He was not very conscious of the curse of loneliness. Indeed, rather on the contrary: he caught himself almost on the point of smiling once or twice at the irony of it that, of all the complement of the Santa Engracia, he should be the sole survivor. García with his bull’s strength, Tarpia with his skill at arms, Moret, young Avila, Tomas the seaman — the storm had killed them all except him, and he felt no particular regret for any of them, save perhaps for Tomas. And even for Tomas he was mainly regretful because with his aid it might have been easier to build a boat.
For he was naturally determined to build a boat. Española might lie only just over the horizon, and even if he hated Española he wanted to return there if only as the first stage of his road to Spain. His chances of being rescued if he waited were negligible, he knew — it might be ten years before a ship came even into sight, and with those coral banks littering the sea he knew that any ship would give his little island a wide berth, as unlikely to contain any reward for the danger of approaching it. He had not the least intention of ending his days on a diet of raw shell-fish and plantains; he wanted to return to Spain, to his comfortable house and his dignified position. His mind was running on food. He had eaten roast sucking pig for his last meal in Spain, and he wanted most unbearably to eat roast sucking pig again, with plenty of whole-some bread — not ship’s biscuit, nor golden cakes of Indian corn, but good honest wheaten bread, although barley bread would serve at a pinch. He could have none of these until as a first step he had built a boat and traversed the fifty miles of sea that lay between him and Española. He set himself again to serious consideration of this question of a boat; his recent experiences had had this profound effect upon him, that he was prepared now to stake his life on the work of his own hands in a fashion he would have shrunk from doing a year ago.
There was driftwood in plenty, and he could supplement it by tearing branches from trees. With creepers he could bind it into faggots, and he could bind the faggots into some kind of raft. It would be a desperately unhandy craft, though, and it might take him as much as a week to paddle it fifty miles to Española. It would not be easy to contrive containers for a week’s food and water — and would a craft tied together with creeper sustain for a week the working and straining of the big rollers which beat so steadily on his beaches? He doubted it. The thing might go to pieces in mid-ocean, even without a storm to help. He needed something much more like a boat; and in a boat he could use his corn sack as a sail, for there was always plenty of north in the wind in these waters — as he had already painfully learned — and he could make the passage to Española in a single day, then.
Rich was altogether of much too intellectual a turn of mind to have any illusions as to the magnitude of the work before him; it is all the more to his credit that he set himself doggedly at his task, exploring the island for timber that might serve his purpose, and perfectly prepared with shells and stones and, his two big nails to dig himself a dug-out canoe from a suitable tree trunk — his mind was already busy with schemes for trying a keel of rock under the bottom to stabilize the thing, not merely to make it less likely to roll over but to save the labor of hollowing it out more than a sketchy amount.
It only took him a single day to discover a suitable tree trunk; but it took him two weeks to discover stones suitable to work with, to chip them to any sort of edge, for he spoiled nine tenths of them. He was consumed with a furious energy for the work — his busy mind could not tolerate the empty idleness of the island, with only the monotonous beating of the surf to windward and the cries of the birds. He chipped away remorselessly, sparing himself only the minimum of time to hunt for food; he grew lean and hard, and the sun burnt him almost to blackness. He reminded himself that when he was home again at last he would have a delightful time building up once more the corpulence essential to the dignity of a successful professional man.
His most exciting discovery was of a thin vein of rock in an exposed scar in the very ravine where he had first fallen. It was of a dark green, nearly black, and when he chipped out a lump and smashed it, it broke like glass into a series of points best adapted for spearheads, perhaps, but with a dull cutting edge which made them possible for use as knives. With infinite patience he quarried out one heavy lump with as perfect an edge as he could hope for. Using that as an axe, he quite doubled his rate of progress in the weary business of trimming off the boughs of his tree trunk.
He went through a period of convulsive labor when he began the process of getting his log down to the beach — even when his canoe was fashioned, it would still be too heavy to move with any ease, and it was better to move the log itself where the damage done would be immaterial. He learned much about the use of levers and ramps while he was engaged upon this task; the log lay on the side of a slope, so that most of the work was straightforward, but twice he encountered cross-ridges which had to be painfully surmounted. He slept each night in the open, hardly troubling to shelter himself under overhanging vegetation, for he was so weary each night that the heavy showers did not wake him. Certainly the winking white fire-flies did not, as they danced round him — nor the ceaseless chirpings of the grasshoppers and the bellowing of the frogs.
Rich had made one miscalculation, when he was considering his chances of being rescued. He had had only Spanish ships in mind, and he had never given a thought to Indians in canoes; and so it came about that all his labor was quite wasted. It was one noontide that the canoe came, at a moment when his log was poised on the brink of the last slope down to the beach and a few more heaves upon his lever would have sent it careering down to the water’s edge. How long the canoe had been in sight he did not know, for he had been engrossed in his work; it was only when he paused that he saw it, with three men at the paddles, threading its way in through the shoals. He threw himself down into hiding the moment he perceived it — instant decision was easy to him now — and he waited until it reached shore and the three Indians had dragged it up the beach before he seized his heavy lever and rushed down upon them.
