HAZEL waited and listened. So did Helen, and her breath came fast; for in
the stilly night she heard light but mysterious sounds. Something was
moving on the sand very slowly and softly, but nearer and nearer. Her
heart began to leap. She put out her hand instinctively to clutch Mr.
Hazel; but he was too far off. She had the presence of mind and the
self-denial to disguise her fears; for she knew he would come headlong to
her assistance.
She said in a quavering whisper, "I'm not frightened; only v--very
c--curious."
And now she became conscious that not only one but several things were
creeping about.
Presently the creeping ceased, and was followed by a louder and more
mysterious noise. In that silent night it sounded like raking and
digging. Three or four mysterious visitants seemed to be making graves.
This was too much; especially coming as it did after talk about the
primeval dead. Her desire to scream was so strong, and she was so afraid
Hazel would break his neck, if she relieved her mind in that way, that
she actually took her handkerchief and bit it hard.
But this situation was cut short by a beneficent luminary. The sun rose
with a magnificent bound--it was his way in that latitude--and everything
unpleasant winced that moment; the fog shivered in its turn, and appeared
to open in furrows as great javelins of golden light shot through it from
the swiftly rising orb.
Soon those golden darts increased to streams of portable fire, that burst
the fog and illumined the wet sands. And Helen burst out laughing like
chanticleer, for this first break of day revealed the sextons that had
scared her--three ponderous turtles, crawling, slow and clumsy, back to
sea. Hazel joined her, and they soon found what these evil spirits of the
island had been at, poor wretches. They had each buried a dozen eggs in
the sand; one dozen of which were very soon set boiling. At first,
indeed, Helen objected that they had no shells, but Hazel told her she
might as well complain of a rose without a thorn. He assured her turtles'
eggs were a known delicacy, and very superior to birds' eggs; and so she
found them. They were eaten with the keenest relish.
"And now," said Helen, "for my discoveries. First, here are my English
leaves, only bigger. I found them on a large tree."
"English leaves!" cried Hazel, with rapture. "Why, it is the caoutchouc!"
"Oh, dear," said Helen, in a disappointed tone; "I took it for the
India-rubber free."
"It is the India-rubber tree; and I have been hunting for it all over the
island in vain, and using wretchedly inferior gums for want of it."
"I'm so glad," said Helen. "And now I have something else to show you.
Something that curdled my blood; but I dare say I was very foolish." She
then took him half across the sand and pointed out to him a number of
stones dotted over the sand in a sort of oval. These stones, streaked
with sea grass, and incrusted with small shells, were not at equal
distances, but yet, allowing for gaps, they formed a decided figure.
Their outline resembled a great fish, wanting the tail.
"Can this be chance?" asked Helen; "oh, if it should be what I fear, and
that is--savages!"
Hazel considered it attentively a long time. "Too far at sea for living
savages," said he. "And yet it cannot be chance. What on earth is it? It
looks Druidical. But how can that be? The island was smaller when these
were placed here than it is now." He went nearer and examined one of the
stones; then he scraped away the sand from its base, and found it was not
shaped like a stone, but more like a whale's rib. He became excited; went
on his knees, and tore the sand up with his hands. Then he rose up
agitated, and traced the outline again. "Great Heaven!" said he, "why, it
is a ship."
"A ship!"
"Ay," said he, standing in the middle of it; "here, beneath our feet,
lies man; with his work, and his treasures. This carcass has been here
for many a long year; not so very long, either; she is too big for the
sixteenth century, and yet she must have been sunk when the island was
smaller. I take it to be a Spanish or Portuguese ship; probably one of
those treasure-ships our commodores, and chartered pirates, and the
American buccaneers, used to chase about these seas. Here lie her bones
and the bones of her crew. Your question was soon answered. All that we
can say has been said; can do has been done; can suffer has been
suffered."
They were silent, and the sunk ship's bones moved them strangely. In
their deep isolation from the human race, even the presence of the dead
brought humanity somehow nearer to them.
They walked thoughtfully away, and made across the sands for Telegraph
Point.
Before they got home, Helen suggested that perhaps, if he were to dig in
the ship, he might find something useful.
He shook his head: "Impossible! The iron has all melted away like sugar
long before this. Nothing can have survived but gold and silver, and they
are not worth picking up, much less digging for; my time is too precious.
No, you have found two buried treasures to-day--turtles' eggs, and a
ship, freighted, as I think, with what men call the precious metals.
Well, the eggs are gold, and the gold is a drug--there it will lie for
me."
Both discoveries bore fruits. The ship: Hazel made a vow that never again
should any poor ship lay her ribs on this island for want of warning. He
buoyed the reefs. He ran out to White Water Island, and wrote an earnest
warning on the black reef, and, this time, he wrote with white on black.
He wrote a similar warning, with black on white, at the western extremity
of Godsend Island.
The eggs: Hazel watched for the turtles at daybreak; turned one now and
then; and fed Helen on the meat or its eggs, morn, noon and night.
For some time she had been advancing in health and strength. But, when
the rains declined considerably, and she was all day in the air, she got
the full benefit of the wonderful climate, and her health, appetite and
muscular vigor became truly astonishing; especially under what Hazel
called the turtle cure; though, indeed, she was cured before. She ate
three good meals a day, and needed them; for she was up with the sun, and
her hands and feet never idle till he set.
Four months on the island had done this. But four months had not shown
those straining eyes the white speck on the horizon; the sail, so looked
and longed for.
Hazel often walked the island by himself; not to explore, for he knew the
place well by this time, but he went his rounds to see that all his
signals were in working order.
He went to Mount Lookout one day with this view. It was about an hour
before noon. Long before he got to the mountain he had scanned the
horizon carefully, as a matter of course; but not a speck. So, when he
got there, he did not look seaward, but just saw that his flagstaff was
all right and was about to turn away and go home, when he happened to
glance at the water; and there, underneath him, he saw--a ship; standing
toward the island.