The Girl Crusoes: A Story of the South Seas Page 6

  "What shall we do when all the bananas are gone?" asked Tommy, as theyate their dinner. "The food we have in the boat won't last a week."

  "We shall have to go exploring," said Mary. "I can't believe thatthese bananas are the only eatable fruits, and no doubt there are morebananas somewhere."

  They looked up once more at the distant mysterious ridge.

  "I don't know how you feel," said Tommy, "but I'm rather scared ofgoing far from the beach. Who knows what we should find among thosetrees?"

  "We might go a little farther than we did yesterday," suggestedElizabeth.

  "Come along, then," said Tommy. "Oh, gracious! What's that?"

  She pointed towards the ridge. The other girls looked, but saw nothing.

  "What is it?" asked Mary.

  "I saw a large beast cross over that bare spot," replied Tommy.

  "I think you must have fancied it," said Mary.

  "Rubbish! I tell you I saw it."

  "But there aren't any large beasts in these islands," said Mary.

  "How do you know? You think you know everything," said Tommy sharply,"just because you've read a few books. I tell you I _did_ see it."

  "It couldn't have been a large animal, all the same," persisted Mary.

  "You're an idiot," cried Tommy.

  Elizabeth saw it was time to intervene. The girls' nerves were alittle on edge.

  "I dare say you are both right," she said tranquilly. "Tommy evidentlysaw something, and though there are no large native animals, Mary,perhaps it's an imported one. We can't tell but that there are peopleover there, and they might have anything, you know."

  "Of course they might," said Tommy triumphantly. "It might be anelephant or anything."

  And so the little storm blew over, but it made Elizabeth verythoughtful. As she lay awake that night, she resolved that somethingmust be done to occupy their thoughts. "It will never do to idle awayour time, as we've been doing," she said to herself, "or there'll beconstant bickerings, and we shall all get slack and mopish. Oh, dear!"

  And she did not sleep before she had made a plan.

  CHAPTER VII

  A LOCAL HABITATION

  "Now, my dears," said Elizabeth as they sat at breakfast next morning,"I've got an idea."

  "Hurray!" cried Tommy. "What is it, Bess?"

  "It's just this. We must act as if we were going to stay on thisisland for ever."

  Tommy gasped, and a look of dismay came into her eyes.

  "Don't you think we'll be rescued, then?" she asked.

  "Oh, I don't give up hope. We may be seen from a ship any day, orUncle may come for us; but we can't depend on it. Plenty of men andboys have been shipwrecked like us on a lonely island, and have managedto shift for themselves. Why shouldn't we? We're used to outdoorwork: at least, _I_ am, and it would be an odd thing if we couldn'tmanage to make ourselves comfortable on an island like this, with halfour work already done for us."

  "What do you mean?" asked Mary.

  "Why, if you're right about there being plenty of fruit--and I don'tsee why you shouldn't be--we shan't have to grow our food, and that'sthe chief thing. So we shall have more time for other things. Thefirst thing is to see just what we've got. Here's mine."

  She turned out her pocket, and displayed two handkerchiefs, a thimble,a small whistle and her jack-knife.

  "That's not a great deal," she said, smiling. "Now, Mary."

  "There's my knife, and a hanky, and my little pen-knife, and hurray! myhousewife."

  And as she suddenly remembered that on the night before the storm shehad been mending her uncle's clothes, the recollection almost moved herto tears.

  "I've got the most," said Tommy, with a laugh. "Look here--scissors,hanky, some bits of string, my match-box, jack-knife, picture postcardof an aeroplane--wish we had an aeroplane!--and----"

  She had unfolded a much-worn scrap of paper; now she folded it againand replaced it in her pocket.

  "What is it?" asked Elizabeth.

  "It's only that stupid old receipt for butterscotch: no good to ushere."

  They all smiled.

  "Well, we can't boast of much in the way of personal possessions," saidElizabeth; "but we have the boat, two oars, a boat-hook, the painter, afew cups and things, my string bag, that's a lucky find--and ourmacintoshes. More than Crusoe had."

