ROSAMOND, sleeping under a banian tree, was woken on the Birthday morning by the sharp talk of monkeys overhead, and by the scurry of a centipede across her face. These creatures had called her just in time, that she might see the Birthday rise, regal and golden, out of the Pacific. She sat up and looked at it. It was being proclaimed by flutings and pipings and trillings, and incensed by pollen-sweet drifts of wind. It was indeed a Birthday. Also, it was a Last Day, and had a bitter-sweet sadness.
Rosamond sipped some milk and bit the end off a banana. A little way off were the huddled forms of William and of Charles. Their light snores mingled agreeably with the other wood sounds, and with the light snoring of the ocean.
Rosamond thought she would bathe while no one was about; she liked to have the Pacific to herself. She stole into Belle Vue, where Mr. Thinkwell slept beneath a roof and between walls, as middle-aged gentlemen like to do. She got into her bathing-dress and went down to the lagoon.
But she was not as alone as she had supposed. On the grass plateau above the shore a bent old woman stood, and her dim, frowning stare searched the Pacific, as though she were dragging the Birthday above the horizon.
Jean. Jean, impatient, presumably, for the Birthday. Jean, watching the sunrise—or watching, marooned old lady, for a sail.
Rosamond bade her good-morning as she passed her. She started.
“Guid-day tae ye, lassie, guid-day. This is a braw day we’ve got for it.”
“For the Birthday? Yes, isn’t it?”
“The Bairthday!” Jean emitted a sound as of contempt. “I was no thinking of the Bairthday. For your wee ship, I’m meanin’, that’s comin’ back the day.… Did your father tell ye, lassie, that he’s promised tae tak me on the wee ship with ye, so as I sall see Scotland afore the gran’ vessel can tak us?”
“Good,” said Rosamond politely. “Is—are any of the others coming, do you know?”
“I dinna ken. Mr. Thinkwell didna say. Forby, I’d as soon nane of the ithers did come. The young anes can bide a wee while longer, sin it’s no their hames they’re longin’ tae set eyes on, but new lands only; and the auld anes have no my sair longin’. They can all bide for the Lord’s guid time and the great ship.”
“I thought perhaps Flora …”
“Flora! The young limb. The less truck ye all have with Flora the better it sall be for ye. She’ll bring ye nae guid. Dinna ye go runnin’ after that wild lassie o’ Bairtie Smith’s; and dinna ye let that brither o’ yours fix his hairt on her, for she’s nae hairt hersel.’ No, no, Flora Smith winna come on the wee ship with me; she’ll bide with the ithers.… Rin on now, lassie, and tak your swim.”
Rosamond left her standing there, peering at the morning horizon.
The lagoon glimmered with the radiant rainbow sheen of spilt milk. Down through it Rosamond dived, till she was close to its floor, with its fantastic coral mosaics and beamy darts of light, that were sometimes shafts of the morning and sometimes fish. Rosamond clutched at them, grasped instead waving weeds, and shot up through swaying beams into clear air, air thin and sweet like some light golden wine.
She floated on her chest, arms spread, face towards the island, gazing as one gazes into the face of a departing friend.
To leave Orphan Island—Smith Island—whatever island it might be; to leave it on the morrow! To leave the lagoon, the reef, the shore, the woods, the valley with the green lake, the antics of monkeys, the humming-birds, scarlet and green and blue, the armadillos, the big thief land-crabs that climbed the Smiths’ palm trees and stole their nuts, the little scarlet sea crabs that scuttled about the coral pools, the great sea turtles, the land turtles that crawled in the woods, the iguanas, geckos, tortoises, the mangos, bananas, bread-fruit, and figs, the paradise birds and the mocking birds, the little silver bird that was like the Holy Ghost, the cow-tree with its warm, gushing stream, the honey in the hollow trees, the trade winds sighing in the tree-tops and bearing bright pollen about the island, bearing scents of almond, of frangipani, of cloves, of wild roses, of vanilla, of frankincense and myrrh.…
To leave the island—it was too much.
