George Manville Fenn

“ Carey had ocular proof that the nude blacks were cautious enough to keep their skins clear of the fearful lash formed by the steel-wire-like tails. For the boomerang struck the distended jaws with a sharp crack, and the next moment the reptile was down, with its silvery-grey scales flashing in the sun like oxidised silver, as it lashed its tail about like a coil-whip. It was not round Jackum’s legs, however, when he ran up to recover his boomerang, but round and round the spear-shaft which he held ready for the purpose. ”

“ Every here and there, though, there were hot sandy patches dotted with peculiar-looking black stone lying in masses, cracked and riven as if by fire, while parts were cindery and vesicular, others glistening in the sunshine like black glass.
“You take the lead now, Carey,” said the doctor. “You can’t go wrong; only follow the river; it will lead you right up to the lake.”
“Wouldn’t you rather lead, sir?”
“No, my lad; I want you to have the first chance at anything worth shooting. Keep your eyes well open, and you may catch sight of the great crowned pigeons. There, forward.” ”

“ There was ample room for all as the captain stood holding on while men hurriedly brought up and threw in bags of biscuit and such necessaries as could be obtained in the hurry, the barge lying in its chocks, lifting with every wave and ready to float out at the open side at any time.
“Now then,” cried the captain, in a voice hoarse from continuous shouting, “you, Bostock, down below with you and help the doctor bring up the young passenger.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” cried the old sailor, and he waited a moment to avoid the water and then made a rush for the saloon cabin. ”

“ Poor Bob Bostock’s head had seemed as much swollen mentally as it had been externally, but these words on the part of Carey gave a fillip to his power of thinking, and he stared at the lad with his mouth open and, instead of being stupefied and weak, he grew rapidly stronger.
“My eyes and limbs, Master Carey!” he gasped; “you don’t mean to go and say such a thing as that, do you?”
“I do, Bob, but look here,” he went on, keeping to a whisper; “try and be cool and take it all as a matter of course. Everything may depend upon our taking our troubles calmly. ”

“ The raft grounded the next minute in what seemed to be a magnificent marine aquarium, into the midst of whose wonders the old sailor stepped to mid-thigh, crunching shells and beautiful pieces of coral in a way which made Carey shiver.
“All right, sir, there’s millions more,” he said, coolly. “Now, doctor, there’s no need for you to step down,” he continued; “it’s wonderful slimy, and there’s shells and things sharp enough to cut through your boots. You give me the guns and basket, and I’ll take ’em up on the sands and come back for you. I’m more used to the water than you are.” ”

“ The black was quick, but the boy was equally so, and as the savage made a snatch, Carey’s disengaged fist flew out in good school-boy fashion. There was the sound of a heavy blow, a yell, and the black bounded off the deck, to come down again club in hand and grinning ferociously as he raised it as if to strike. ”

“ Buzz–zz–uzz,” he went, with a wonderfully good imitation of the whirr of an insect’s wings, while he made his hand describe the dartings to and fro.
“Big fly so,” he cried, and drawing his boomerang from the hair girdle, he took a few steps, whirled it a moment or two, and then hurled it towards the shore. “Buzz—hum!” he cried, and then he stood grinning with delight at the boy’s admiration of the gyrations made by the curious implement.
At the first throw it seemed to Carey that it would drop as soon as the force was exhausted into the sea, where the hard wood must cause it to sink. ”

“ But, pooh! we’re not going to be beaten, doctor. We must get Mr Dan Mallam—Old King Cole, Bob calls him—shut up below somewhere and out of sight of the blacks. They’d obey us then, and we should be all right. Why, we’re not going to be afraid of one man.”
“One man?” said the doctor.
“Yes, one man. He’s only one man when he’s alone. I felt yesterday that we had twenty-one enemies. Now I feel that we’ve only one. Bob says we must wait.”
“Yes, it is good advice,” replied the doctor, “and we will wait. Carey, my lad, we must bend to circumstances till our chance comes. ”

“ He growled like a wild beast, turned on his black companion suddenly, and kicked him over, ending by jumping on him softly, to the black fellow’s great delight. Then he seemed to run amok among a number of imaginary people, pulling out his boomerang, pretending to cock it, and shooting in all directions, ending by making a furious rush at Bostock, making believe to drag him to the hatchway, where he took out his club, struck one tremendous blow and clapped down the trap-door. ”

