CHAPTER XVI.SPIES OF CANAAN.
Daydawned in crimson and gold; up rose the sun, and showed us the Haunted Island.
There was a narrow shore of white sand, curving and twisting with stupendous cliffs, the sheer and beetling fronts of which could not have had less than fifteen hundred feet. A little to the left we spied an opening, wherein a river ran spating down to the sea, making a great indraught of the water, and occasioning, no doubt, the current that had horsed us in.
It was now flood of tide; yet the depth of water was increased but little, and, to our dismay, the ship remained fast.
On seeing this, Wallis, the new Captain, caused great store of heavy gear to be hove overboard to lighten her. Yet ’twas all one: the ship would not budge. Thereupon we got out the boats and fastened tow-lines, to have rowed her off; but we could not. Nay, it had been all one even if we could have floated her; for soon the land-breeze sunk, and then the wind came from the sea.
So they gave over the attempt; and, their anxiety being somewhat abated with the labour, they turned in to breakfast.
I fared with Wallis in the great cabin, his mate—one Peter Burrows—remaining with the watch on deck. Wallis was very moody and cross, and I dwelt heavily on the death of my brother; so that the meal passed with but scant speech. Wallis, afterwards going to the quarter-deck, called lustily for all hands; and, when they were come together, he made them a sort of rambling speech.
“Shipmates,” said he, “there a’n’t no manner of need for me to tell you how we lay. You know what fell yester-night, that there be dark things hatching yonder. We be fallen in on the Devil’s island by the look on’t. Ay, but we don’t properly know that yet! We a’n’t got the bearings of this business; and maybe we’re like children frighted with tricks and shows.
“Howsoever, this here a’n’t no sort o’ berth for you and me, and I’d scamper away full-sail if I could. But I can’t. We be stuck here as fast as so many limpets; and when the wind rises she’ll split, and we’ll be scurrying ashore like rats!
“Well, then, I’m for leaving of her now, afore the break-up comes—ay, and afore the night comes, too! There be the boats; but this here a’n’t the English Channel, and yonder a’n’t the cliffs of Dover, and what we mought look for in the boats a’n’t pleasant to think. No, there’s no way out on’t that course, sure! So I gives my vote for going ashore and boarding ’em while there’s light.... And then the treasure!—you a’n’t forgot the treasure, mates, as we’ve come sofar for to get it? Well, then, who’ll offer for a shore-party to spy ’em out?”
The words were brave and mettlesome enough. But there was no weight in them. All was hollow; and the seamen listening were nothing slow to divine this. The speech fell short of the mark, moving no man. Wallis, indeed, was weighed in the balance and found wanting there and then; for, when a seaman asked, “And would you go along with us, Wallis?” he halted out, “Nay, shipmate, for I must mind the ship”—an answer which put a period to that enterprise.
The seamen held off glum and murmuring, no man offering. If, however, they had no stomach for the work, Thalass and I were even eager to set foot on the island; and, when Wallis and the rest perceived this, they were nothing backward to encourage us, giving us good words, proffering us small-arms and ammunition, whilst some ran to the cook-room to fetch victuals for us, and others put themselves into the jolly-boat to row us ashore.
Surgeon Burke would have gone with us, but it seemed to him, and to us also, that his duty lay rather in remaining on the ship.
Our first care on landing was to search the parts of shore for the dead body of the Captain, for we doubted not that he was dead; but found nothing.
After that, we turned alongshore to the southward, looking out for an opening into the island. Thalass told me that he was able to guide meto the habitation of the pirates, but, however, that it was far distant at the south side of the island, and the journey and return not possibly to be accomplished before night, to say nothing of the risk we would run by attempting it. I answered that therefore we should not attempt it, but take instead a random course, making what discoveries we could.
We advanced warily, having each of us a loaded pistol in his hand; and, coming round an elbow of the cliff beneath a gigantic headland, we lost sight of the ship. The character of the prospect remained unchanged, the bleached white sands stretching away to the next bend, the towering cliffs frowning upon us. The Indian marched briskly at my side, perfectly at his ease, as it should seem, and fearing no evil; but I went harassed with a thousand apprehensions, and was sometimes brought to a stand by fantastical alarms.
The dreadful death-cry of my brother still sounded in my ears, and even more than the apparition on the shore, it put a fear on me. One while glancing back fearfully over my shoulder, another while looking aloft at those stupendous summits, I went, indeed, like a haunted man.
At length, being gotten about a league along the shore, we spied that we were looking out for—an opening in the cliffs. For, a little in advance of us, as we coasted round beneath a headland, the cliffs were quite broken off about two ships’ lengths, leaving an inlet of the island indeed!