Rosamond blinked away tears, with the salt Pacific, from her eyes.
As to Flora—well, whatever old Jean might say, Rosamond did not believe that Charles, far gone in love as he now was, would leave the island without Flora. Either Flora must come, or Charles would stay—one or the other.
And if Charles should stay … well, if Charles should stay, why should not Rosamond stay too, and await the coming of the liner? Why not indeed?
But when Rosamond had hinted as much to Mr. Thinkwell, he had said no, he certainly was not going to leave her behind; she would travel on the Typee with him. He had behaved like a father; he was decided, firm, an arbiter of destinies; there was no more to be said.
Turning seaward from the island, as one turns at last from the friend’s face which breaks one’s heart at parting, Rosamond saw that over the golden horizon there climbed a sail. A sail, a mast, a hull: in brief, a schooner. So the Typee had come back, punctual to the day; she had not foundered or deserted or split in two on some hidden reef. Here she was. It was the end of the party, and the carriage had called.…
A shrill cry rent the morning.
“The guid Lord be praised for His maircies! The ship is back!”
On she flew before a light, favouring wind that had sprung up since the dawn. Soon she would be at the gate in the reef. Rosamond, floating in the lagoon, watched her come. Mr. Thinkwell’s carriage was cantering, so as to be in time to take Mr. Thinkwell, Miss Thinkwell, and the Masters Thinkwell from the party.
Jean’s cry had brought other people down to the shore, all staring seaward, pointing, talking. Then, because the Birthday had begun, trumpets and pipes sounded, ushering it in, welcoming also the Typee.
Jean wept. The tears chased down her aged face, her lips worked, and this was always the burden of her speech. “The Lord be thankit for this day! The guid Lord be thankit, that He has let me see Aberdeen ance mair afore I dee!”
There was to be a morning service on the Birthday. A brief service of thanksgiving, with hymns and short sermon, and every one was to attend. One was to give thanks for Miss Smith, who had so fortunately seen the light on this day ninety-eight years ago, and had so providentially been preserved. The service, it was announced by the crier, was to be in the middle of the wood, near Balmoral, at noon.
The Typee lay at anchor by the reef. Its boat had landed and rowed back again, leaving Captain Paul and Mr. Merton ashore, to spend the day there. To-morrow the Typee was to depart.
“I’m not coming to this service,” William said to Charles and Rosamond. “I shall catch crabs and filefish in the pools.”
But Charles and Rosamond thought they had better go to the service, so as not to annoy any one on their last day. Besides, Flora would be obliged to go.
Every one was to be there; Miss Smith had been very insistent on that. Every one, that is, but the convicts, who were to have their treat at this hour. They were to row out to the schooner and be taken for a sail. Miss Smith had arranged it through Mr. Denis Smith with Captain Paul, who had sent orders to the crew by his own boat. They were to row out in two island boats, each boat in, charge of a warder. Only Captain Paul and the Thinkwells had been told of this treat; it was feared by Miss Smith that, if news of it got about, the island would be jealous.
“Mustn’t tell Bertie,” Denis said. “Mamma don’t want Bertie to know. Bertie’d think it silly. ’Tis silly, too, that’s a fact. But there, it’s poor old mamma’s birthday, and the kind thought does her credit, and the poor fellows don’t get much fun in their lives, so there it is. It’s to be during church, so people won’t see.”
Mr. Denis Smith was, as usual, genial. He had, even thus early in the day, not wasted the Birthday.
So, when the trumpets blew at noon and the congregation took their places in the wood, every one but William and the convicts were there.
It was a happy and thankful service. Hymns of praise and gratitude for Miss Smith, who sat in her palanquin by the clergyman’s side, rose among the trees, exciting the birds and monkeys from their noon rest, so that these flew in bright, twittering legions above the congregation’s heads, and those eagerly cast down bananas and nuts, as if in tribute. There was a sermon, from the text, “And Deborah ruled in Israel three score years and ten, and did that which was pleasing in the sight of the Lord. And the Lord blessed Israel greatly in the days of Deborah.”
