by L. A. Meyer
It's been decided that planks from the Dolphin's deck will be pulled off to build a small boat that will carry a party of men to go off to get help and supplies. Sailors have been sent up with glasses to the tops of the tallest coconut trees to see if they can spot any land, but no luck, so the boat will just have to strike off blindly to the west, where we know the continent lies, somewhere. It could be twenty miles away, just over the horizon, or it could be a hundred miles off. Maybe two. Work has already begun on the boat. We can hear the hammers and saws.
"And there's sure to be a ship's boy or two in that very boat," says Liam, merrily. We all know the story. Ha-ha. Very funny.
"I volunteer Jaimy," says Davy with a twinkly look at me. "He's the one what wants to be a midshipman and needs to be off studying small boat handlin'. Jacky and me'll take care of things around here."
I spread evil looks all around.
We hear from Liam that most of the men are setting up kips onshore for the long wait for repair or rescue. The carpenter and his crew will be at least two weeks building the boat. Jaimy and I exchange quick glances.
"We'll be havin' the wake for Lafferty and Grant tonight," says Liam, looking at me. I nod and say that I'll be there. Five more of the wounded have died since the battle. At least they're to be buried on land, which is good because sailors really don't like to be buried at sea.
We leave the mess tent and walk up the beach, the sand warm and soft beneath our feet. We mean to look up Tilly and report for duty, and after that, maybe set up our own kip in a nice cozy little spot. Dark it will be, with soft boughs for a bed. And far away from the others. I notice that Davy hangs back.
"Davy, get up here and walk beside us," I warns hotly. "I know what you're doing back there." I should smack him.
Tilly is in a state of high scientific excitement. He takes us about, pointing out edible plants and fruits and nuts and clams and such, and I'm thinking I'll be sticking to my usual salt pork and weevily biscuit, thank you. I'm looking off into the bush, thinking secluded bowers, soft boughs and all, while he rattles on.
I put up with the lecture, but really I'm hoping he'll get done soon so Jaimy and I can go off exploring and such, but it is not to be. Oh no, it is not ever to be. Tilly's scientific blather was all just a ruse to get me to go uncomplaining to my sorry fate. As we go around a stand of small trees Tilly's hand clamps around my arm so I can't run away and there it is: The horror. Staked to the ground, shakin' in the wind like a live thing strainin' against its leash. The end of all my joy.
The Kite.
Aw, Tilly, you couldn't give me one day, could you, just one day of happiness before you have to take me up and kill me in your stupid machine? I know I was wicked and I know that every time I get happy and sassy I end up getting thumped, hut this is beyond all reason and III be a good girl from now on, I promise.
But I know it's useless to hope. Instead of having a romp with Jaimy in the bushes, I'm to be executed for my crimes. This ain't exactly like a hangin', but it's damned close.
There's a huge pile of nasty coiled rope next to the hated kite, each loop looking like a noose. Men are beginning to gather to handle the line, and callin' up the beach for more help. Three of them lift up the kite to hold it in position while the line is played out. I look wildly about. I am trapped, there is no escape, none. I am doomed.
A crowd is gathering to watch the spectacle.
Jaimy begins to protest for me.
"Nonsense, James," says Tilly. "My flying machine is perfectly safe and thoroughly tested. We have the proper breeze and direction. We can send Faber up with a glass and he'll be able to spot any land that's out there. He'll be much higher than the trees, higher even than the masts on our poor ship. After he's had a look, we'll haul him back down and he'll brag on his flight for the rest of his life."
I've got a sick feelin' in the pit o' me belly and think I'm goin' to lose me breakfast.
"Beggin' your pardon, Mr. Tilden," I croaks out, "but what happened to that man what went up in the kite at that Exposition last year?"
Tilly shakes his head and tut-tuts. "He was a condemned criminal, anyway, so it didn't matter. Besides, my kite is superior."
"Jaimy, you may have me shiv and Davy me seabag and Tink can have me clothes and me Last Will is in me vest if you recover me body. And here, Liam, take back your whistle..."
