West Wind Drift Part 28

The torrent came at that instant, but it requires a very slight stretching of the imagination in order to understand precisely what Miss Spotts insisted ought to be understood.

It rained very hard all night, and thundered, and lightened, and blew great guns. Not one, but all of the women, tucked away in their bunks, wondered how those poor men were faring out there in that black and lonely camp!

The next morning it was still raining. (In fact, it rained steadily for three days and nights.) Betty Cruise died shortly after daybreak, and with her death ended the controversy over the naming of her babe.

She was the first to be laid to rest in the burying-ground on Cape Sunrise. Services were conducted on the Doraine by the Reverend Mr.

Mackenzie, a.s.sisted by Father Francisco. All work was suspended on the morning of the funeral. Shortly before noon the entire company walked, in a long, straggling procession, from the landing to the spot three miles distant where the lonely grave awaited its occupant. Careni-Amori sang "Lead, Kindly Light" and "Nearer, my G.o.d, to Thee," at the graveside. There were tears in a thousand eyes, and every voice was husky. To most of these people, Betty Cruise meant nothing, but she was to lie out there alone on the wind-swept point, and they were deeply moved. They all went back to work after the midday meal, a strangely silent, thoughtful company,--even down to the lowliest "Portugee."

Mr. Mott, the gaunt old cynic, surprised every one, including himself, by adopting the infant! He announced his decision on the day after the funeral.

"That baby's got to have a father and a grandfather and a mother, and all that," he declared to Captain Trigger, "and I'm going to be all of them, Weatherby. It ain't legal, I know, and I reckon I'll have to turn her over to her proper relatives if they make any demand,--provided we ever get off this island,--but while she's here she's mine, and that settles it, and as long afterward as G.o.d's willing. Chances are that no one at home will want to be bothered with an infant that don't actually belong to 'em, so I shouldn't wonder but what I'll have her always. What are you laughing at?"

"I was just thinking that you didn't mention anything about being a grandmother to her."

"Is that meant to be sarcastic?"

"Not at all," said the Captain hastily, noting the look in Mr. Mott's eyes. "But for fear you may think it was, I take it all back, Andrew."

"I laid awake all last night worrying about how lonely and useless and unoccupied I'm going to be if we stick here on this island for any considerable length of time, not to say, always, and I made up my mind that if I had that kid to bring up, life would be sort of worth while.

I'll probably live a good deal longer if I have something to live and work for. Ain't that so?"

"It certainly is," agreed the Captain. "Do you mind my asking how you're going to feed it?"

"I've got that all attended to," said Mr. Mott calmly. "I've been to see three of these women who've got tiny babies, and they've promised between 'em to nurse this one. It's all fixed, Captain. Of course, I don't know how it's going to work out, seeing as one of 'em is Spanish, one of 'em Portugee and the other a full-blooded Indian,--but they're all healthy."

"It's very n.o.ble of you, Andrew," said the Captain, laying his hand on the First Officer's shoulder.

"Absolutely not," snapped Mr. Mott. "It's nothing but plain, rotten selfishness on my part,--and I don't give a d.a.m.n who knows it."

CHAPTER VI.

Inside of a fortnight after the events just chronicled, the women came ash.o.r.e to occupy the practically completed huts.

The Doraine was deserted except for Captain Trigger and the half-dozen sailors who remained with him. These sailors were ancient tars whose lives had been spent at sea. They were grizzled, wizened old chaps. One of them, Joe Sands, had been an able seaman for forty-six years, and, despite a perpetual crick in the back, he insisted that he was still an abler seaman than ninety-five per cent, of the thirty-year-olds who followed the sea for a living. When Captain Trigger announced his resolve to stay on board, where he belonged, these vainglorious old seadogs elected to remain with him to the end.

