Foul Play Part 37

Helen was very much pleased with this arrangement, and did not disguise her grat.i.tude. She slept in peace and comfort that night. Hazel, too, profited by the mud walls and leafy roof she had compelled him to rear; for this night was colder, as it happened, than any preceding night since they came ash.o.r.e. In the morning, Hazel saw a green turtle on the sh.o.r.e, which was unusual at that time of year. He ran and turned her, with some difficulty; then brought down his cart, cut off her head with a blow, and, in due course, dragged her up the slope. She weighed two hundred pounds. He showed Miss Rolleston the enormous sh.e.l.l, gave her a lecture on turtles, and especially on the four species known to South Sea navigators--the trunk turtle, the loggerhead, the green turtle, and the hawks-bill, from which last, and not from any tortoise, he a.s.sured her came the tortoise-sh.e.l.l of commerce.

"And now," said he, "will you not give up or suspend your reptile theory, and eat a little green turtle, the king of them all?"

"I think I must, after all that," said she; and rather relished it.

That morning he kept his word, and laid their case before her.

He said: "We are here on an island that has probably been seen and disregarded by a few whalers, but is not known to navigators nor down on any chart. There is a wide range of vegetation, proving a delightful climate on the whole, and one particularly suited to you, whose lungs are delicate. But then, comparing the beds of the rivers with the banks, a tremendous fall of rain is indicated. The rainy months (in these lat.i.tudes) are at hand, and if these rains catch us in our present condition, it will be a calamity. You have walls, but no roof to keep it out. I tremble when I think of it. This is my main anxiety. My next is about our sustenance during the rains; we have no stores under cover; no fuel; no provisions but a few cocoanuts. We use two lucifer matches a day; and what is to become of us at that rate? In theory, fire can be got by rubbing two pieces of wood together; Selkirk is said to have so obtained it from pimento wood on Juan Fernandez; but, in fact, I believe the art is confined to savages. I never met a civilized man who could do it, and I have questioned scores of voyagers. As for my weapons, they consist of a boat-hook and an ax; no gun, no harpoon, no bow, no lance.

My tools are a blunt saw, a blunter ax, a wooden spade, two great augers, that I believe had a hand in bringing us here, but have not been any use to us since, a center-bit, two planes, a hammer, a pair of pincers, two brad-awls, three gimlets, two sc.r.a.pers, a plumb-lead and line, a large pair of scissors, and you have a small pair, two gauges, a screw-driver, five clasp-knives, a few screws and nails of various sizes, two small barrels, two bags, two tin bowls, two wooden bowls, and the sh.e.l.l of this turtle, and that is a very good soup-tureen, only we have no meat to make soup with."

"Well, sir," said Miss Rolleston, resignedly, "we can but kneel down and die."

"That would be cutting the gordian knot, indeed," said Hazel. "What, die to s.h.i.+rk a few difficulties? No. I propose an amendment to that. After the words 'kneel down,' insert the words, 'and get up again, trusting in that merciful Providence which has saved us so far, but expects us to exert ourselves too.'"

"It is good and pious advice," said Helen, "and let us follow it this moment."

"Now," said Hazel, "I have three propositions to lay before you. 1st.

That I hereby give up walking and take to running; time is so precious.

2d. That we both work by night as well as day. 3d. That we each tell the other our princ.i.p.al wants, so that there may be four eyes on the lookout, as we go, instead of two."

"I consent," said Helen; "pray what are your wants?"

"Iron, oil, salt, tar, a bellows, a pickax, planks, thread, nets, light matting for roofs, bricks, chimney-pots, jars, gla.s.s, animal food, some variety of vegetable food, and so on. I'll write down the entire list for you."

"You will be puzzled to do that without ink or paper."

"Not in the least. I shall engrave it in _alto-rilievo,_ make the words with pebbles on the turf just above high-water mark. Now tell me _your_ wants."

"Well, I want--impossibilities."

"Enumerate them."

"What is the use?"

"It is the method we have agreed upon."

"Oh, very well, then. I want--a sponge."

"Good. What next?"

"I have broken my comb."

"Good."

"I'm glad you think so. I want--Oh, Mr. Hazel, what _is_ the use?--well, I should like a mattress to lie on."

"Hair or wool?"

"I don't care which. And it is a shame to ask you for either."

"Go on."

"I want a looking-gla.s.s."

"Great Heaven! What for?"

"Oh, never mind; I want one. And some more towels, and some soap, and a few hair-pins; and some elastic bands; and some pen, ink and paper, to write my feelings down in this island for n.o.body ever to see."

When she began Hazel looked bright, but the list was like a wasp, its sting lay in its tail. However, he put a good face on it. "I'll try and get you all those things; only give me time. Do you know I am writing a dictionary on a novel method."

"That means on the sand."

"No; the work is suspended for the present. But two of the definitions in it are--DIFFICULTIES--things to be subdued; IMPOSSIBILITIES--things to be trampled on."

"Well, subdue mine. Trample on--a sponge for me."

"That is just what I was going to do," said he; opened a clasp-knife and jumped coolly into the river.

Helen screamed faintly, but after all the water was only up to his knees.

He soon cut a large sponge off a piece of slimy rock, and held it up to her. "There," said he, "why, there are a score of them at your very door and you never saw them."

"Oh, excuse me, I did see them and shuddered; I thought they were reptiles; dormant and biding their time."

When he was out of the river again, she thought a little, and asked him whether old iron would be of any use to him.

"Oh, certainly," said he; "what, do you know of any?"

"I think I saw some one day. I'll go and look for it."

She took the way of the sh.o.r.e; and he got his cart and spade, and went posthaste to his clay-pit.

He made a quant.i.ty of bricks, and brought them home, and put them to dry in the sun. He also cut great pieces of the turtle, and wrapped them in fresh banana-leaves, and inclosed them in clay. He then tried to make a large narrow-necked vessel, and failed utterly; so he made the clay into a great rude platter like a shallow milk-pan. Then he peeled the sago-log off which he had cut his wheels, and rubbed it with turtle fat, and, using it as a form, produced two clay cylinders. These he set in the sun, with bricks round them to keep them from falling. Leaving all these to dry and set before he baked them, he went off to the marsh for fern-leaves. The soil being so damp, the trees were covered with a brownish-red substance, scarce distinguishable from wool. This he had counted on. But he also found in the same neighborhood a long cypress-haired moss that seemed to him very promising. He made several trips, and raised quite a stack of fern-leaves. By this time the sun had operated on his thinner pottery; so he laid down six of his large thick tiles, and lighted a fire on them with dry banana-leaves, and cocoanut, etc., and such light combustibles, until he had heated and hardened the clay; then he put the ashes on one side, and swept the clay clean; then he put the fire on again, and made it hotter and hotter, till the clay began to redden.

While he was thus occupied, Miss Rolleston came from the jungle radiant, carrying vegetable treasures in her ap.r.o.n. First she produced some golden apples with reddish leaves.

"There," said she; "and they smell delicious."

Hazel eyed them keenly.

"You have not eaten any of them?"

"What! by myself?" said Helen.

"Thank Heaven!" said Hazel, turning pale. "These are the manchanilla, the poison apple of the Pacific."

"Poison!" said Helen, alarmed in her turn.