My whistle is on a thong around me neck and I goes to lift it off to give it to Liam, who's lookin' at me with fatherly concern, but I know he can't do nothin', and he knows it, too. Tilly stops me from dolin' out me worldly goods and pushes me into the harness.
"Put that stuff away and stop with all this twaddle. It's perfectly safe. Look, the end of the rope is tied to that tree. You're going out over the water so you'll have a soft landing if anything happens. But what could happen? In you go, now."
They're strappin' me in tight, one strap across me chest and another across me hips and a strap around each thigh and up over me crotch to connect up with the hip one, when the crowd parts and the Captain and First Mate walk up. Captain Locke says all hearty, "Well, Faber, all your good work hanging about the rigging on the ship has certainly paid off as you are certainly not afraid of heights. We saw that amply displayed yesterday, didn't we, Mr. Haywood."
"That we did, Sir. Faber has shown himself to be most brave in all our encounters with the enemy and with nature."
Even in the fog of my despair, I am amazed at this. Mr. Haywood sayin' that about me?
"This will hold you in good stead now, I reckon," says the Captain, looking at the fiendish kite with approval.
A spyglass has been fitted with a strap and it's hung around my neck. Hands are placed on the rope.
"And, Faber," continues the Captain, all beaming in his countenance, "when next you touch the ground, it shall be as Midshipman Jack Faber."
My feet leave the ground.
The group onshore gets smaller and smaller as I am lifted up. The ship itself becomes toylike down there in the blue-green lagoon with all the palm trees around. All I see of Jaimy is his uplifted face gettin' smaller and smaller, and I make that image stay in my mind cause that might be the last time I ever see it.
I know I was bad and careless and cheeky with Davy, but the swiftness of the punishment leaves me astounded. One minute I'm planning a bit of a frolic with Jaimy and the next I'm aloft with only the regret of my free and wanton ways for company.
They seem to have gotten to the end of the rope. I peer down and see that the ants below seem to be relaxing, not even holding on. I guess they trust the tree to which the rope is tied. I hope they are right.
Well, since I'm up here and not yet dead, I should do my duty. I lift up the glass and scan the horizon. I can only see three quarters of it 'cause I can't see behind me and there ain't nothin' on the horizon in the part I can see.
I wiggle around and try to see out to the west but the straps cut most cruelly and I can't ... quite ... get around.
I do manage a bit more but not enough. I bring up the glass and ... maybe there's something there? I yell out, "Hey!" but all of a sudden the kite lurches up in a strong gust of wind. It scares me but I figure it'll give me a few more feet of height so I look again but, no, nothing.
Another gust and this time it gives a real jerk and I gasp and train the glass down on the beach. All the men are back on the line again and there seems to be a certain unsettlin' panic to their movements. I lift the glass a little higher and see that the rope is pulling the tree out by its roots and the roots come out all white and ghostly and the sand falls quickly off them. Another great gust. That's it, then, I say to myself, as I watch the tree pull free and the men are dragged toward the shore, falling off, one by one.
Then the tree itself is lifted in the air. It doesn't even touch the water. I'd like to think that Jaimy is the last one to let go.
That's it for me, then. There will be no boat to come get me when at last I settle into the sea.
That's
it for me.
Chapter 37
So farewell light
And sunshine bright
And all beneath the sky...
Strange that I should think of that lyric from a song about a man who's going to be hanged, which is what I always feared the most and was sure was going to happen to me, and now I'm to be drowned instead. I remember back to when I first skipped on board, thinking as how a girl what's meant for hangin' ain't likely to be drowned. Well, here I am. It looks like a deep swallow of the salt rather than the jerk of the hemp for me. Cold comfort. Same throat what gets it, seawater or rope.