  "Not so much, Bess," said Mary. "You don't remember. I always thinkCrusoe was jolly lucky."

  "I dare say you are right. Well, we've taken stock. That's one goodthing done. Now what do you say to building a hut?"

  "What! With scissors and knives?" asked Mary.

  "You'll see. We ought to try, I think. The weather is lovely now, butI shouldn't care about sleeping in the boat in a rainstorm, even undera macintosh. And you know how it rains in these tropical parts."

  "It'll be great fun," said Tommy, "but I don't see how it's to be done."

  "We'll have to cut down some saplings with our jack-knives. I don'tquite see myself what we shall do next, but that will be a start,anyway, and I dare say ideas will come as we go along."

  "That doesn't sound much like an architect," said Tommy, "but let'stry. It will give us something to do and keep us from getting catty."

  Elizabeth smiled as she saw her intentions thus realized.

  "We must choose our site," she said. "Surveying, don't they call it?"

  "All settlements are made near running water," said Mary, "so it oughtto be near the stream."

  They followed with their eyes the course of the bright little stream asit flowed out of the woodland down to the shore. There was no suitablespot for the hut near at hand, and to find one involved going fartherthan they had yet ventured to go. But having now a definite object inview they found themselves a little more courageous, and springing upthey set off along the bank of the stream towards the higher ground.They walked cautiously and in silence, looking about them withwide-open eyes, ready to flee at the slightest alarming sight or sound.Suddenly Tommy said in a whisper--

  "Here! this is the very place."

  She indicated a grassy knoll some ten or twelve feet above the bed ofthe stream. The girls stopped at its edge and looked at it. On theinland side it was fringed with a row of small trees; seaward the viewwas uninterrupted.

  "It looks nice," said Mary. "Let's measure it."

  Elizabeth, being the tallest, stepped the grassy plot from end to endand from side to side.

  "I make it about twenty feet by sixteen," she said, "just about thesize of our dining-room at home. I think it will do splendidly.There's water close at hand; there are plenty of saplings in the woodsbeyond; and the hillside will protect us from storms, unless they comefrom the sea."

  "And what a lovely outlook it has!" said Mary, turning towards the sea."We couldn't have a nicer place."

  "Then we will fix on it," said Elizabeth. "Now who's to be architect?"

  "Oh, you, Bess!" said Tommy; "we're no good at that."

  "I'm afraid I'm not either," said Elizabeth, laughing. "But I supposewe ought to put up some posts for the walls, and weave rushes andthings between them. Anyway, the first thing is to cut down some stoutsaplings that will be strong enough."

  "Well, there are plenty in the woods; quite close too," said Tommy.

  "But how can we cut them down?" asked Mary; "we haven't axes or saws."

  "We have our knives, though," said Tommy. "Come on, let's begin."

  They went into the wood, where the trees at the edge were not at alldense, and selected several saplings of about the same height andthickness. Then each dropped on her knees before one of the saplings,scratched a circular line on the bark and began to hack away at thiswith the knife. For some time nothing was heard but the slight soundsmade by the knives; each girl worked hard as though engaged in acompetition. But presently Tommy straightened her back, and uttered asort of sighing grunt.

  "How are you getting on?" asked Elizabeth, without desisting from hertask.
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  "All right," cried Tommy, stooping and setting to work furiously."They shan't beat me," she said to herself.

  But in a few minutes Mary gave a plaintive little exclamation, droppedher knife, and rubbed her right hand with her left.

  "You're _soon_ tired," said Tommy, working harder than ever.

  "I think my tree must be a specially tough one," said Mary. "I don'tseem to make much impression, and my wrist does ache so."

  "Take a rest, dear," said Elizabeth. "Shouldn't we get on better iftwo worked at the same tree while the other rested? We could take itin turns. When we have cut down the first, we shall have something toshow for our work."