They looked up at him in fright as he arrived, and scattered, squeaking with dismay; they may have recognized him as one of the terrible white men of whom they had heard, but just as likely his mere appearance was sufficiently terrifying to strike with panic. One ran along the beach and the other two dived into the vegetation, and Rich found himself master of a canoe which, crude as it was, was far better than anything he could have hoped to make in three months. But it was a big boat for a single man to handle, and Española was far away, He would prefer to have a crew for the voyage, and he set himself to wonder how he could catch the Indians.
The Admiral had always managed to play upon their curiosity, he knew — he had studied his reports closely enough to remember that — and somehow he must manage to coax them within his reach. He looked into the canoe: it contained only a crude creeper fishing-net and gourds of water and a few cakes of cassava bread — the sight even of cassava bread made his mouth water after his recent diet — nothing by which he could get them into his power. He wanted to eat their bread, but he thought that the sight of a man eating bread would be hardly sufficient to excite their curiosity. He took up his big lever, balanced it upright on his open hand, and walked solemnly down the beach with it. Then he raised it to his chin, and he was able to keep it poised there for a few unstable seconds. He picked up three white lumps of stone and tried to juggle with them — as a boy he had been able to keep three balls in the air at once, and he managed to make a clumsy effort to recapture his old skill. Stealing a glance sideways he saw that the Indian who had run along the beach had halted and was looking back, mystified; he was even retracing a few of his steps, hesitant, just like a child. Rich juggled all the harder, tossing the white stones higher and higher. He took his lever again, and spun it in his fingers, and he sat down on the thick gunwale of the canoe with his back to the land, twisting his lever and working his left elbow as if he were doing something mysterious with his left hand, out of the Indians’
sight. It was while he was so engaged that he heard soft footfalls on the sand behind, and whisperings; he was careful to turn round as slowly as possible, lest a sudden movement might scare them away like the wild animals they were.
They were standing in a row, half a dozen yards off, and staring at him big-eyed; they jumped when he turned, and were poised for flight again, but they did not flee. Rich put down his lever and extended his hand in the gesture of peace.
“Good day,” he said, soothingly.
They looked at each other, and nudged each other, but they said nothing.
“This is a very charming island,” he said. “Do you come here for fish or turtles?”
They actually were smiling at the strange noises he made — these children of nature were never far from laughter if the white man had not actually laid his hands on them. He racked his brains in an effort to be more conversational. He pointed south-westwards.
“Cuba?” he asked.
They knew that name, and stirred with recognition.
“Cuba,” said one of them, nodding, and another added something unintelligible.
Rich pointed to the south.
“Española?” he asked, and then, correcting himself: “Hayti? Hayti?”
They shrank back a little at that — to them, clearly, the name of Hayti was accursed. But the boldest one managed to nod in reply.
“Hayti,” he said.
The assurance was worth having, even if nothing else came from the interview. One of them stepped forward again, asking a question. He pointed to Rich and then to the south; Rich caught the word ‘Hayti’ repeated several times — he was being asked if he came from there, and he judged it best to disclaim all acquaintance with the place.
“Oh, no, no, no,” he said, shaking his head. “Me Cuba. Me Cuba. Hurricane.”
They knew that word too, and there was a faint light of understanding in their faces; they chattered to each other as they debated how a hurricane could possibly have blown this queer bearded stranger all the way from Cuba. One of them sidled past him to the canoe, picked out a cassava cake, and gave it to him. He nodded and smiled his thanks and ate, the cooked food grateful to his stomach, although he did his best not to appear too hungry. The more normal his reactions the easier it would be to win their confidence. He rubbed his stomach and pointed down his throat — a plan was forming in his mind.
He picked up the end of the creeper net and pointed to the sea; they knew something of what he meant. He pointed to the sea again with a sweeping gesture of his arm, and rubbed his stomach again. They grasped what he wanted; this simple stranger needed some fish, and they were perfectly willing to oblige, here on this admirable seining beach. They came fearlessly forward now; one of them took up the end of the net while the other two, smiling, prepared to push the canoe into the water. Rich smiled too, and casually picked up his lever and dropped it into the canoe before he bent to help them shove out. The canoe floated, and one of the two Indians prepared to paddle while the other paid out the net; they were only a little surprised when Rich climbed in behind them.
The canoe danced over the small surf as the single paddle drove it slowly forward; the other Indian, standing precariously, dropped the net overside armful by armful. Farther and farther out they went, in a curve, until Rich, watching narrowly, decide that half the net was out and they were about to curve back to the beach. The decisive moment had come. He scrambled forward and seized the whole remainder of the net, and lifted it in his arms and dumped it overboard amid the Indians’ ejaculations of mild protest. He picked up his lever, poised it menacingly.
‘’Hayti,” he said, and pointed southward.
They protested much more strenuously at that, piping in their shrill voices and gesticulating despairingly.