I think I must have passed out for a while when the kite was climbing ever higher and higher in the sky. I look down now between my dangling toes and see the rope hanging almost straight down with that traitorous tree at the end of it, still high above the water. The island is far away now, just a smudge like when I first spotted it from the mainmast. Only yesterday, was it? The wind is lessening now, as it almost always does in the late afternoon, and the kite is starting to settle. Now the island ain't even a smudge. Now it's gone.
The kite's swooping back and forth as it settles and the rope snakes back and forth, back and forth like a long tail, and I know it's 'cause the wind can't get running smooth across the top of the kite 'cause the kite ain't held steady like a sail is held steady and soon all will drop into the ocean and that will be it for both the kite and me.
I don't rant or cry or anything like that. I don't even pray, hardly. I've prayed for deliverance before and I get delivered and then someone else dies and that someone could be Jaimy this time and I don't want that, but I do hope that he sheds a few tears for me. No, no I don't want that, either. I want him to become a fine officer and marry a fine lady, which I am not and never will be now, but I do hope he remembers me fondly, I do.
The water draws closer. Soon the tree will touch and at least the water will be warm. I look at its blue hugeness and I say, I will ask one thing please, God, please no sharks, no sharks. I just want to be let down softly and then go to sleep 'neath the curl of a smooth little wave, gentlelike. A nice little warm wave. That's all.
I imagine Liam and the rest will be waking me tonight, too. The thought gives me some comfort. I hope he asks Jaimy to come to the wake, too, even though it's Catholic stuff and Deacon Dunne would say no, but all the cryin' and hollerin' and keenin' and such is good for a grieving soul. I've never held back my tears, that's for sure.
Closer yet. I've got to get myself ready in my mind and so I think about how far I got from London and how Muck never got me and how I'll not be put up in jars and I've seen a lot of stuff and how I gave it a good run and got farther than Charlie, who I might be seeing real soon, and how I got to love a fine boy and I think he might love me and I am goin' to cry now but I think that's all right, I never was very brave....
I see the tree hit the water and I'm thinking I'll cut myself out of the harness when me and the kite comes all the way down cause I wants to float free and go down when I'm ready. I figure that the best thing to do when I finally slips under is to hold me breath till I get down a ways and then suck in a chestful of water all sharp and fast so's to get it over with quick with not much choking. I hope not much choking. I don't even know if I can swim 'cause I ain't never tried.
At least it's a plan and I feel a little better for it.
The kite steadies down. It don't swoop no more and I'm wonderin' why, and I look down and see that the tree is half under the water and leavin' a wake. I don't pay it no mind and get back to puttin' my final thoughts in order. I look down again in another minute and the tree is still half under water. No change ... but wait a minute ... I should have dropped down closer and I didn't, I...
Leavin' a wake! I shakes the cobwebs out of me mind and ciphers it out. The tree is draggin' like a sea anchor, just as if a bunch of men was hanging on to the rope so Bernoulli can get back on the job, and the kite stays up and steady! I ain't goin' down no more.
I dare not hope, but I can't help it. No, no, this can't be true, I must be dreamin' or be out of me mind, but it seems too real. It IS 5 real! I have me own ship and I'm under way with way on! As long as the wind holds, I could fly all the way to Mexico!
I twist around in the harness, tryin' to see behind me, but I still can't, but ain't the water gettin' lighter and brighter and shinin' all like an emerald and, oh thank you, God, it means the bottom's comin' up and it's gettin' shallower and shallower and then, as sudden as a slap in the face, there's a white beach beneath me. I don't know if it's Mexico or Timbuktu or what, but it surely looks like home to me! I christen my wonderful ship the Hope and in a few moments the tree pulls up on the beach and catches in a grove of palms. The wind lessens and dies.
His Majesty's ship, the Hope, settles slowly and gently into the treetops.
Midshipman J. M. Faber commanding.
PART V
Oh, Western Wind, When Wilt Thou Blow,
That the Small Rain Down Can Rain.
Oh, That My Love Were in My Arms,
And I in My Bed, Again.
