CAUGHT
The two sailors each had the same thought. They wanted to catch this
strange man, whether or not he was really wild. So when Will and
Sam, who were inside the queer little wooden house, heard that noise
outside they at once thought they had a chance to catch the wild man,
if it should prove to be that person who had caused the sound.
“Lay low and go easy,” whispered Will to Sam. “I’ll take a look out
and see if it’s him.”
“Go ahead,” whispered Sam.
Very quietly Will went on his tiptoes to the door and looked out.
Instantly he darted back inside the little house again.
“Did you see him?” asked Sam.
“Yes, he’s coming up the path. He must have stepped on a stick that
broke and made that noise. But he’s coming right up here—it’s his
home, you know. When he comes inside we’ll grab him.”
“All right,” agreed Sam. “But it’s sort of rough to treat a man like
that when he comes into his own house. You wouldn’t like that, Will,
and I wouldn’t either.”
“No, maybe not,” agreed the other sailor, “But this is for his own
good. We aren’t going to hurt the wild man. We want to be friends
with him. But very likely he’s so wild he won’t trust us. All we want
to do is to talk to him and tell him we’ll be friends and help him.”
“Oh, well, I guess that’s all right,” agreed Sam.
“Besides,” went on Will, “we don’t want this fellow with his long
hair and beard scaring Bunny and Sue.”
“No, that’s so,” admitted Sam. “He is sort of scary looking,” he
added, as he peered from the window and saw the wild man, as they
called him, coming up the path that led to the little wooden house
amid the cocoanut trees. “He looks like some monkeys I’ve seen in the
jungle,” added Sam.
“Yes, he’s a queer chap,” said Will. “Now don’t make any noise and
we’ll catch him.”
The sailors had talked in whispers since the noise had told them the
stranger was approaching. They now placed themselves, one on either
side of the door, to be ready to grab the fellow when he should come
in. From where they stood, Will and Sam could watch the wild man
coming along.
Every few seconds he would stop and seem to be listening with all
his might. He had seen some strangers in his house, and though these
strangers were kind people, who meant him no harm, the wild man did
not know that, for he had been alone so long that he had grown a
little queer.
After listening two or three times and hearing no sound from his
house (for Will and Sam kept very quiet) the man walked on again. He
was now within ten feet of the place and was walking a little faster.
The sailors had a good look at him. Truly he seemed a wild person.
His clothes were tattered and torn and in one hand he carried a big
club with a knob on the end. But it was his long hair and long and
matted beard that gave him the wildest look.
“He looks just like the wild man in the circus!” whispered Sam.
“Keep quiet!” whispered Will. “He’ll hear you!”
But the strange man did not appear to hear the sailors. He came on, a
little more slowly now, and was almost at the door. Will and Sam were
on their tiptoes, ready to jump and grab the fellow, when, all of a
sudden, Sam went:
“A-ker-choo!”
It was such a loud sneeze that it made Will jump and it frightened
the man outside. He jumped, too—jumped up in the air. Perhaps he
thought that when Sam sneezed “A-ker-choo!” he said: “I’ll catch you!”
At any rate, some sneezes do sound like that, and it is no wonder the
strange man was startled. In another moment he turned around and ran
toward the woods.
“Now you’ve done it!” cried Will. “You’ve scared him, Sam!”
“I didn’t go for to do it!” said Sam, quite ashamed of himself. “I
sure didn’t go for to do it!”
“No matter, you did it!” said Will. “Now we’ve got to run after him
and catch him! Come on!”
Will dashed out of the little house followed by Sam, and the two
raced after the wild man. But the queer chap had a head start of the
sailors, and, as you know, sailors are not very good runners at best.
Their legs get warped and twisted from steadying themselves on
rolling ships so much, maybe.
At any rate, the wild man was well ahead of Sam and Will. And he knew
just where to run—which paths to take through the woods. This the
sailors did not know.
So, after a short chase the two sailors lost sight of the wild man.
Then it was useless for Will and Sam to keep on after him.
“He got away!” said Sam.
“And all your fault, too,” declared Will. “What did you have to go
and sneeze for?”
“I couldn’t help it,” declared Sam. “Can you stop a sneeze when you
want to?”
“Well, maybe not,” agreed Will. “But we’ll have to go back and tell
Mr. Brown we saw this fellow but couldn’t catch him.”