  "A good idea!" said Tommy, springing up and running to Elizabeth'stree. "You take first spell off, Mary."

  The two girls worked at the trunk from opposite sides. The air wasgrowing hotter and hotter, the insects became very troublesome, and astime went on and the incisions they had made in the sappy wood werestill very shallow, both felt very much discouraged.

  "We shall never get through the wretched thing," said Tommy in disgust."Can't we snap it off, Bess?"

  "I'm afraid that would only splinter it," said Elizabeth. "It is abother. What troubles me most is that our knives will be hopelesslyblunted if it takes so long to cut one tree. Still, we must peg away.You rest now, Tommy, and let Mary try again."

  Tommy got up with relief, and strolled a few yards away while hersisters continued the work. In a few minutes she came running back.

  "What idiots we are!" she cried. "Stop work, you two. We needn'tbreak our backs or our wrists at all. Come and look."

  She led them to the edge of the grassy knoll, and pointed to threesmall trees standing within a few feet of each other about the samedistance apart, and forming the corners of a sort of triangle.

  "There!" she said. "Don't you see? There's half our work done for us.Those three trees can be the corner posts of our hut, and we can usethe branches to make a roof."

  Quite excited at her discovery, she pointed out that two of the treeshad each thrown out a branch about seven feet from the ground, and thethird had a branch a little higher. These overhanging branchesprotected one side of the triangle, and Tommy suggested that they couldbe employed as a framework upon which they might spread mats woven fromthe grasses on the bank of the stream.

  "It would take a terrible time to weave the mats," said Mary dubiously.

  "Not so long as to cut down the trees," replied Tommy, "and not nearlyso hard work. What do you say, Bess?"

  "It's a capital idea, but I can't weave."

  "Oh, we'll soon teach you that," said Tommy. "You didn't go to akindergarten like Mary and me; but it's not very different from thestring work you did on board. Come along; let's make a start."

  They went hopefully to the bank of the stream, but when they tried tocut down the rushes, they found that their knives were already blunt.As the day was now very hot, and they were hungry and tired, theyresolved to have an early dinner, then rest for a while, and later onsharpen their knives on stones at the beach and try again.

  By the evening they had cut a large quantity of grasses, which theyplaced in a heap to be weaved next day. They decided again to sleep inthe boat, and returned to it just before sunset by way of the clump ofbanana-trees, carrying their supper with them.

  "We have made a good start," said Elizabeth cheerfully, as they satmunching bananas in the boat.

  "Yes, but I tell you what," said Tommy, "I'm getting tired of bananas."

  "Already!" said Mary, smiling. "Don't you remember how you said onceat home you'd love to live in a banana plantation, where you could pickas many as you liked?"

  "And you told me the story of a greedy boy who loved cake, and dreamtthat he was in the middle of a big one, and had to eat his way out. Iwas a silly kid then. Anyway, I'm sick of bananas now, and people sayit's bad to have no change of diet."

  "But what can we do?" said Elizabeth. "We haven't seen anything else."

  "Except birds," said Mary. "Pigeon-pie is rather nice."

  "We might snare some," said Tommy, "or fish--what about fish? They'dbe easiest to catch, I expect. I've got some string, and we can easilyfind something that'll do for a rod."

  "And a bent pin for a hook," said Mary.

  "Now just listen to that!" said Tommy. "Anybody would think we weregoing fishing for sticklebacks. No fish worth cooking would ever lethimself be hooked by a bent pin. We'll find something better thanthat."

  "We'll see what we can do to-morrow," said Elizabeth. "We've neverdone any sea-fishing, and fishing in the river at home won't help usmuch, I fancy. Still, we can try, and I'd like a little fish for achange. You both look awfully tired, so let's go to sleep now; weshall have plenty to do in the morning."

  And Elizabeth, as she laid herself down that night, felt happy in thesuccess of her plan. "If we can only keep busy," she said to herself,"all will be well. But I do hope it won't be for long."