Chapter 38
After I land in the top of the trees, I pull out my shiv and cut myself out of the harness and swing over to a good limb and climb down. The trees are much bigger here, the Captain and the carpenter will be delighted to know. I find my way out to the beach and to that tree, which was both a traitor and savior to me. Strange to see it with its roots all washed off and white and sticking up in the air. I cut the rope off of it and haul the end back into the brush, so as to keep my presence here a secret from any passing cannibals. I'd hate to think that I'd survived all that I had just to end up on a spit.
I go back to the Hope and manage to pull it down from the tree without too much damage. I cut it off from the rope and drag it to a little clearing and put it down such that it forms a little tent. I cut lengths off the rope and use some to tie down the Good Tent Hope so it won't rock about in the wind. I coil the rest neatly nearby. Shipboard habits die hard.
It is nearly dark now so I crawl into my new home and prepare for sleep. One bit of complete and total and almost sinful pleasure I have this night is in the taking off of that damned vest in which I had been crammed, corseted, and confined for a whole year.
I put the rolled-up vest under my head as a pillow and take stock of my situation. I have, besides my Immortal Soul, which is still thankfully tucked in my not-so-immortal body, the following:
My clothes—drawers, vest, shirt, pants
My shiv
My whistle, with thong
My Will
The spyglass, with halter
The Good Ship Hope
Much rope
It's not much to ensure my survival in this strange land, but it will have to serve. I plan, on the morrow, to:
Gather food and eat it
Gather wood for signal fire
Explore to determine danger if I light fire
Light fire and await rescue
I always feel better with a plan.
It rains that first night like I have never seen rain before. It comes on in an instant and pours down in sheets instead of drops, and I know it is soaking every bit of wood beyond any hope of lighting as a signal fire. I reach my cupped hands out and they quickly fill with water, which I gratefully gulp down. It goes on for an hour, and then, just as suddenly, it stops.
Then there is silence. After the droplets stop dripping off the leaves, it gets so quiet I can hear my own heartbeat. I have never, in my whole life—with Mum and Dad and Penny, or on the streets of London with the gang, or on the Dolphin—ever been really alone. I curl up a little tighter. On the ship I was used to sleeping in a room full of sailors, a hundred or more in our hold, with their snores and grunts and other noises. All I hear now is the thump of my own heart and the sound in my ears that I know is the sound of my blood going through my veins, the rush of my own salt sea...
Then the jungle comes alive. It starts with an unholy shriek not ten f
eet from the tent, the sound of somethin' bein' ripped open and torn and eaten—or maybe it was the sound of the thing eatin' the other thing, I don't know—and then the rest of the fiends joins in with such a chorus of grunts and groans and chitterings and howls and screams that I spend the whole night with my eyes open and on the open end of the tent, my hand clutched around my shiv, and wondering what the snakes do after a rain.
I do fall asleep towards dawning and sleep away most of the morning. I figure there's no hurry; the fire's not going to light, anyway.
When I do get up, I head to the beach for breakfast. There's some of the plants that Tilly pointed out as all right to eat, and when I walk on the sand next to the water, things squirt water up so that will be clams. Very well. Clams and weeds it is.
I kneel down in the sand and commence to digging with my hands and my shiv right where I see a good strong squirt, and before too long I come up with a small round clam about the size of my thumb. I rinse it off and run my shiv between the shells and it gives up the fight. I pry off the top shell and see this disgusting lump of what looks like snot, but I must keep my strength up for the good of the Service and all so I lift it up and let it slide out of the shell, over my tongue, and down.
Not as bad as I would have thought. Sort of like salty nothing. I dig up a few more and do them, and then I try the weeds. Tilly called it pigweed when he was pointing out edible plants to us back on the island. Well, this is one little piggy what don't like it overmuch. It is stringy and not very good, but I force some of it down and it dawns on me that all of this would taste better if it were cooked. The problem is that I don't have a cook pot. Further thought is required.
The breakfast being less than hearty, I decide to explore to see if I can improve my condition in other ways.
