AFTER TO-MORROW----
The truth of his loss was hardly to be credited as Grenville continued
to stare below where the hollowed log had been.
There was not a sign of a living thing in the clearing or near-by
jungle. There had been no sounds of unusual movement in the thicket,
he was sure, or otherwise he must have wakened. No voices had spoken,
since his ears had all but ached to catch the slightest disturbance.
On the blue of the sea, so tremendously expanded from this particular
point of vantage, there was not a hint of a sail. But the fact
remained his boat was gone, with all the work it represented, and all
the hope their situation had centered upon it for them both.
An utter sinking of the heart assailed him. His moment of sleep, he
told himself, could have been no more treacherous had it been planned
by a scheming enemy to complete their abandonment to some rapidly
impending fate. And yet had he waked in the gray of the dawn, with his
bombs and fuses still too damp for employment, and his cannon planted
only to guard the trail, the boat could hardly have been saved. At
most, his protest would merely have betrayed the fact he was camped
there on the terrace.
A new line of thought sprang into his brain, as one suggestion after
another was swiftly deduced from his loss. The natives who had landed
and carried off his precious craft must certainly have found the wall
with which he had barred the trail. He could hardly doubt they knew of
his presence on the hill. They might even now be lying in wait to get
him the moment he appeared.
His preconceived theory, that they dared not land while those tidal
sounds still haunted this end of the island, received a shattering
blow. Their craft was doubtless hidden now behind either one of the
other lofty walls comprised by the neighboring hills. The thieves had
cut off all possible hope of his escape with Elaine by means of his
solid, if crude, canoe, and could finally starve them on the hill, if
they had no courage for a battle.
Yet how had they happened on his boat and why had they removed it?
That they must have carried it bodily down to the shore, through the
jungle, was absolutely certain. And this, he thought, argued a
half-dozen men, though it might have been done by four.
He remained there, stunned by this utterly defeating discovery,
watching the thicket for the slightest sign that might betray the
presence of the enemy and revolving the proposition over and over in
his mind. When at last he admitted that the natives might have known
the log was lying there, if they had not indeed prepared it with fire
for some of their uses the previous year, he was more than verging on
the facts. They had felled it solely for a boat--and much of their
work he had completed.
This line of reasoning did not, however, serve to quiet further
questions. The visitors must certainly have wondered how it came about
that the log was so nearly hollowed. The clay, still plastered upon
it, must have suggested to their minds the work of a craftsman minus
tools. That the workman must be present on the island would be more
than suspected, since his boat was not even launched.
They might suppose the tiger had captured and devoured him--always
admitting they knew of the brute's former presence on the place. It
seemed far more likely to Grenville they had found his tracks about the
spring, his gate on the trail, and the signs of his recent fires and
general activity about the region of his smelter, and would therefore
conclude he was still encamped on the hill.
He could fancy a half-dozen pairs of maliciously glittering eyes
fastened even now upon the crest and edges of the terrace, all hidden
by the thickets. Had the poisoned dart from a blowpipe come winging
swiftly up from the shadows of the foliage, he should not have been
surprised.
But not a leaf below him was disturbed. Not a sound arose to warn his
eager ears. With a sense of bitter rage and humiliation in all his
system, he finally crept once more to the trail, and beyond it to the
cliff's final shelving.
From this extremity of the heights new aspects of the island were in
view, as well as different expanses of the sea. His keen eyes searched
the jungle and the clearings first, with no more results than before.
It was not until he gazed afar, on the darkening silver of the waters,
that his search was at all rewarded. Even then, for a moment he was
not wholly convinced that what he saw was not a spearlike leaf of
foliage projected beyond the clean-cut edge of the farthest of the
island's tufa towers.
But the angle of color detached itself and receded in far perspective.
It was plainly the sail of the visiting craft, previously hidden from
his sight by the hill at the island's end. It was already far on a
northern course, where he should not have thought to find it. The
freshening breeze was heeling it over gracefully; it would vanish in
less than half an hour.
He wondered instantly--had they towed away his boat? Or might they
have left it moored in some inlet of the island, to be taken upon some
future visit?
Stifling an impulse to hasten down the trail, and aware that one, or
even more, of the natives might have been left concealed upon the
place, to ambush himself and Elaine, or anyone else suspected of being
present on the rock, he remained behind his barrier of stones, no less
cautious than before.
The fact that the entire morning passed in apparent security, with
never the flicker of a leaf below to advertise a lurking menace, could
not suffice to render Grenville careless or overconfident. He had told
Elaine of their loss--which worried her less than himself. Together
they maintained an all-day vigilance, half expectant of the
sailing-craft's return and keyed to the highest tension of expectancy
at every stirring of a shrub below them in the jungle.
