queer, quick voice:
"Do you suppose it could possibly be Greg?"
I can't describe the way I felt when he said it, but if you've ever
felt the same you know what I mean. It was a little as though
something heavy dropped from my throat down to my toes, through me,
leaving me all empty, with cold, tingly things rushing up again to
my head. They were still rushing as we flew around the rock, and I
kept saying:
"It can't be Greg.... It _can't_ be...."
But it was.
He was lying doubled up, just below the high place where Jerry had
told him to keep watch. We didn't dare to touch him, because we
didn't know how badly he was hurt, and he couldn't seem to tell us.
But when I tried to put my arm under him, he pushed me a little and
said, "No, no," so I stopped. Then I saw that his right arm was
twisted under him horridly and that his shoulder looked all wrong. I
touched it very gently and asked him if it was that, and he said,
"Yes; don't!" We had to get him out somehow from that jaggedy place
in the rocks where he was lying. So Jerry got him under the arm that
wasn't hurt, and I took his legs, and we hauled him to a flattish
part of the rock.
I pulled off the football jersey and put it under him, and Jerry ran
back to get my skirt, which I'd put in the kit-bag when we fixed our
costumes. Just after Jerry had gone something dreadful happened.
Quite suddenly Greg seemed to shrink smaller, and his face grew
rather greenish and not at all like his, and his hand was perfectly
cold when I snatched it. I suppose he'd fainted from our carrying
him so stupidly, but I'd never seen anybody do it before and I
didn't know that was the way it looked. I'd never heard of people
dying from hurting their arms, but I thought that perhaps he was
hurt somewhere else that we didn't know about. But by the time Jerry
came back with the skirt Greg had opened his eyes and looked at me a
little like himself. There is a book in our medicine cupboard at
home called, "Hints on First Aid." Jerry and I used to like to look
at it, and Father said:
"Go ahead; you may need it some day." But neither of us could
remember anything that was at all useful now. I could plainly see
the picture of some queerly-drawn hands doing a "Spanish Windlass,"
but that wouldn't have done poor Greg any good at all. Jerry did
remember that you ought to cut people's clothes and not try to take
them off in the ordinary way, so he took out his knife and ripped up
the sleeve of Greg's jumper and the shoulder-seam of the white
brocaded waistcoat. I don't see how people can stand being Red Cross
nurses in France, for I'm sure I never could be one. Greg's shoulder
was quite awful,--what we could see, for it was almost dark now.
There was nothing at all we dared to do. We couldn't even bathe it,
for there was only sea-water, so I just sat and held Greg's other
hand and patted it. He didn't cry,--I think the hurting was too bad
for that,--but he moaned a little, and sometimes he said, "Hurts,
Chris."
I tried to tell him a story, the way I did when we all had the
measles and he was so much sicker than the rest of us, but he
couldn't listen. So we just sat there in the dark--it was perfectly
dark now and we couldn't see one another at all--and I began to
count the flashes of the Headland light--two long and two short, two
long and two short--till I thought I should scream. Suddenly Jerry
said:
"Are you hungry, Chris?"
I said that I wasn't, and asked him if he was. But he said:
"No, not very."
There were real waves on the Wecanicut side of the Monster now, and
the wind was still blowing from that direction harder than ever. Now
and then a drop of spray would flick my cheek, and I think the sound
of the wind around the rock was really more horrid than the noise
the water made. It seemed like midnight, but it was really quite
early in the evening, when Jerry saw the lights bobbing along the
shore of Wecanicut. They were lanterns, two of them, and they
stopped quite often, as if the people were looking for something.
For a minute I couldn't even move. Then I scrambled and slid after
Jerry to the place on the Monster that most nearly faced the
Wecanicut point. I don't think Greg really knew we'd left him; at
least he didn't make a sound.
The lanterns swung and bobbed nearer till they almost reached the
point, and we could hear faint shouts. Jerry and I braced our feet
against the slimy rocks and shrieked into the dark, and the wind
rushed down our throats and burned them. We could hear the people
quite clearly now.
"It's Father's voice," Jerry said. "Oh, Chris, the wind is dead
against us. _Now_ for it!"
I'd always thought Jerry could shout louder than any boy I ever
heard, but you can't imagine how high and thin both our voices
sounded out there on the Sea Monster. We heard Father's voice quite
distinctly:
"Chris-ti-ine ... Jer-r-r-y ... ti-in-e!"
We shouted till our chests felt scraped raw, the way you feel when
you've run too hard, and the wind tore our voices straight out to
sea, away from Wecanicut. The lanterns stood quite still for a
minute more, and then they bobbed away. At first I didn't believe
that they were really growing smaller and smaller. But they were,
and at last they were gone entirely, far down the shore.
"Are you crying, Chris?" Jerry said suddenly, in a queer, wheezy
voice. He'd been shouting even harder than I had.
"I think not," I said, and my own voice was very strange indeed.
Jerry whacked me hard on the back, and said:
"Good old Chris! _Good_ old Chris!"
The shore of Wecanicut was so black that we might have dreamed the
lanterns, but I still could hear the way Father's own voice had
sounded, calling "Chris-ti-ine!" We almost stumbled over Greg when
we crawled back to him, and he said: "Can we go home now, Chris?"
The wind gnashed around in a spiteful kind of way, and Jerry touched
my hand suddenly and said: "Chris, it's raining."