Mr. Maclean was towards the end of this sermon, when some one came breaking hurriedly through the wood, and William Thinkwell appeared in front of the congregation, stopping by Miss Smith’s palanquin, a wet, flushed, dishevelled figure, trousers rolled above the knees, field glasses in one hand and net in the other, his white pith hat at the back of his head.
“I say,” he said loudly, between deep breaths, “those convicts have got the Typee and are making off as hard as they can go. There was a fight; I saw it through my glasses; they chucked three of the crew overboard and tied up the rest. They’re off now before a perfectly good sailing wind, and don’t look as if they meant coming back.”
Horror and amazement swept the congregation, as a wind sweeps a forest. For a moment tense silence held them; one heard only the monkeys, the birds, the tumbling, splitting nuts. Then a shrill cry tore the noon in two.
“Lord! Lord! Hae ye desairted us after all?”
The old woman’s cry broke the spell. With a loud, sibilant gasp, the congregation sprang to its feet.
“Come on,” cried Captain Paul, and dashed off through the trees. Every one followed, rushing shoreward as a startled herd of wild pigs dash through a wood. Old Jean, sobbing harshly and bent low over her stick, hobbled in the rear.
Behind her the four black men marched, swinging Miss Smith in her palanquin. Between the palm curtains the old face appeared, the fierce blue eyes blinked.
They crowded to the lagoon’s edge. Far out, they saw the Typee running full-sail before an easterly wind, bounding over a swelling sea. The two island boats were being rowed out to sea, each by a solitary oarsman.
“You see,” said William, “at first I thought it was all right, they were just going for a sail and coming back. Then when they’d got a little way, the row began. The convicts suddenly went for the crew, and chucked three of them over the side. I put my glasses up then, and saw the rest of the dagoes knocked out and tied up. So now, if those chaps know how to work a ship, they’ve got right away with her, whatever their game is.”
“Damn,” said Captain Paul, raking the schooner with William’s glasses. “Damnation.”
It seemed, at that moment, about all he had to say.
Mr. Albert Smith, however, had more.
“What,” he demanded loudly, “is the meaning of this? How did it happen that the convicts were allowed to escape? How do the warders come to be out in the boats?”
“A plan of mamma’s,” Denis uneasily explained. “Little birthday treat for the convicts. They were to row out to the ship and be brought back while we were all at church. Damn silly plan; see it now, of course; damn silly.… What are those chaps doing out there? Oh, looking for the poor fellows they threw overboard, I suppose. No chance, I’m afraid; too many sharks about.… Ought to have known it was a damn silly game.”
“Certainly you ought,” his brother said. “And I fail to see why I was not consulted in the matter. Well, your folly—I can only suppose you were drunk when you agreed to this insane plan—has ended in a disaster we cannot yet measure. It is tolerably obvious that, having murdered three sailors and stolen a ship, these men won’t feel much inclined, even if they succeed in navigating the ship so as to arrive anywhere, to mention their action or our whereabouts.”
“Marooned,” said Mr. Merton forcibly. “Bloody well marooned. Christ!”
“No foul language, sir, if you please,” said a sharp voice from the palanquin. “I must ask you to remember in whose presence you are—if your Creator’s presence is not sufficient to restrain you.”
“Restrain be damned,” said Mr. Merton rudely. “You old fool, it’s all your fault it happened. Letting your bloody convicts loose like that.…”
“Oh, shut up, Merton. Rowing won’t help,” said Charles.
“Enough, sir,” said Albert Edward, more sternly. “You forget yourself. No one can deny the folly of this scheme so unfortunately conceived and executed, but that is no reason for insulting Miss Smith in her age and infirmity.”