Grenville finally armed himself with his bow and straightest arrow, to
descend the trail, go quietly over to the spring, and then to the spot
from which his boat had vanished. About the pool of crystal water
there was not so much as a track of human boots or feet, other than his
own. There were none to be seen about the foot of the trail, where
there was ample dust in which they might have been recorded.
Where his boat had lain, with its end on a rock, there were far fewer
footprints in the ash and soil than Sidney could have believed
possible, judging the visitors at only four in number and their task
not particularly light. Apparently, however, they had landed down
beyond the jungle, proceeded straight to the log, and, wasting no time
in wondering how it chanced to be covered with clay or hollowed to a
shell, had taken it up, to depart with it as swiftly and directly as
possible.
Even his tools still lay beside the hollow tree utilized for a smelter.
The one explanation that addressed itself to his mind as being
plausible was that the visitors, knowing of the log and having planned
to secure it, perhaps in merely passing by the island, had come ashore
so soon as the first faint gray of dawn broke the shadows of the
jungle, when they had taken their prize and halted for nothing, not
even a search for whatsoever tools they must have seen had been
employed.
Once more his original theory of their superstitious fright of the
island's "haunt" seemed to Grenville to be confirmed. He felt the
natives had sneaked ashore--not in fear of himself, since they could
not have foreknown his presence on the hill, but in possible fear of
some spirit of the place whose wailing filled them with dread.
Barely less cautiously than heretofore, he followed the faintly
imprinted trail of the boat's mysterious abductors, where it led across
the clearing. He was certain now that a cleared path did exist where
he had partially explored the previous morning. But branches and
shrubbery had been freshly cut, as if to insure the silent passage of
the log.
The lane thus created through the thicket led directly down an easy
slope to a broken bit of seawall at the bottom. This, at high tide,
would be scarcely a foot above the water. Here the log had undoubtedly
been rested. Both broken clay and a charcoal smudge recorded the
unseen fact.
The entire inlet was no more than twenty feet across. It was bounded
on either side by pitted walls that permitted no access to the jungle.
The last faint hope of again beholding his precious boat now vanished
from Grenville's mind. It had not been moored, nor probably even
towed, but doubtless loaded bodily on the visitor's deck, to be taken
to parts unknown.
But, if this heavy fact sunk home in his breast, the man was somewhat
relieved, at least, concerning a probable native left behind. He felt
practically certain that none of the crew of the native craft had
stepped beyond his clearing. How much they might guess as to who had
hollowed the heavy log was another matter altogether. He knew that
their tale would be widely told--and felt that developments would
follow.
He went to Elaine, to whom he owed a report.
"I think we're alone on the place," he said, and related all he had
discovered. "We may as well re-light our fires," he added, in
conclusion, "and eat the best our sunny possessions afford."
Elaine could not so promptly recover from all she had undergone. She
still sat staring at his face, a prey to confused emotions.
"Suppose they had really been friendly, after all--and we let them go
and leave us here like that?"
"In that event they may return, since the boat will excite a bit of
wonder."
"You mean they will know, of course, that someone must be here who made
it?"
"It certainly tells that story rather plainly."
She was thinking rapidly.
"Then--if they shouldn't happen to be friendly, they would know it all
just the same--and may still come back to--look us up?"
Grenville nodded.
"I shall certainly go to work with that chance in view."
"Yes," she agreed, "we'll certainly do all we can. But another boat
would take you weeks! After all your patient, tedious work--to have it
stolen like that! Oh, I could cry, if I weren't so vexed and sorry!"
Grenville smiled despite his sense of loss.
"Perhaps I can rig some sort of a catamaran," he answered. "But for
day and night sailing, such as we would doubtless have before us, the
best of boats would be none too comfortable."
"And we don't know where to sail."
"Well--not precisely."
"Then--what is the first thing to do?"
"Cook and devour a hearty dinner."
"But after that--to-morrow?"
"Thank God for peace--and prepare for war, meanwhile praying it may not
come."
Elaine was grave, but her voice was clear and steady.
"You think it will--that a fight will come? ... I'd much rather know
the worst."
"So would I!" said Grenville, cheerfully. "We can't. We can only get
ready to acquit ourselves like--well, like gentlemen, and keep out an
eye for a steamer.... Would you mind retreating to the cave I found,
if dire necessity arose?"
"I'll go wherever you tell me," she answered, with a smile that went to
his heart. "But of course I can't help wishing that a steamer would
really come."