A spacious and gentle valley it was, sloping from the shore between the ends of the cliffs, which were all hung about with vines, and adorned with waving groves and rustling tall tufted grasses and flowers crimson blue and green. We immediately began to ascend, making towards a colossal boulder of rock near forty feet in height. Coming up to it, we climbed, by jagged ridges, creepers and rockweed, to the top, and there stood to view the country.
’Twas a charming panorama—champaign, woody, and rocky in grateful alternation, or confused and intermingled as in some silent conflict; but of man, or man’s habitation, not a trace! I asked Thalass whether this part of the island was really uninhabited; he answered after his broken manner:
“This side only him spirit, great, big; look.” (Here he made a grimace that gave me a scare, so like it was to that dreadful visage), “and him little spirit, sing:
Stay not in the land of sighing,Stay not in the vale of tears....”
Stay not in the land of sighing,Stay not in the vale of tears....”
Stay not in the land of sighing,
Stay not in the vale of tears....”
But hereupon I cut him short; for, indeed, he sang so marvellously mimicking that other voice, that I could not bear it.
We descended the great boulder; and, the hour being about midday and the sun shining hot, we looked out for a place to rest in, and found it beneath the shade of a banana tree. The tree was full of fruit, and we ate of it very deliciously, and quenched our thirst at a clear spring that was near.
We returned to our journey, or rather ramble, of discovery, but lighted on nothing remarkable; nor saw we any appearance of man. So, the afternoon beginning to be far spent, and we a great way from the shore, I thought it time to be jogging from thence; for this finding no men in the island had in no wise allayed, but rather increased, my apprehensions, and the thought of being overtaken by night there went very much against my inclination.
Accordingly, we turned about, stepping out briskly towards the shore; meanwhile the sky became overcast with clouds. We came through the ravine to the shore, and soon, to our great content, in sight of the ship.
Drawing near, I hailed her. But there came no answer, nor could we descry a man upon her decks. I thought this looked very strangely: I hallooed a second time; but again no answer.
And now a nameless fear began to take hold on me; but, stepping to the marge of the shore, I tried a third time, giving a great halloo. Yet came there no answer: there was no sound nor motion; there was not a sign of life on the ship!
But twilight had fallen this while, and the clouds looked black; and, even as my voice yet echoed from the cliff, there fell a shadow vast and vague, and dark shut down upon us like a lid!
Then grew I afraid, indeed, drawing closer to the Indian, who, too, I think, felt the terror now.
“The place is enchanted,” said I, “we are lost!”
But the cock-boat lay where the Captain had left her upon the shore; and, getting her down, we launched forth, intending to row out in a bee-line and shoot for the ship. For, though concealed by the darkness, we knew how she lay.
We began to row, steering with the greatest heed, until, by our reckoning, we had made way enough, and should be up to the ship. Yet no ship appeared.
We went a little farther; yet no sign of her.
Peering fearfully into the darkness, we ceased to row. I took my pistol and fired it in the air, listening for an answering hail or gunshot; but none came.
’Tis a wonder I never thought to contrive a flare with some tinder or other and my flint and steel; but the truth is, my mind was completely over-run and confused with innumerable fluttering thoughts and whimsies and frightful apprehensions. It came to me, indeed, that the ship was no longer there, but had been spirited away by enchantment. Nor, in view of the dreadful mysteries of the place, will the reader be likely to censure me.
Thalass thrust his hand into the sea. It was immediately whelmed, the water gushing up over his wrist:the boat was being borne along by a swift current!
The night was very dark, the sea moderately calm. It was becoming cold, so that we werevery glad of the liquor in our flasks; for, each taking a dram, it warmed and spirited us.
Soon I observed the Indian to nod, for his eyes were heavy; and I told him that he might sleep, for I would watch. He sunk to slumber immediately. But I was sore fatigued, and the cock-boat rocked with a gentle motion: sleep stole upon me like an enemy, making at the last, as it were, a stealthy spring; in short, before ever I could take thought to have waked the Indian, I, too, slept.
Suddenly we were awakened.
There had come a great sound of cannonading on the sea; the last of it was still in my waking ears. It seemed to have come from close by. The night drew on towards the dawn, and was not so pitchy dark; I thought I made out the loom of a large ship. Ay, it was a ship!
But not for long! Scarce, indeed, had she hazily taken form before our eyes, but, with a prodigious sound, she blew up.
Stunned by the concussion, I swooned in the boat.