Bevis Part 76

Yow-wow-wow! Pan, who had been idle all the morning lying on the ground, jumped round and joined the chorus.

"Now! Heave-ho! She's going! Now!"

"Stop!"

"Why?"

"She'll slip away--right out!"

"So she will."

"Run for a rope."

"All right."

Mark ran for a piece of cord from the hut. The raft as it were hung on the edge more than half in and heaving up as the water began to float her, and they saw that if they gave another push she would go out and the impetus of her weight would carry her away from the sh.o.r.e out of reach. Mark soon returned with the cord, which was fastened to two stout nails.

"Ready?"

"Go!"

One strong heave with the levers and the raft slid off the last roller, rose to the surface, the water slipping off the deck each side, and floated. Seizing the cord as it ran out, they brought her to, and Mark instantly jumped on board. He danced and kicked up his heels--Pan followed him and ran round the edge of the raft, sniffing over at the water. The raft floated first-rate, and the deck, owing to the three layers under it, was high above the surface. These layers, too, gave the advantage that they could walk to the very verge without depressing it to the water. Mark got off and held the cord while Bevis got on, then they both shouted, "Serendib!"

They pushed off with long poles, like punting, Pan swam out so soon as they had started, and was hauled on board. A short way from sh.o.r.e the channel was so deep the poles would not reach the bottom, but the raft had way on her and continued to move, and paddling with the poles they kept up the slow movement till they reached the shallows. Thence to Serendib they poled along, one each side. The end of the raft crashed in among the willow boughs, and the jerk as it grounded almost threw them down. Pan leaped off directly, and they followed, fastening the raft by the cord or painter to the willows.

"Nothing but blue gums," said Mark, who led the way. "What are these?"

pointing to the wild parsnips or "gix" which rose as high as their heads, with hollow-jointed stalks and broad heads of minute white flowers.

"It's a new kind of bamboo," said Bevis. "Listen! Pan's hunting out the moorhens again. This is some kind of spice--you sniff--the air is heavy with the scent, just as it always is in the tropics."

As they pushed along they shook the meadowsweet flowers which grew very thickly, and the heavy perfume rose up. In a willow stole or blue gum Mark found the nest of a sedge bird, but empty, the young birds hatched long since.

"Mind you don't step on a crocodile," said Mark, "you can't see a bit."

The ground was so matted with vegetation that their feet never touched the earth at all, they trampled on gra.s.ses, rushes, meadowsweet, and triangular fluted carex sedges. Sometimes they approached the sh.o.r.e and saw several empty nests of moorhens and coots, but just above the level of the water. Sometimes their uncertain course led them in the interior to avoid thickets of elder. If they paused a moment they could hear the rustling as water-fowl rushed away. Pan had gone beyond hearing now.

Presently they came on a small pool surrounded with sedges--a black-headed bunting watched them from a branch opposite.

"No fish," said Bevis: they could see the bottom of the shallow water.

"Herons and kingfishers have had them of course."

Crashing through the new bamboos they at last reached the southern extremity of the island, where the shallow sea was covered with the floating leaves of weeds, over which blue dragon-flies flew to and fro.

"Everything's gone to the river again," said Mark; "and where's Pan?

He's gone too, I dare say."

A short bark in that direction in a few minutes made them look at an islet round which reed-mace rose in a tall fringe, and there was Pan creeping up out of the weeds, dragging his body after him on to the firm ground. He set up a great yelping on the islet.

"Something's been there," said Bevis. "Perhaps it's the thing that makes the curious wave. Pan! Pan!"--whistling. Pan would not come: he was too excited. "We must come here in the evening," said Bevis, "and make an ambush. There's heaps of moorhens."

As there was nothing else to see on Serendib they worked a way between the blue gums back to the raft, and re-embarked for New Formosa. Just before they landed Pan dashed into the water from Serendib and swam to them. He did not seem quite himself, he looked as if he had done something out of the common and could not tell them.

"Was it a crocodile?" said Mark, stroking him. Pan whined, as much as to say, "I wish I could tell you," and then to give vent to his excitement he rushed into the wood.

Volume Three, Chapter III.

NEW FORMOSA--NO HOPE OF RETURNING.

After fastening the raft they returned towards the hut, for they were hungry now, and knew it was late, when Pan set up such a tremendous barking that they first listened, and then went to see. The noise led them to the green knoll where the rabbit burries were, and they saw Pan running round under the great oak thickly grown with ivy, in which Bevis had seen the wood-pigeons alight.

They went to the oak, it was very large and old, the branches partly dead and hung with ivy; they walked round and examined the ground, but could see no trace of anything. Mark hurled a fragment of a dead bough up into the ivy, it broke and came rustling down again, but nothing flew out. There did not seem to be anything in the tree.

"The squirrels," said Bevis, suddenly remembering.

"Why, of course," said Mark. "How stupid of us--Pan, you're a donk."

They left the oak and again went homewards: now Pan had been quite quiet while they were looking on the ground and up into the tree, but directly he understood that they had given up the search he set up barking again and would not follow. At the hut Bevis went in to cut some rashers from the bacon which had not been cooked and Mark ran up on the cliff to see the time.

It was already two o'clock--the work on the raft and the voyage to Serendib had taken up the morning. Bevis showed Mark where some mice had gnawed the edge of the uncooked bacon which had been lying in the store-room on the top of a number of thing's. Mark said once he found a tomt.i.t on the shelf pecking at the food they had left there, just like a tomt.i.t's impudence!

"Rashers are very good," said Bevis, "if you haven't got to cook them."

It was his turn, and he was broiling himself as well as the bacon.

"Macaroni eats his raw," said Mark. They had often seen John Young eating thick slices of raw bacon in the shed as he sat at luncheon.

"Horrible cannibal--he's worse than Pan, who won't touch it cooked."

He looked outside the gate--there was the slice of the cooked bacon Bevis had cut for the spaniel lying on the ground. Pan had not even taken the trouble to put it in his larder. But something else had gnawed at it.

"A rat's been here," said Mark. "Don't you remember the jack's head?"

"And mice in the cave," said Bevis.

"And a tomt.i.t on the shelf."

"And a robin on the table."

"And a wagtail was in the court yesterday."

"A wren comes on the stockade."

"Spiders up there," said Mark, pointing to the corner of the hut where there was a web.

"Tarantulas," said Bevis, "and mosquitoes in the evening."

"Everything comes to try and eat us up," said Mark.

The moment man takes up his residence all the creatures of the wood throng round him, attracted by the crumbs from his hand, or the spoil that his labour affords. Hawks dart down on his poultry, weasels creep in to the hen's eggs, mice traverse the house, rats hasten round the sty, snakes come in for the milk, spiders for the flies, flies for the sugar, toads crawl into the cellar, snails trail up the wall, gnats arrive in the evening, robins, wrens, tomt.i.ts, wagtails enter the courtyard, starlings and sparrows nest in the roof, swallows in the chimney, martins under the eaves, rabbits in the garden among the potatoes--a favourite cover with all game--blackbirds to the cherry-trees, bullfinches to the fruit-buds, tomt.i.ts take the very bees even, cats and dogs are a matter of course, still they live on man's labour.

The sandy spot by the cliff had not been frequented by anything till the cave was made and the hut built, and already the mice were with them, and while Mark was saying that everything came to eat them up a wasp flew under the awning and settled on the table.