"Thirty or so--perhaps forty."
"And you have eaten all but those?"--pointing with savage contempt to
five of the round, white balls; "give me those for your wife."
"My dear man, Louise has too much Island blood in her not to be able to
do better than I--or you--in a case like ours. And as you have kindly
constituted yourself her providore, you had better go and look for a
nest yourself."
"You dog!"--and the sharp-edged coral stone crashed into his brain.
* * * * *
When Enderby returned, he found Mrs Langton sitting up on the
creeper-covered mound that over-looked the beach where he had left
Langton.
"Come away from here," he said, "into the shade. I have found a few
turtle-eggs."
They walked back a little and sat down. But for the wild riot in his
brain, Enderby would have noted that every vestige of colour had left
her face.
"You must be hungry," he thought he was saying to her, and he placed
the white objects in her lap.
She turned them slowly over and over in her hands, and then dropped
them with a shudder. Some were flecked with red.
"For God's sake," the man cried, "tell me what you know!"
"I saw it all," she answered.
"I swear to you, Mrs Lan----" (the name stuck in his throat) "I never
meant it. As God is my witness, I swear it. If we ever escape from here
I will give myself up to justice as a murderer."
The woman, with hands spread over her face, shook her head from side to
side and sobbed. Then she spoke. "I thought I loved him, once....
Yet it was for me ... and you saved my life over and over again in
the boat. All sinners are forgiven we are told.... Why should not
you be? ... and it was for me you did it. And I won't let you give
yourself up to justice or any one. I'll say he died in the boat." And
then the laughter of hysterics.
* * * * *
When, some months later, the JOSEPHINE, whaler, of New London, picked
them up on her way to Japan, VIA the Carolines and Pelews, the captain
satisfactorily answered the query made by Enderby if he could marry
them. He "rayther thought he could. A man who was used ter ketchin' and
killin'whales, the powerfullest creature of Almighty Gawd's creation,
was ekal to marryin' a pair of unfortunit human beans in sich a
pre-carus situation as theirs."
* * * * *
And, by the irony of fate, the Enderbys (that isn't their name) are now
living in a group of islands where there's quite a trade done in
turtle, and whenever a ship's captain comes to dine with them they
never have the local dish--turtle eggs--for dinner. "We see them so
often," Enderby explains, "and my wife is quite tired of them."