PREPARATIONS.
"Sit down, Charley," said the captain sternly, "are you crazy, lad?
You can do nothing in your present state, and if you go and make
yourself sick, you will cause us all a deal of trouble and worry."
Charley sank back upon his couch. "But there is so much to be done,
Captain," he protested.
"Now look here, lad," said the old sailor, "say those fellows have got
their boat finished and start for that island we left this morning, it
will take them quite a while to get there and I expect they will look
it over a bit before following us. Take the time spent there and the
time it will take them to reach here, an' I reckon it will be late in
the afternoon before we see anything of them."
"It won't do to take any chances, Captain. We had ought to be ready
now."
"Go ahead and say what you want done and we will do it while you
sleep," said the captain. "But if you persist in getting up, I'll be
hanged if I'll do a stroke of work, outlaws or no outlaws."
"Me neither," chimed in Chris.
"Better go to sleep, Charley," advised his chum. "I am going to get a
nap, myself. I know I'll be able to work better for it."
Charley gave in with an unwilling sigh. "All right, I suppose I'll
have to do as you all say."
"Tell us your plans and we will see that they are carried out," the
captain said.
"We cannot keep those fellows from landing on the island," said the
young leader, thoughtfully. "There are so many places where they can
come ashore, and we are too few to guard the entire coast. I do not
think we can even hold the walls against so many. There are more gaps
in them than we could defend. I have thought it all over and I believe
that all we can do is to confine the defense to this house. We ought
to be able to hold this place until the Indians come."
"My ideas exactly," approved the captain.
"It's the only sensible thing to do," Walter agreed.
"To be successful, it is necessary for us to have a good supply of food
and water. I intended to dry the venison, but there is not time to do
that, you will have to cut it into thin strips and smoke it, that will
not take long and it will keep for several days. That big copper and
all the gourds should be filled with water and brought inside. When
that is all done, we will have food and drink to last us a week with
care."
"Chris and I will see to it all," said the captain arising. "Is that
all, lad?"
"We had ought to keep a lookout at the landing so as to know when they
come and be ready for them."
"We'll 'tend to that when we get the other chores done. It's too early
to expect them yet, anyway. Now you lie down and get a nap, lads, and
don't worry, Chris and I will look out for everything."
Charley laid back and closed his eyes, obediently, while Chris and the
captain passed out of the hut to attend to the tasks set them.
The two boys were soon fast asleep.
It was noon before Walter awoke, sat up, and looked around him. He
noted that the workers had already completed their tasks; long strings
of smoked venison strips were hung down from the roof, gourds and
copper kettle were brimming full of sweet, clean water, and all of the
guns had been freshly cleaned and oiled.
Treading softly so as not to awaken his chum, Walter passed out of the
hut.
The captain and Chris were busily engaged in trying to dispatch a pot
of venison stewed with yams, and Walter lost no time in joining them.
"Well, we are all through," observed the captain as he took a second
helping of stew. "We would have called you to dinner, but I reckoned
the sleep would do you more good. How do you feel now?"
"All right," Walter answered. "You should have left some of that work
for us to do, Captain."
"I reckon you will have enough to do before we get a chance to leave
this island," said the old sailor with a sigh. "If you are through,
Chris, take your gun and go down to the landing and keep a sharp
lookout. Those fellows had ought to be here this afternoon, some time.
I will come down and spell you in a couple of hours."
"You had better go in and get a nap yourself, Captain, while there is
nothing doing," said Walter. "It may be all hands on deck to-night."
"I reckon I'll take your advice, lad. I was awake all last night
worrying about you boys and I can't stand loss of sleep now like you
young fellows. I will just take forty winks. Call me when it is time
to spell Chris."
Walter sat waiting until the old sailor's loud snoring proclaimed he
was asleep. Then filling a small gourd with water from the spring, he
made his way into the fort, where he righted one of the overturned
canoes and fished out a large package from under the stern and undid
its fastenings. "I wonder they did not notice it when they carried the
canoe up," he muttered.
For a long time he was busily engaged with the contents of the package
and the gourd of water. At last he gave a sigh of triumphant
satisfaction which died away as he heard Charley's voice calling his
name from the hut.
With an exclamation of impatience, he emptied out the water, quickly
bound up the package again, and thrust it back in its old place under
the canoe's stern deck, then turning the canoe again bottom up, he
passed out of the fort whistling, carelessly.
Charley in the door of the hut eyed him curiously as he approached.
"What has happened to you?" he exclaimed, "you look as happy as if you
had discovered a gold mine."
"Well, I haven't," laughed his chum, "how's your leg now?"