“Oh, indeed,” came from the palanquin. “Folly, you said, Bertie, did you? Folly indeed! I’d have you know it was no such thing.” She pushed the palm curtains back, and looked out on the crowd, purple with pride and noon heat, breathing heavily, shaking her head from side to side.
“Wits failing from age, I dare say you all think. No such thing! What we did, we did with our eyes open. It was our birthday treat to the convicts—their liberty. And our birthday treat to you, you poor fools, was to make sure you stayed safe on the island, instead of going out into the wicked world to lose your souls and bodies. We gave the convicts their orders ourself. Told ’em they’d be shut up in England if they waited to be brought there as convicts, and that this was their chance, and they were to take it. Another thing we told ’em—that if ever it came out what they’d done they’d certainly be put to death, so you may be sure they’ll keep mum about us. No hope of rescue from them. Oh, we managed ’em! You don’t suppose, you poor fools, we were going to let you leave your homes and gallivant about the world? Not a bit of it. We care for our people too much for that, we hope. Who are you to start complaining of the good land the Lord has provided for you to live in and want to go trapesing into strange countries? You, whom we picked out of the gutter! No; here you’ll live and die, be sure of that. So will you, Bertie, who thought you were going to be so great in England. And as to you, Thinkwell, you won’t see that ship of yours again —nor any other ship neither. Here you are and here you’ll stay, and make your home with us. Serve you right, you rascal. It’s a judgment. You’re marooned, Thinkwell, just as you marooned us all those years ago. Marooned; that’s what you are.…”
Her voice had risen higher and louder, and the last words were a shrill cry, as she bent forward and shook her bamboo stick towards Mr. Thinkwell.
A murmur swelled to a growl among the population. But, before any had time to speak, old Jean stepped forward, leaning on her stick, lifting one arm prophetically above her head for silence. It was as if the storm of passion and despair which shook her had broken at last the dams which had held for half a century of hate.
“And noo, friends, wull ye listen tae me a bit while, for I hae something tae tell ye. Ye’ll be surprised tae hear it, I mak nae doot. … Na, na, Miss Smith, I wunna whisht—I hae held my whisht ower long, and this day the Lord has put His judgment into my hands. Listen, all of ye. Miss Smith, wha’s ever been sae stairn anent marriage, and bastards, and the like, makin’ all these bastardy laws, and what not—Miss Smith was ne’er the honest wife o’ the doctor. For why, the mon had a wife already, ower in Ireland—though I’ll do Miss Smith the justice tae say she didna ken it when she took him. So her marriage was nae marriage ava, but plain adultery, e’en though ’twas committed in ignorance, and her bairns were all born in sin—ay, every ane o’ them, bastards all. Ay, Bairtie Smith, standin’ there sae prood and gran’, ye’re nought but a puir bastard, and by ye’re ain laws ye’ve nae right tae be hauldin’ a foot o’ land or to be takkin’ any pairt in the government o’ this island—this cairsed island desairted by the Lord. And noo I hae said my say, and I’ll whisht gin ye like. Ay, Miss, Smith, sittin’ there in ye’re sins and ye’re pride, ye may weel rage and storm, but ye canna deny the truth, rage ye ne’er sae fierce. Ye’re nought but an adultering wumman, when all’s said. The Lord who has desairted an’ rejected us be ye’re judge for this last wickedness, ye ill wumman!”
She broke off, overcome, and sank on the sands.
But no one observed her; it was now on Miss Smith that all eyes were turned. The old lady’s face, staring furiously at Jean, had become a violent purple, the swollen veins standing out like cords. Her lips worked, but no sound emerged; she grasped and shook her stick at Jean, at her people, at heaven, till it fell suddenly from her hand, and she seemed to collapse, with a loud and stertorous groan.
In brief, Miss Smith appeared to have had a stroke.
Albert Edward and Mrs. Smith-Carter were at her side, and Mrs. Smith-Carter called for her son-in-law, the doctor, who hurried up, looking efficient, and commanding that those present should stand back in order that Miss Smith might “have air.”
