THE NATIVES
“Are you an apparition?” the boy smilingly inquired, when he was near
enough to speak. “It is hard for me to believe my eyes.” Then, before
the girls could reply, the lad was eagerly asking, “Have you come in a
boat that is anchored nearby, and will you take little sister and me
over to the mainland?”
Virginia, being the oldest, stepped forward and held out her hand,
smiling in her frank, friendly way. “I wish that I might reply in the
affirmative,” she said, “but that I cannot do, for we are shipwrecked,
as I suppose you are also.” Then she told of their recent adventures,
ending with, “But I am sure that we will soon be found by the Vine Haven
authorities. This island cannot be far away, and so in time their search
ought to lead them here.”
“I sincerely hope that they will for all our sakes,” the boy declared,
“but before I tell you of the misadventures which led to Peggy and my
being shipwrecked, I shall cook these fish for I am sure, if you have
had nothing to eat since yesterday, that you must be nearly famished.”
Then, he added, with a smile that assured the girls that he was just the
kind of a lad Megs could depend on, he said: “Permit me to introduce my
little sister, Mistress Peggy Wentworth. My own name is Winston.”
Virginia then told the first name of each of the six girls. “You never
could remember so many last names, and so there is no need to tell them.
Now, what can we do to help prepare the fish?” Then Virginia hesitated.
“Although it doesn’t seem quite right for us to eat up your supplies.”
The boy laughed. “Luckily for us, this particular kind of a small fish
seems eager to be caught. I can get as many as I want. I’ll rig up some
more lines and we can all go fishing when our larder gets empty.”
“That boy has been well brought up, hasn’t he?” Eleanor said to
Margaret, when they had left the group to search for sticks for the
fire.
“Yes, indeed. And isn’t he good-looking?”
“Little Peggy would be a beauty if she were prettily dressed and had her
hair cut.”
At another time Sally, the pampered darling of an idolizing mother would
have scorned such coarse fare, but she ate her share at the strange
banquet which soon followed as though it were the most delicious kind of
food.
Luckily there was enough to satisfy even the ravenous appetites of the
guests, then each was given a large shell and told to go to the spring
for a drink. Laughingly they trooped along to the ferny dell, while
their host remained behind to bury the bones.
“Winston,” Margaret said, when they returned, “we are all curious to
know how you happened to be here. Will you tell us?”
“Yes, willingly,” was the reply, then the lad slipped an arm about his
little sister as though it were a comfort to have her close, when he
told, what the girls knew from his expression, would be a sad story. “My
father having died,” he began, “my mother, Peggy and I set sail in a
merchant ship bound for a port in the South where we were to make our
home with my father’s brother. That was last December. There were
constant storms and at last the captain told the few passengers that the
boat might flounder at any time. My first act was to fasten a life belt
about mother, who, not being well, kept to her cabin.
“Little sister had gone up on deck, although a gale was raging and the
waves were so high that each one seemed about to break over the deck and
engulf us. I was terrorized to see that she had made her way to the bow,
and having reached there was afraid to return. Clinging to the rail, she
turned toward me a white, pleading face. At that moment the boat tipped
so far over that the deck seemed almost perpendicular. ‘Hold fast,
Peggy!’ I shouted. I clung to a corner of the cabin until the vessel
righted. Then I ran across the unsteady deck and hastily fastened about
her the belt I had carried. As I stood up, I heard her scream. She was
pointing back of me. I turned and saw a roaring, rushing wave that
lifted its angry crest high about the deck. I knew that nothing could
save us, but instinctively I caught little sister in one arm and held
hard to the rail with my other hand. I tried to shelter her from the
torrent of water that surged over us. With tremendous force it hurled us
against the rail which instantly snapped and in another moment we were
both being whirled about in the seething water back of the boat. No one
had seen us, and, even if they had, the merchant ship could not have
been turned to come to our rescue. I still held my sister’s dress and
with the other hand I was clinging to the part of the rail which had
broken, permitting us to fall overboard. For a time we were driven along
at an almost breathless speed by the next mountainous wave. At the crest
I looked back and was glad to see that the boat had righted and still
had a chance of making port, but I have since doubted that, as surely
our mother would have had the coast searched for us. Luckily I am an
excellent swimmer. I put my sister’s arms over the rail and then swam or
floated until at last we found ourselves in calmer water. This assured
me that a harbor had been reached.
“My feet soon touched bottom, then, on the next wave, we rode high on
the beach, remaining there when it had receded. Since then I have had to
recall all that I have read and use a good deal of invention besides,
but we have managed to keep alive. Several times I have caught a glimpse
of what I believed might be mainland, but I never have been quite sure
enough to risk the life of my little sister by venturing out on our
small raft. It is none too securely made, as reeds are all that I had to
lash together the logs.”
It was very hot in the little sheltered hollow and Sally’s head was
nodding by the time that the tale was told.
“Poor girl,” Virg said softly, “she has been terribly frightened, but
she has been very brave, I think.”
“You all look tired and sleepy,” the boy rose as he spoke. “I am now
going to take Peggy out on my raft for we will need many more fish for
the evening meal. Tomorrow you may have a turn,” he assured Virginia
before she could voice the protest that he knew was coming, “but right
now I want you to all sleep, for at least two hours. Go in our house if
you wish.”
But Virginia declared that the warm sandy ground made a good bed.
Indeed, as soon as they saw the raft bobbing on little waves in a
sheltered harbor, they all lay down and were soon sound asleep.