“We’ll have another try for him,” said Sam. “But while we’re here,
let’s finish looking around his house. Maybe we can find what ship
this came from.”
“All right,” agreed Will.
While the wild man was running as fast as he could to get away from
those he probably thought were his enemies, Will and Sam went back to
the little wooden house.
They had not looked around very long before Sam saw something that
caused him to grasp Will by the arm and point, saying:
“Look at that!”
What Sam pointed to was a name painted on a piece of wood behind one
of the chests in the little house. The wood was broken off from a
lifeboat, it seemed.
“The _Mary Bell_!” read Will, for those were the words. “That’s the
name of the ship that was wrecked, Sam. That’s where this deckhouse
came from—the _Mary Bell_.”
“Yes,” agreed the other sailor. “And—don’t you remember?—the _Mary
Bell_ was the name of the schooner that Mr. Pott sailed on—the Mr.
Pott that Bunny and Sue told us about. You know, the man that was
pitched off his horse and they took him green apples and buttercups
in the hospital. Don’t you remember?”
“Of course I do,” said Will. “Then Mr. Pott’s schooner, the _Mary
Bell_, must have been wrecked on this island. This deckhouse from the
wreck was washed up on shore and this wild man has been living in it.
But there was another man—Mr. Pott’s son, you know—a fellow named
Harry, so Bunny tells. What became of him?”
“That we don’t know,” replied Sam. “Nor what became of the treasure,
either. But this is where the _Mary Bell_ was wrecked.”
“Come on!” cried Will, greatly excited. “We’ll go back and tell Mr.
Brown and then we’ll try to catch this wild man.”
As the sailors turned to cross Cocoanut Island and go back to the
palm-hut camp, Bunny and Sue were getting ready to catch the same
wild man—only the children did not know it.
After Will and Sam had gone that morning and while Mr. and Mrs. Brown
were talking matters over and wondering when the _Beacon_ would come
back, Bunny and Sue went a little way from camp to look about and
play.
“Don’t go too far away, my dears,” called Mrs. Brown. “We don’t want
you to get lost.”
“We won’t,” promised Bunny.
He and Sue found some beautiful scarlet blossoms growing near the
spring of water.
“Oh, how lovely! Don’t you wish we had some like these to take to Mr.
Pott in the hospital, Bunny?”
“Yes, I do,” said the little boy. “Mr. Pott would like these. And
he’d like cocoanuts, too!”
“Let’s take some home for him!” proposed Sue, going toward them.
Before Bunny could answer there was a rustling in the bushes near the
children. At first they thought it was just another cocoanut falling
from a tree, for this often happened. But a moment later Sue, looking
up, saw something that made her cry out:
“Look, Bunny! The wild man!”
Bunny glanced up and saw, thrusting itself out of the bushes, the
head and face of the strange creature with his matted hair and long,
straggly beard.
Sue was just going to run and Bunny was going to follow her when the
wild man spoke. In a very gentle voice he said:
“Don’t be afraid, children! I wouldn’t hurt you for the world. I’m
not half as wild as I look. I’m only a poor, shipwrecked sailor. I
live in the little wooden house. There is some one in my house now,
and that’s why I ran away from it. But don’t be afraid of me. I won’t
harm you.”
“I—now—I’m not afraid,” declared Bunny.
“That’s right, my little chap—don’t be afraid! I wouldn’t hurt any
one,” went on the man. “I have been very sick, and I guess I must
have been out of my head. That’s why I ran away when I first saw you.
But now I’m right again. I want to get off this island. Have you
folks a boat? If you have we can sail away in her. Oh, I have been so
lonesome here! I want to get away. Have you a boat?”
“My father has a boat,” said Bunny. “But we came off a steamer and
it’s coming back for us.”
“That’s good!” cried the man, no longer wild. He dropped the club he
carried and walked slowly toward Bunny and Sue.
“Please take me to your father, children,” he begged. “I’ll tell him
who I am and how I happened to be wrecked. Oh, I am so glad there
is a chance to get off this island! Come, children, take me to your
father.”
He held out his hands. Bunny took one and Sue the other. Then the
children went back to their father and mother.
Thus it was that Bunny Brown and his sister Sue caught the “wild
man.”