“She must be taken home,” he said, and called “Nurse!”
Nurse, a buxom and cheerful looking lady, came forward, all readiness, and the Zacharies picked up the palanquin and started for Balmoral, followed by Mrs. Smith-Carter and another Smith daughter.
Albert Edward remained on the beach. He had something to say. He cleared his throat, firmly grasped his whiskers, and said, loudly and clearly, “Jean, your wild talk has, I fear, reduced Miss Smith” (his was the only obeisance to the name)” to a very serious and dangerous state of health. She was already, as you all observed, affected by the heat, and by the great disaster of the loss of the schooner, so that she talked fancifully” (this he said very firmly and clearly) “about her own share in that disaster. You saw fit to add to her distress by wild and unfounded accusations, in the very worst of taste, which must have hurt and distressed her very deeply. Your only excuse is your own great age, which makes you, no doubt, entirely irresponsible for your utterances.”
“Prood words, Bairtie Smith,” the old voice quavered up shrilly from the sands, where Jean sat huddled and shrunk, staring out to sea. “Prood words ye hae, as always. But ye dinna believe them yersel’. Let any wha doots me, look in that journal; tairn tae the year 1870, and see if the entries there, gin ye understand them, dinna bear me oot. Oh, she was cunnin’, and thought nane but auld Jean wad e’er lairn the truth; so she talked proodly of ‘bastards’ and ‘livin’ in sin,’ puttin’ up a screen between hersel’ an’ her ain saul. An’ her secret wad hae been safe tae the end but for this wickedness. She suldna hae driven auld Jean tae vengeance. Ay, ay, blather hoo ye like, Bairtie Smith, there’s nane here that’ll believe ye, so ye may’s weel spare ye’re breath. Ye’re naught but a bastard bairn, an’ all here ken it verra weel.… But what does any of it matter the noo? Oh, Lord, ye hae visited us sairly with Thy judgments this day!” She fell to wailing, her head in her withered hands.
“Come, come,” said Mr. Thinkwell, stooping over her and patting her kindly on the shoulder. “Come, come, come. Don’t give way. There is no reason to suppose that all is lost, or that we shan’t be rescued in time. Surely some of these convicts have left families behind them here, whom they would scarcely wish to abandon for ever.”
“That’s true,” said some one. “Not that they would all trouble about their families; but there are some who might. Michael Conolly, for instance.”
“You’re right there,” cried Mrs. Michael Conolly. “If Michael ever gets to safety, he’ll send help, even if it does put him in danger again himself. Trust Michael!”
“And what about the crew?” suggested Denis Smith. “The ones they didn’t chuck overboard. They’ll tell.”
“The odds are,” said Mr. Merton gloomily, “the crew will all be chucked overboard before they arrive anywhere. Can’t put much money on them, poor devils. Besides, without chart or direction, who’s to find the way here? Paul brought the log with him ashore. It’s a thousand to one they’d never find us, even if they sent a search party. Might take ’em years, anyhow, and they’ll get tired of looking before that.”
“If they try to work the schooner themselves,” said Captain Paul, “they’ll probably come to grief and run her on a reef, or let her capsize in the first squall.”
“If they are sensible,” said Mr. Thinkwell, “they will make the crew navigate her. That is, no doubt, what they kept some of them for. Well, it’s no use speculating. We can do nothing but wait and see how it turns out.… Those poor fellows out there don’t seem to have been found.”
“Sea’s alive with sharks,” said Mr. Merton.
The two boats were being rowed into the lagoon. The population watched them gloomily. Mr. Albert Smith was talking continuously and loudly, but no one listened much.
“No one will ever listen to papa again,” Flora muttered. “He’s like a paradise bird whose tail has been cut off. Bastards! I must say that’s rather amusing. The one bright spot in this horrid business.”
Charles, who was standing by her, said “No. There’s another bright spot—anyhow for me. You and I are staying here together.”