“Hayti,” said Rich inexorably. He swung his club back; he was ready to strike one Indian down if by so doing he could terrorize the other into paddling. The one he menaced screamed and cowered under the impending blow.
“Hayti,” said Rich, again, pointing to the paddles.
They gave way before his snarling ferocity — Rich was desperate now that there was this chance of reaching home. They picked up their paddles and began work; one of them was weeping like a girl. They headed out through the shallows to the open sea, while from the distant beach came the wailing of the third Indian, standing there puzzled and deserted. His voice mingled with the weird cry of the sea birds.
The canoe effected its passage to Española in the course of that night, with Rich steering by the sun while daylight lasted, and by the North Star — he had to stand up in the unsteady canoe to discover it low down on the horizon — at night. The steady hours of paddling wore out the frail Indians entirely; even before darkness fell they were sobbing with fatigue and Rich had to goad them to work. Then later he allowed one rest, sitting hunched up with his forehead on his knees, while the other worked; at first it had been hard to make them understand what he wanted, as they shrank and cowered before him, but they understood at last and paddled alternately while Rich sat in the stern, sleeping in cat-naps of a minute or two each, and waking with a jerk to see that his unwilling crew were still at their tasks and to set the canoe on her course again. The canoe rose and fell with dizzy insecurity over the dark invisible waves in whose depths the stars were reflected, and the wind sighed overhead.
Just before dawn there was a sudden squall of wind and rain which blotted the world from sight, and for a few minutes Rich felt, for the first time, a sense of danger. He turned the canoe bows on into the wind and sea, and had to struggle hard to hold her there; but the odd little canoe, with its thick sides of light wood, rode the waves in a fantastically self-confident manner, threading her way through difficulties as though endowed with an intelligence of her own. Then the squall passed, with the end of the squall dawn was lighting the eastern horizon, and to the southward there were mountains reaching the sky, wild and jagged.
“Hayti!” said the Indians.
They turned faces yellow with fatigue towards him, dumbly imploring him not to force them to approach nearer to the accursed land, but Rich hardened his heart. With a stroke or two of his paddle he swung the canoe round towards the island, and then used the paddle to prod them into activity. The canoe danced and lurched over a quartering sea in response to a last effort from their weary arms, and the mountains grew steadily nearer until the white ribbon of surf at the base of the rocks was visible, and then the canoe ran alongside a natural pier of rock and Rich stepped out, so stiff and cramped that he could hardly stand straight.
The Indians still looked up at him apprehensively. They had not the spirit — or else the strength — to try to escape, and they could only sit and wonder what awful fate now awaited them, in this land which the white devils had come to plague. Rich returned their gaze, looking thoughtfully down on them. He could still find a good use for the canoe, employing it to take him along the coast until he found a Spanish settlement; but the two Indians were so depressed and apprehensive and pitiful in appearance, that he found it difficult to bring himself to detain them further. He tried to debate the pros and cons of it coldly and practically, but he suddenly thought of what might happen to the poor wretches if his fellow Spaniards laid hands on them.
“Go!” he said, suddenly. “Go home!”
They looked at him without comprehension, and he swept his hand in a wide gesture towards the horizon and pushed the canoe out a little way from the rock. Still they hardly understood until he turned his back on them and walked a little way inland. When he looked round again they were paddling bravely out to sea again, their fatigue forgotten in their new freedom. Rich found time to hope that they would remember to call at his own island to pick up their marooned companion, and then a great wave of elation caught him up to the exclusion of all other thoughts. He was back again in Española, whence ships sometimes sailed to Spain, and he was the sole survivor of a shipload of men all far tougher and stronger than he. He was all a-bubble wi
th excitement as he breasted the cliff and set out to find his fellow men.
Rich walked a hundred and fifty miles through the forests before he found what he sought, and he spent sixteen days doing it. There were tracks through the forest, now almost vanished again as the Indians had ceased to use them. Three times they brought him to ruined villages whose decayed huts and deserted gardens had almost become part of primitive nature again, but there he found a few ears of corn and was able to dig up a few roots which kept him alive. The Indian inhabitants, he supposed, had died in battle or of disease, or were toiling away to the south gathering grains of gold in the mountains of Cibao. But the fort of Isabella was somewhere to the eastward, and even though Isabella had been Roldan’s late headquarters he would be able to obtain assistance to make his way to San Domingo. So Rich walked through the forest to Isabella.
They gave him help when he reached it; they even were anxious to make him welcome when once he had explained who he was and whence he came. They gave him clothing and food — it was good to set his teeth into meat again — and listened sympathetically while he told them of García’s wild scheme to discover a land of gold to the north-westward. They had heard of that land themselves — more than one vague account of it had drifted in to Española. In return they told him their news, of the wild disorders which had spread through the island again; how Anacaona, the mistress of Bartholomew Columbus, had been hanged for treason, and sixteen petty chiefs roasted alive at the same time.
To the Indies Page 24