“ During the next few hours the captain sent down twice for news, but did not once leave the deck, the storm raging with, if possible, greater violence; but the vessel fought bravely, backed as she was by the guidance of skilful hands, and evening was approaching, with everybody on board growing worn out with anxiety or exertion.
The night came on weird and strange, the white spray and the peculiar milky phosphorescent surface of the sea relieving the darkness, but giving in its place a terribly ghastly glare. ”

“ I know that,” said the old sailor, quietly. “Didn’t you give that there nigger a smeller just now?”
“What!” cried the doctor, sharply.
“Got in a temper with one of ’em for trying to steal more’n his share o’ ’bacco, sir, and give him two, one in the mouth and one in the cheek. Stop a moment; let’s tell the truth if I die for it. Warn’t one o’ them cracks on the nose, sir?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Carey, hurriedly. “But I did think at a time like this, you’d have been ready to fight, Bostock.”
“Bob, if it’s all same to you, Master Carey, and I didn’t say I warn’t ready to fight. ”

“ Do you know, sir, it seems to nip me more about that poor young chap than it does about myself.”
The doctor looked at the speaker searchingly for a few moments, and then said, quietly:
“Can we do anything to try and save his life, my man? Life-preservers, raft, or anything of that sort?”
The old sailor laughed softly.
“Life-preserver in a sea like this means being smothered in a few minutes, and such a raft as we could make would be knocked to pieces and us washed off. No, sir; we’re in shelter where we can die peaceably, and all we can do is to meet it like men.” ”

“ Bostock reached down his hand, but the help was not needed, the black springing up and rapidly making his way on deck, where he stood for a few moments gazing across the lagoon, stained blood-red now by the big fire; and he laughed softly.
“Black fellow eat plenty snakum. Jackum eat plenty now. Sit alonga self.”
A few minutes later he was happily sitting on the deck by the galley “alonga self,” eating half the overdone bird which Bostock had given him, while the old sailor had roughly prepared the most tempting part for his young companion and taken it to the saloon skylight. ”

“ The only thing which seemed repellent to Carey was the growing heap of pearl shells, and the work upon which Bostock was engaged, which the boy looked upon with disgust.
“Bah!” he exclaimed at last; “you’re a regular oyster butcher, Bob. It’s horribly messy.”
“Don’t you call things by ugly names, Master Carey,” said the old man, stolidly. “Butchers aren’t a nice trade sartinly, but think of the consekenses. Think on it, my lad. Who’s got a word to say agin the butcher when there’s a prime joint o’ juicy roast beef on the table, with the brown fat and rich gravy. Ah! it seems sad, it do.” ”

“ Human nature’s human nature, you know, sir, and if you stop its victuals it gets ravenish. I aren’t had a mouthful of anything but salt water for quite thirty hours, and I don’t believe you have neither.”
“I don’t believe I have, Bostock,” said the doctor, smiling.
“Thought not, sir. So what do you say to going and looking up the stooard’s and the cook’s quarters and seeing what we can find?”
“Yes, Bostock, the wisest thing we can do, and I must be thinking about my patient too. I must not let him starve.” ”

“ I’ll come and give you word, and help you with young squire here.”
“What!” said the doctor, excitedly now. “Impossible; it would mean death for the boy to be moved.”
“It’ll mean death, sir, if he aren’t moved,” said the old sailor, sternly. “You button him up in a coat, and be ready against I come.”
The door banged to, and the doctor hurriedly caught up some of his patient’s garments and stood frowning, as he leaned over him, felt his pulse, and then laid his hand upon the poor lad’s head.
“Impossible,” he said; “it would crush out the flickering flame of life. He cannot be moved.” ”

“ The black fellow nodded, looked in the tub, and then as if quite at home at the work, picked up the great bamboo lying ready for the purpose and set two of his followers to give all the other tubs a good stir-up, the result being a most horrible odour of such extent that, but for the breeze blowing and their getting on the windward side, it would have been unbearable.
But it had not the slightest effect upon the beachcomber, who stood looking on while Black Jack and a companion heaved together and tried to overturn the oldest tub, but without result. ”

“ The chance came the next minute, but he was not able to take advantage of it, for on turning one of the black masses of slag which looked as if it had lately come from a furnace, the great lizard was started again, and what followed was over in a few seconds, for the lithe, active creature turned threateningly upon its pursuer with jaws thrown open, and it looked startling enough in its grey, glistening armour as it menaced the lad, who stood aghast—but only to be brought to a knowledge of his position by the attack which followed. ”