She turned on him, with angry eyes.
“Oh, that’s a bright spot, is it? I hate you, Charles Thinkwell. I don’t want to speak to you. You and your absurd ship that hasn’t rescued us after all. My life is spoilt, and you say it’s a bright spot that we’re here together. I can tell you, you won’t find it so. Because I was pleased to hear you tell me about England, and so on, I suppose you think I’m in love with you. Well, I’m not, so there. Now that we’re left stranded on this abominable island—perhaps for years, perhaps for ever, who knows?—I don’t want you in the least. I wanted you to show me England. I hate your chatter about things I shall never see.”
“Very good,” said Charles, white about the lips and nostrils. “I quite understand. You needn’t be afraid I shall bore you any more.”
He turned his back on her and walked away.
“Peter,” said Flora. Her proud, gay mouth was quivering, her eyes held tears. “Peter”
He was at her side.
“Peter—I can’t bear it. Take me away in a boat, and let’s get somewhere or drown. I can’t endure to stay on here and never see the world after all.”
“They’ll come for us,” Peter consoled her. “My papa won’t desert us, I know that. Not unless they are lost themselves.”
“They will be,” Flora cried. “I know it. The first squall—didn’t you hear Captain Paul say it? Oh, Peter, how could your papa?”
“I suppose he thought it was his only chance of freedom,” said Peter moodily. “He was a prisoner for life.”
“Serve him right,” said Flora. Then, “Oh Peter, I don’t mean it; don’t be cross. If he gets help sent to us, I shall forgive him a hundred times. But only imagine it—perhaps years and years more of this tedious place! I am sure I shall die of it quite soon.”
The boats landed with the two warders, and every one crowded about them as they told their tale.
“I am sure,” said one of them, “I thought there were enough on board to keep them in order should they get troublesome. But indeed, we never thought of such a notion. So quiet they seemed, and coming away so pleased last night after their audience with Miss Smith—ungrateful fellows. Who’d have dreamed of such a thing?”
Mr. Albert Smith looked uneasy lest some one should mention what indeed the warders were bound to learn soon enough, the part played by Miss Smith in the day’s proceedings. He talked quickly of the poor brown sailors who had been thrown into the sea.
Mr. Albert Smith was a shaken man.
Slowly the crowd dispersed. It was of no use to stay on the shore any longer, watching for a schooner now far away out of sight. They strolled off in groups and knots, discussing the day’s strange occurrences. Many were discontented, angry, rebellious; others thought they were, but were really relieved not to have to make this disturbing move and leave their home for ever behind them. But on all the Smith yoke lay, galling and precariously balanced; why should they stand it any more? That was the burden of their talk. Miss Smith had betrayed them, and was now fallen into a state that seemed a judgment. Her children, who had annexed the island, had, it seemed, no right to a foot of it, for they were bastards, and, as such, condemned by their own laws.…
Why should they stand it any longer?
They would not stand it any longer.
Newspapers came out on the Hibernian shore, saying that they would not.
“Up, Orphans, and take the island from these so-called Smiths!”
“Why so-called?” inquired Mr. Thinkwell, reading this as it came out. “They are Smiths. To-day, in fact, we learn for the first time that Smith is (according to Jean Fraser anyhow) their correct name. Though, as to that, the point raised by Jean as to their illegitimacy is debatable. It raises, in fact, a not uninteresting legal question as to the marriage laws on desert islands.”
Charles, who was sulkily reading the news with him, reminded him that so-called was, in Great Britain, often used merely as a term indicative of distaste and contempt. Sometimes during the European War people had even, when roused, spoken of our foes as “these so-called Germans.”
“Very true,” Mr. Thinkwell agreed. “Obviously, here, as there, people will say anything.”
They perused further revolutionary utterances.
“It certainly looks,” said the languid voice of Hindley Smith-Rimski, “as if our respected family hadn’t a much longer run here. What do you think, Mr. Thinkwell?”
