On a certain evening, some eight or ten days after that outburst on the
part of the Finn in connection with his demand for weapons, Billy
remarked to me, apropos of nothing in particular, as we sat together
studying as usual:
"That Dutchman is a queer chap and no mistake, Mr Blackburn. He will
sit for hours, saying never a word but: `Billy, pass me that,' or
`Billy, take hold of this,' and then all of a sudden he'll begin to
chatter like a parrot."
"Really!" said I. "And what does he chatter about?"
"Oh, all sorts of things," answered Billy, "chiefly about what he and
Svorenssen went through before they joined us here. And he likes to
hear how _we_ managed, too, before we settled down on Eden. Do you
know, I'm beginning to think he's not such a bad sort of chap after all.
He seems to admire you immensely."
"Does he, indeed?" I commented dryly. "In what particular way does he
reveal his admiration?"
"Well," said Billy, "he thinks you are perfectly wonderful, every way.
Wonderfully clever as a navigator, you know; clever to have been able to
build the sailing boat; still more clever to have designed and very
nearly built such a beautiful craft as the cutter; and most clever of
all to have built this bungalow. He said that he could understand that
a clever sailor like you might be able to build a boat; but he could not
understand how any sailor--even _you_--could build such a fine house.
He wanted to know how long it took us to build it, and how we set about
it, whether you invented it as we went on, or whether you drew it out on
paper beforehand; and when I said that you had drawn it all out before
we began to build, he said that he'd dearly like to see the drawing,
because it would give him some wrinkles if he should ever again be
shipwrecked."
"And what did you say to that?" I asked.
"Well," said Billy, "you see, I thought it was perhaps his roundabout
way of asking me to show him the plan, so I said I didn't know where it
was; that I rather thought you had destroyed it; and when I said that,
the poor chap looked so disappointed that I showed him what it was like,
by sketching it out on the ground with the point of a sail needle."
"That is very interesting," I said. "Here is paper and a pencil. Just
reproduce on it, as nearly as you can, the sketch you made on the
ground."
The boy took the pencil and paper, and in a few minutes completed a
rough but quite accurate plan of the bungalow, showing the relative
positions of the several rooms in the front and rear portions of the
house. I observed also that he indicated with scrupulous fidelity the
position of every window and door, showing the possibility of passing
from any one room to any other, through the passages and the living-
room.
"This sketch does you credit," I said. "It gives an excellent idea of
the general arrangement of the house; but I really do not see how the
information it affords is in the least degree likely to be of use to Van
Ryn, even should he be shipwrecked a dozen times over. To speak quite
frankly, I would very much rather that you had not made that sketch on
the ground for his information. Do you think he understood it?"
"No," confessed Billy, "I don't believe he did, for he asked all sorts
of silly questions about it that he wouldn't have asked if he had
understood the plan."
"Ah, indeed!" said I. "Do you happen to remember any of those
questions?"
"N-o, I don't think I do," replied Billy. "They were so awfully stupid
that I didn't pay much attention to them. I explained that those
marks,"--pointing to the drawing--"represented doors; yet the silly ass
couldn't understand how the servants got from their room to the kitchen,
nor how they brought our meals from the kitchen to the living-room
without going outside and walking round the house. And he couldn't
understand how you and I got from our rooms to the living-room without
going outside."
"That's too bad," said I. "It seems to reflect upon your powers of
description, doesn't it, Billy?"
"It does, rather," admitted the boy, "yet I did my best to make him
understand. But he didn't seem able to grasp that we were supposed to
be looking down upon the bungalow, with the roof off. He persisted in
thinking that we were looking square at it, and that the rooms in the
rear were _above_ those in the front of the house."
"Stupid fellow!" I commented. "And was the house the only thing he
manifested curiosity about?"
"Oh no," answered Billy; "there were lots of other things he asked
about. He wanted to know where we got Kit from, and how it is that he
is so tame with us, and so savage with everybody else. He asked if we
weren't afraid that some day he would turn upon us and do us an injury.
He said that if he was boss he'd shoot the beast right away; and he
grumbled a bit because you wouldn't give him and Svorenssen any firearms
to defend themselves with, not only from the leopard but also from the
natives, whom, he said, he didn't trust a little bit, and who might come
across any night and massacre us all in our sleep. Then he wanted to
know how we are going to get the cutter into the water when she is ready
for launching; and then--let me see--oh, yes, we got on about the
natives again--and the apes. He said it was all very well for us who
could bolt ourselves securely in the house at night; but what about him
and Svorenssen if an ape should come across and surprise them in their
tent some night? How were they to defend themselves without weapons of
any kind? I laughed at that, and told him that there was so little
likelihood of anything of that sort happening that we never closed our
doors or windows, except when it rained. But he said that didn't
matter; we could defend ourselves if such a thing happened, because we
had plenty of arms; and they ought to have some too. He said that, what
with the leopard, the apes, and the savages, life was none too safe for
unarmed men like him and the Finn."
"Did his terror seem quite real, or do you think it was at all
exaggerated?" I asked.
"Oh no," asserted Billy, with conviction; "it was real enough, and it
wasn't exaggerated either; he was in a regular funk. You see, he and
Svorenssen had a pretty bad time, one way and another, all the time they
were on West Island; but it was the apes that frightened them worst of
all."
"Yes," I agreed, "I can quite understand that; but,"--as an idea
suggested itself to me--"do you think Van Ryn suspects that you repeat
these conversations of his to me?"
"N-o, I don't think so," answered the boy. "Why should he. I don't
believe such a thought ever enters his head."
I did not feel by any means so sure of that as Billy seemed to be. If
the man suspected that his remarks and questionings were repeated to me,
his assumption of extreme stupidity might be explained as designed to
disarm any suspicion aroused in my mind by the queer character of some
of his questions. Take those relating to the arrangement of the house,
for example. The pretence that the information would be valuable to
him, should he ever again be cast away, was altogether too puerile for
consideration; he required the information--and very cleverly extracted
it from the unsuspecting Billy, too--for some entirely different reason.
But what was that reason? I wondered.