  CHAPTER VIII

  THE FISHERS

  Up with the sun next morning, the girls began the day by bathing in alittle secluded pool, where there was no danger of being interrupted bya shark. Immediately after breakfast they set off to the site of theirhut, looked cautiously around to make sure that no one had been there,and began to weave the grasses they had prepared the day before.Elizabeth was at first rather slow, but the others worked quickly, andby dinner-time they had each finished a mat several feet square.

  "You two have quite outstripped me," said Elizabeth as they returned tothe boat. "I'll go on with my mat after dinner, while you see what youcan do to make some fishing-tackle."

  "Right!" cried Tommy; "you shall have fish for supper, if you're good."

  They dined on bananas and coffee, ruefully noticing that the tin ofcondensed milk was nearly empty. Then Mary and Tommy went up thestream to a place where they had seen a clump of canes, which wouldfurnish any number of fishing-rods. They selected one about six feetlong, and after a good deal of trouble, the wood being tough, cut itdown. Tommy brought out of her pocket two or three pieces of string ofunequal length and thickness, and knotted them together.

  "There's our line," she said, "and it's lucky there's no one here tolaugh at it."

  "How can we fasten it on to the rod?" asked Mary.

  "Tie it, of course."

  Tommy proceeded to tie the string to the thinner end of the rod.

  "Oh, bother!" she said, "the cane's so smooth the string slips downevery time. This won't do."

  "Let's make a hole in the rod, and put the string through it,"suggested Mary.

  "The cane is sure to split if we try to bore a hole with a knife," saidTommy. "I know! There's a sort of spike in my knife. We'll make itred-hot, and then I dare say we can bore a clean hole."

  They ran back to their little camp on the beach, where Elizabeth wasstill at work on her mat.

  "How are you getting on?" asked Mary.

  "Faster now," replied Elizabeth. "I shall beat you both soon."

  They told her what they had done, and Tommy thrust the spike into thefire, which they never allowed to go out. Meanwhile, Mary hunted forsomething that would serve as a hook. She gave a cry of delight whenshe discovered a strong safety-pin; and Tommy having by this time boreda hole neatly through the cane, they very soon had theirrough-and-ready fishing-tackle complete. It only remained to bait thehook. They found plenty of small shellfish clinging fast to the rockson the shore, and they prised these up with their knives, and providedthemselves with a number of the little molluscs. Thus equipped, theywent along the shore in search of a spot that promised success. Theywere both excited--and Elizabeth was so much interested in theexperiment that she laid down her mat and followed her sisters. Aftera little time they came to an irregular line of rocks running from thebase of the cliffs towards the reef on which they had nearly struck onapproaching the island. They had already observed that some of therocks always stood above water, while others were sometim
es submerged.These latter were easily distinguishable by the seaweed and the limpetswith which they were covered. At the present moment the tide was goingdown, and the girls thought that they would have a good chance ofcatching some of the fish that had probably come up with the tide.

  Accordingly, they made their way for some distance along the rockybarrier. The sea was pretty calm, owing to the protection of the reef;but every now and then there was a dash of spray over the rocks at thefarthest end. Choosing a rock that was lashed by broken water on theseaward side, and had a deep calm pool on the landward side, theydetermined to try their luck.

  "I can see hundreds of fish darting about," said Mary, peering into thepool as Tommy baited the hook.

  "The more the merrier," said Tommy. "Look out, Bess, I don't want tohook you, dear."

  The other girls gave Tommy a wide berth as she cast her hook, then cameto her side and waited for the expected catch. She had not put on afloat, declaring that any fish worth catching would soon make itselffelt. But as she drew the line towards her she had no sense of weightor resistance; the hook came up with the bait untouched.

  "They don't fancy it, apparently," said Tommy. "I'll have another try.Look out!" Again she cast the line, and again drew it in.

  "I declare, the little wretches are nibbling the bait off under ourvery noses," she cried, as the hook passed through the clear water ofthe pool. "How disgusting!"

  "Poor little things! why shouldn't they enjoy themselves?" said Mary.