“I certainly think it would be wise to make considerable changes in the constitution and the property laws. The time seems to have come when this is positively demanded.”
“It may be demanded, but it won’t be granted, I imagine. The only change in the laws I anticipate is the repeal of the bastardy laws. But I dare say we shan’t even have that, as at present my Uncle Bertie’s line is to maintain that grandmamma’s—er—adultery (if you will pardon the crude word) is a delirious and senile fancy of old Jean’s.”
“It is an awkward position for him,” said Mr. Thinkwell, who saw every one’s point of view.
“It is. And it may very soon be a confoundedly awkward position for us all. See there!”
In large capitals was being written, “THE NAME OF THIS ISLAND IS HEREBY CHANGED FROM SMITH ISLAND TO ORPHAN ISLAND.”
Hindley shrugged his slim shoulders. “The Orphans mean business, I fear. In their present mood, and if they work themselves up much more and spend a fairly bibulous afternoon, they should be up to anything by the evening. Odd, how excited they get.”
His glance at the population, calm, quizzical, amused, was such as a French aristocrat might have turned on the canaille on the eve of the Revolution.
“It will be more amusing than this,” he said, “this evening, when the official journal comes out. It will need such very earnest and vigilant censoring on the part of poor Uncle Bertie. I shall be interested to see in what form he does let the day’s news appear. Let us leave this rather noisy peninsula.… Well, Mr. Charles, how does the prospect of settling down for some time among us please you? You look a little melancholy, if I may say so.”
“Naturally,” said Charles, “I want to get home. I have a great many things to do there.… Not that I expect we shall be held up here for long, but still, it’s a bore. I’ve been talking to Paul about the chances of getting anywhere in a boat, but he doesn’t think much of them. He says you couldn’t provision a small boat for long enough, even if it wouldn’t be swamped. But I can’t see why it is impossible to build a much larger boat, that would be seaworthy.”
Hindley shcok his head.
“All our attempts at that have so far failed—and we’ve tried, at intervals, for sixty-eight years, you must remember. We haven’t the materials. We can build houses, of a sort but not ships.”
“The experience of all castaways as to that seems to have been much the same,” Mr. Thinkwell agreed. “Even Crusoe, a man full of resource and perseverance, though stupid in many ways, failed to build a boat in which he could voyage far. We have to make about two hundred miles, across a sea noted for its sudden and violent storms. But I certainly feel we should give our minds to the problem. It would seem a pity merely to sit idle, waiting for rescue.”
“Meanwhile,” said Hindley, “and pending both the construction of this vessel and the Orphan revolt, let us dine while we may. Perhaps you will both honour me? We will talk of literature and the arts, and forget the troublous world awhile.”
The banquet had been, of course, given up, on account of Miss Smith’s indisposition, which remained unchanged. Loyalty would have demanded a respectful quiet on this her birthday evening, while she lay ill. The fact that there was no respectful quiet seemed to the Smith family ominous. There was defiant noise, shouting, public speaking. Some assisted in the making of noise because they were annoyed, some because they were relieved, others because they liked noise.
Mr. Albert Smith stayed in Balmoral, after a painful half-hour spent in superintending the issue of the evening news on the shore. He had failed to censor the news as he thought fit; for the first time the news editor took no notice of him, but, supported by public opinion, went his own way, and Mr. Smith had the vexation of reading in full the story of the convicts and his mamma, and that of his mamma’s alleged illicit union with his papa. Nothing he could say, not all his loud commands and imperious gestures, had sufficed to stop or ameliorate these news. When he said “Erase, please,” the editor had said, in effect, “Stet,” and no one had come forward to obey the Prime Minister’s command. There was even a paragraph about the bastardy of the Smiths of the second generation, and how this might affect their position in the state. This paragraph Mr. Smith had, stepping forward, erased with his own foot, but not before great numbers had read it. When it came to the paragraph headed “Health of Miss Smith,” all that was said was “Miss Smith has had a fit, and is no better.” No anxiety or regret was expressed. Mr. Smith heard even his brother-in-law, Mr. Carter, mutter, “Serve her right, too, the old devil.” Mr. Carter had never got on over well with his mother-in-law, who had kept him in his place as merely the consort of Adelaide Smith. Only some of the Orphan women, incurably loyal, said, “Poor old lady! I hope she’ll get better. She is Miss Smith, when all’s said, and she acted for our good, after all.” (For they did not by any means all desire to leave the island.)