"Stiff as a ramrod, and, whew, how it hurts," Charley said with a
grimace of pain. "I can't bear my weight on it."
"You don't want to try to," said Walter, severely. "Just go back to
your bunk and keep still. All the work is done, now, and I am going
down to the landing right off to relieve Chris so that he can get a
little sleep."
Charley obeyed and Walter made his way down to the landing where he
found Chris sitting on a log watching intently.
Walter took the gun from the tired little darky and sent him up to the
hut to rest.
The hours passed swiftly by without any signs of the outlaws. When
darkness fell, Walter abandoned his now useless post and made his way
up to the hut where he found his three companions gathered around the
camp-fire outside.
"Have you seen anything of them?" Charley inquired anxiously as he came
in sight. "Not a sign," Walter answered. "I think you have done wrong
in lighting that fire," he continued gravely. "There was a bare chance
that they would have given up the chase after not finding us at the
chief's island. If they are anywhere near, though, that fire will give
us dead away."
"They would not have given up the chance of getting the plumes they
have worked so hard to obtain as easily as all that," said his chum
decidedly. "Remember, they believe that Big Tiger and his son are
still with us and that the rest of the Indians are far away. No, they
would not have given up so easily after the trouble they have been to."
Walter said no more but helped himself to an ear of corn and a piece of
fish and fell to eating.
The silence that had fallen upon the party was broken by an exclamation
from Chris.
"Golly, dar dey is," he cried.
Far off in the direction of the chief's island, a tiny shaft of light
pierced the darkness.
"They are on the island we left," exclaimed Charley, "that's their
camp-fire."
"No, no," said Walter. "See, it is getting bigger, I bet they have
fired the wigwam."
In a few minutes all the party agreed with Walter, there was no
mistaking the cause of the pillar of flame that rose high in the air on
the distant island.
They watched it in silence until it died down and nothing remained but
a faint glare.
"Let's go to bed," said Charley at last. "If they are on the chief's
island, they will not bother us to-night."
But after a short discussion, it was decided to stand guard and watch,
Charley and Walter to stand on guard until midnight, and then to be
relieved by Chris and the captain.
The two sentinels climbed up on a portion of the wall that lay in the
shadow of a big tree and from which they could command a good view of
the rest of the wall and inclosure itself.
"I have been thinking that the unsavory reputation of this island may
keep those fellows from coming here," Walter observed in an undertone.
"It will likely keep Indian Charley away, and I am more afraid of him
than all the balance. I do not think it will stop the rest though,"
Charley answered, and they lapsed again into cautious silence.
The minutes had lengthened into an hour when there fell upon their ears
the now familiar tolling of the bell.
"I am going to have another look in that chapel," declared Walter, as
he slipped down from his perch.
"I'd like to go with you," said Charley, wistfully, "but my game leg
won't carry me that far." He watched his chum until he disappeared in
the shadow of the church.
Walter hesitated for a moment at the chapel doorway. It required more
courage to enter that gloomy, black, mysterious interior, alone, than
it had when he and Charley were together. Summoning up all his
resolution he passed through the gaping doorway into the blackness
beyond. All was dark and still inside, the bright moonlight shining
through the high little windows threw patches of ghostly light upon the
white, ghastly walls. Walter felt his flesh creep as he made his way
through the darkness up towards the bell.
He stumbled often and bruised his knees against the stone seats but at
last he reached the little platform and stood beneath the little tower.
He could not see up into its gloomy interior, but the great bell above
him tolled mournfully on.
For a space Walter stood silent, a superstitious dread creeping over
him. "Dreaming, dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before." A
horror grew upon him, a feeling that something, some being
antagonistic, repugnant to his very nature was sharing the darkness
with him. The strokes of the bell above him seemed to grow horribly
menacing to his feverish fancy. He struggled with himself to throw off
the mantle of terror descending upon him but the feeling grew and grew.
With a rush of unreasoning anger he flung up his gun and fired at the
swaying bell.
A shrill, human-like cry rang out, the bell ceased tolling, and a heavy
body crashed down at the terrified lad's feet.
Throwing out his arms Walter sank to the floor in a dead faint.
He opened his eyes again to see Charley bending over, examining him by
the light of a flaring torch.
"What, what was it?" he whispered.
Charley shifted the torch and held it close to a dark figure stretched
out on the stone floor.
Its glare lit up a face strangely human, and bearing the apparent mark
of centuries in its furrowed features and wrinkled skin.
"A big monkey," gasped Walter in astonishment.
"Yes," said Charley gently, "an old man monkey, old, old, very, very
old."