The exodus of women was hastened somewhat by the further listing of the Doraine. This was due primarily to the removal of thousands of tons from the holds, the galley and the engine room. A more sinister cause for alarm, however, was the action of the greatly lightened vessel when a tidal wave swept into the basin from the north. This came at the tag end of the storm,--on the third day, in fact. The Doraine seemed actually to be afloat for a few seconds, heaving, shuddering, groaning. Her bottom, after sc.r.a.ping and grinding and giving up the most unearthly sounds, suddenly appeared to have freed itself completely from the rocks on which it was jammed. She seemed on the point of righting herself. Then she started to roll over on her side! Almost as abruptly she stopped, shivered, and then lay still again. But she was not in her old position.

She was lying over at least two degrees farther than before the upheaval.

This same, tremendous tidal wave, driven up by the strong wind that had blown steadily and viciously out of the north for three days,--or perhaps created by some vast internal convulsion of the earth,--completely inundated the low-lying point of land known as Cape Sunrise, At least two miles of the island was temporarily under water.

The high ridge lining the sh.o.r.e alone prevented the sea from hurtling over into the valley to destroy the fields and gardens and even to imperil the row of huts along the opposite slope.

Out on Cape Sunrise the waters swept over the lonely grave of Betty Cruise, but fell back baffled when they attacked the foothills that protected the homes of the living. There were superst.i.tious persons who read meaning into this startling visitation of the sea. They made ugly romance of it. For, said they, the lonely spirit of Jimmy Cruise was trying to reach its mate,--aye, striving to drag her body down to the bottom of the sea to lie beside his own.

As the days went by,--long days that were not governed by any daylight saving law,--the settlement took on the air and life of a sequestered village. There was the general warehouse from which stores were dispensed sparingly by agents selected for such duties. Women and men went to market and carried home the provender. A fish market was established; wood-yards, fruit and vegetable booths, a dispensary, and a general store where leather, cloths of various description, and furs were to be had by requisition.

In speaking of the dispensary, Dr. Cullen complacently announced that the supply of medicine was limited, but that it was nothing to worry about. He declared bluntly,--and with a twinkle in his eye,--that people took too much medicine anyhow.

"Medicine is a luxury," he said. "The more we stuff into people the more they want, and the less they take the sooner they forget they're sick.

As your doctor, from this time on, I shall be delighted to set your broken bones, sew up your gashes, and all that sort of thing, but it is precious little medicine I'll give to you. So don't get sick. The only epidemic we can have here, according to my judgment, is an epidemic of good health. Am I right, gentlemen?"

The two young American doctors put aside their dignity and grinned.

The wines and liquors from the Doraine were brought ash.o.r.e and locked away in the cellar beneath the warehouse. It could be had only on the doctor's orders.

"It won't hurt any of us to drink nothing but water for awhile," said Percival in discussing the matter; "and the chances are we'll be less likely to hurt each other if we let the grog alone. There'll be no drinking on this island if I can help it. I understand some of you men are planning to put the pulp of the algarobo through a process of fermentation and make chica by the barrel. Well, if I have anything to say about it, you'll do nothing of the sort. I know that stuff. It's got more murder in it than anything I've ever tackled. We can make flour out of that pulp, as some of you know, and that's all we are going to make out of it. Besides, we can be decent longer on flour than we can on chica.

"We'll find it harder to do without tobacco than without booze, and unless we discover something to take its place we'll be smokeless in a few weeks. Professor Knapend.y.k.e is experimenting with a shrub he has discovered here. He says it may be a fairly good subst.i.tute if properly cured. But it won't be tobacco, so I guess we may as well make up our minds to swear off smoking as well as drinking. I hope there's nothing in the saying that the good die young. Because if there is, we're in for an epidemic that will wipe out four-fifths of our population in no time at all. We're going to be so good we'll die like flies."

The weeks wore on and the fields of grain were harvested. The yield was not a heavy one, but it was sufficient to justify the rather hap-hazard experiments. The fifty-odd acres of wheat produced a little over a thousand bushels. The twenty-acre oat-field had averaged forty bushels.

A few acres of barley, sown broadcast in the calcareous loam along the coast, amounted to nothing.

Primitive means for grinding the grain had been devised. This first crop was being laboriously crushed between roughly made mill-stones, but before another harvest came along, a mill would be in operation on the banks of Leap Frog River.