“ That was enough, and Carey softly dropped down and whispered what he had seen to his companions.
“And they could brain the old scoundrel at any moment with their clubs,” said the doctor. “It is astonishing.”
“Yes, sir,” said Bostock, softly; “but aren’t it a bit like big savage dogs as I’ve seen? They could take a man by the throat and shake the life out of him in a minute, but they don’t. They sits and watches over him, and it’d be an ugly business for any one as attempted to touch him. He’s got hold of the black fellows, sir, and can do just what he likes with ’em. That’s how it is there.” ”

“ The first efforts of the two men were now directed towards carefully placing Carey high and dry in an upper berth of one of the state-room cabins, where a lamp was still burning steadily as it swung to and fro.
“Hasn’t killed him, has it, sir?” growled Bostock, excitedly, as the doctor examined his patient.
“No; he is breathing easily, and the bandages have not shifted,” replied the doctor, who then turned upon his companion in misfortune and said in a hard, defiant way: “Well, my man, this seems hard luck; we’re left in the lurch. I suppose the captain will not come back to take us off.” ”

“ They went up together into a storm of blinding spray, which swept by them with a hissing rush; but there were no raging billows striking the steamer’s sides and curling over in turns to sweep the deck, and, getting into shelter, they tried vainly to make out their position.
They had no difficulty in stepping to the side of the saloon deck, for there was no water to wade through, and the great vessel was as steady now as if built upon a foundation of rock, and as soon as they had wiped the spray from their eyes they tried hard to pierce the gloom. ”

“ As soon as possible he was allowed on deck to watch the making of a raft and use his uninjured glass in studying the shore of the island, with its constant change of hue. Then, too, there was the reef with the clouds of spray, and the beautiful lagoon, alive at times with the fish which came in with the tide through an opening in the reef, beyond which there was the heaving, open sea.
“It doesn’t seem a bit like being shipwrecked,” said Carey one day, as he lay back in a cane chair. “One has so many things about one. Shipwrecked folk don’t generally have plenty of tools and things. ”

“ Ay, sir, some of our chaps didn’t much like me, because I was hard on some o’ the young ones over making ’em tackle to. But I’ll be bound to say, sir,” cried the old man, chuckling till the tears stood in his eyes, “some on ’em’ll be saying among theirselves that old Bob Bostock was as good a mate as ever stepped the deck.”
“I hope so too,” said the doctor, smiling; “people are very fond of finding out a man’s good qualities when he’s dead.”
“But I aren’t dead, sir, and I don’t mean to be dead as long as I can help it. But don’t you feel awful sick and faint, sir?” ”

“ It was not very dark, but there was a thick mist which seemed to glow faintly with a peculiar phosphorescent light that was horribly weird and strange, and after a few minutes’ effort they turned to descend to the cabin again.
“This won’t last long, sir,” shouted the old sailor in the doctor’s ear; “these sort o’ storms seldom do. Dessay it’ll be all bright sunshine in the mornin’. We’re safe as safe, with the reef and the breakers far enough away, but the old Chusan will never breast the waves again.” ”

“ It’s rushing upon us like a great wall. Hear it?”
Doctor Kingsmead turned his face for a moment towards the door, to hear a peculiar dull distant roar, different from any sound with which he was familiar. Then the door swung to, and he was bending over his young patient again, thinking of nothing else, hearing no more for a few moments, till the door was pushed open again, and the rough, ruddy bronze face of Bostock appeared in the full light of the swinging lamp.
“Beg pardon, sir,” said the man, hoarsely. “Just going on dooty, and mayn’t have another chance, as things looks bad.” ”

“ The doctor looked at him too and then smiled sadly at Carey.
“I say,” said the latter, “it seems rum, doesn’t it, for us three prisoners to go off to sleep like that without minding a bit?”
“Nature will have her own way,” said the doctor.
“Eh? Right, sir! I—well, look at that now! It’s a rum ’un.”
Bostock had suddenly awakened, and he now rose quickly and stared at Carey.
“I say, I aren’t been asleep all night, have I?”
“Yes, Bob. There, it’s all right.”
“Well, they haven’t killed and eaten us, sir; but I don’t like this. You ought to ha’ wakened me, doctor.” ”

“ Bostock took the auger from the hole he had begun to make, and held it as if it was a hammer with which he was going to threaten the boy.
“Look ye here, my lad,” he said, “do you know what the fish is like as comes into this lagoon?”
“Yes, of course I do; like fish,” said Carey, angrily.
“Fish they is; but do you know how big some of ’em are?”
“No.”
“Well, I do. There’s some of ’em big enough to pull like donkeys. Now, jest s’pose as you hooks one.”
“Well, suppose I do? We’ll have it out, and you shall cook it. Doctor Kingsmead said it would be nice to have a bit of fresh fish.” ”