The exploration of the island had long since been completed. In certain parts of the dense forest covering the western section there were magnificent specimens of the Norfolk Island pine. Fruits of the citrous family were found in abundance; wild cherries, wild grapes, figs, and an apple of amazing proportions and exceeding sweetness. Pigeons in great numbers were found, a fact that puzzled Professor Knapend.y.k.e not a little.

He finally arrived at an astonishing conclusion. He connected the presence of these birds with the remark-able exodus of wild pigeons from their haunts in the United States in the eighties. Millions of pigeons at that time took their annual flight southward from Michigan, Indiana and other states in that region, and were never seen again. What became of this prodigious cloud of birds still remains a mystery. Knapend.y.k.e now advanced the theory that in skirting the Gulf of Mexico on their way to the winter roosts in Central America they were caught by a hurricane and blown out to sea. By various stages the bewildered survivors of the gale made their way down the east coast of South America, only to be caught up again by another storm that carried them out into the Atlantic. A few reached this island, hundreds of miles from the mainland, and here they remained to propagate. At any rate, the naturalist was preparing to put his impressions and deductions into the form of a paper which he intended to submit to the National Geographic Magazine as soon as he returned to the United States.

The more practical Mr. Fitts decided to start a squab farm.

A few of the giant iguanas were seen, and many smaller ones. The meat of the iguana is a great delicacy. There were no beasts of prey, no herbaceous animals.

Lookouts on Top o' the Morning Peak reported the presence of monstrous birds at rare intervals. Where they came from and whither they went no one could tell. There were unscalable cliffs and crags at the western end of the island, and it is possible that they had their nests among them.

Lieutenant Platt described the first of these huge birds as being at least thirty feet from tip to tip. It flew low above the top of Split Mountain and disappeared beyond the hills to the west. When first descried by one of the lookouts, this bird was far out over the ocean, approaching the island from the east. As it soared over the heads of the men, several hundred feet above them, its wings full spread, it was more like a small monoplane than a bird. In colour it was a dirty yellow, with a black belly and head. Before any one could procure a gun from the hut it was out of range, flying at an incredible speed. A few days later another was seen, coming from the same direction. It was flying much higher, and a few futile shots were fired at it. Then, after a week or ten days without a single one of the monsters being seen, five of them appeared in the west and flew eastward over the island and out to sea.

"What was the name of that pa.s.senger-carrying bird they were always talking about in the 'Arabian Nights'?" inquired Platt.

"You mean the roc," replied Knapend.y.k.e. "If it ever really existed outside of the fairy tales, it is now extinct. The nearest thing to it in size is the condor, I suppose."

"I've seen some whopping big condors up in the Andes," said Percival, "but twelve feet from tip to tip was what the natives called a full-grown specimen. What do you make of these birds, Flattner?"

"After seeing an iguana eighteen feet long, I'm ready to believe anything. A protracted and an enforced spell of sobriety is the only thing that keeps me from diagnosing my own case as delirium tremens.

There's one thing sure. Birds as big as these, and iguanas as huge as the three we've seen,--to say nothing of the enormous flying fish Morris Shine claims to have seen,--take me back to the Dark Ages. I daresay we're seeing the tag end of the giants. G.o.d knows how old these birds and reptiles are,--hundreds of years, at least. I'd give almost anything to get one of those birds and stuff him. There was once a flying animal known as the pteranodon. It has been extinct for millions of years.

Belonged to the cla.s.s called pterodactyls. Who knows? If you fellows could shoot for sour apples, I'd have one of 'em."

Christmas and New Year's day, long since past, had been celebrated in a mild, half-hearted way on board the Doraine. Easter was drawing near, and Ruth Clinton took upon herself the task of arranging special services for the children. She was going ahead with her plans when her aunt, with some bitterness, advised her to consult the "King of Babylon"--(a t.i.tle surrept.i.tiously accorded Percival by the unforgiving lady)--before committing herself too deeply to the enterprise.

"It would be just like him to cut Easter out of the calendar altogether," said she.

"He cannot possibly have any objection to an Easter service," protested Ruth, her brow puckering.

"There's no telling what he will object to," said Mrs. Spofford.