It was all very unpleasant. There was nothing for it but to retire to Balmoral and hold a family conclave outside the sick room. Dr. Field and the nurse bustled in and out, letting Miss Smith’s blood, applying cold compresses to her head, saying, “A severe fit. She is conscious but helpless, and may remain so indefinitely. There is no reason to apprehend immediate death. In these cases, no one knows what will happen.”
The family tiptoed about the bed, talking in whispers.
Miss Smith lay, purple and rigid, breathing heavily, with wide open eyes. If she was conscious, if she was enraged, if she was struggling to say “Don’t whisper, Bertie; it annoys us; we’ve told you before,” she failed to indicate it. She merely lay and breathed.
Anticipating no immediate change in her condition, Mr. Albert Smith went back to the Yams for supper. At the Yams sat Mrs. Albert Smith, sewing at a frock for an infant grandchild, saying at intervals, “Tut, tut. To think of your mamma doing such a thing! Well, I never!” which was not helpful, whether it referred to Miss Smith’s exploit with regard to the Typee or to her earlier behaviour with the doctor.
Flora came in, sullen and defiant, and Heathcliff, excited and flushed. Heathcliff, during supper, remarked that the island was in a great state of discontent, and that, so far as he could see, the only way to avert a rising which would overthrow the government was for parliament to meet tomorrow and radically reform the constitution itself, redistributing both land and power among the many.
“Don’t talk nonsense, my dear boy,” his papa told him. “We Smiths are not the sort to betray our trust through fear. And at the moment, too, when your grandmamma lies helpless.…”
Flora, rousing from a sullen reverie, said that, for her part, she did not care in the least what happened to the constitution or the land, to the Orphans or to the Smiths, but that she supposed her papa would no longer raise objections to her marrying Peter Conolly on the grounds that he was a bastard.
Her papa said that he certainly could and did.
“Well,” said Flora spitefully, “in that case, and if marriages of that kind are wrong, I think you ought to undo your marriage with mamma.”
“Flora, be silent. I desire you to be silent immediately. I should have thought, I must say, that you would have known better than to use, in order to wound and insult me, the irresponsible libel of a demented old woman. To say the least of it, that appears to me to be hardly cricket. Particularly with your grandmamma lying helpless and unable to defend herself.”
Flora shrugged a shoulder, possibly a trifle ashamed.
“Well, in any case,” she said, “Angus says he will marry us. He says he doesn’t see why he shouldn’t. We talked to him about it this afternoon. Oh, dear me, papa, surely if we have to spend months and years more on this tedious island, we must pass the time as best we can!”
Her voice broke on a sob. The prospect of marrying Peter, though it might alleviate the island’s tedium, could not compensate Flora for losing the world.
“Oh, tut, my dear, tut,” her mamma soothed her. “We mustn’t be peevish, you know. I shall have to talk to you like little Harriet’s mamma in the poem—I’m sure I used to be always saying it to you when you were little:—
“These slight disappointments are sent to prepare
For what may hereafter befall;
For seasons of real disappointment and care,
Which commonly happen to all.
For, just like to-day with its holiday lost,
Is life and its unnfoits at best:
Our pleasures are blighted, our purposes crossed,
To teach us it is not our rest.
And when those distresses and crosses appear
With which you may shortly be tried,
You’ll wonder that ever you wasted a tear …”
“Oh, mamma, do be quiet!”
Heathcliff got up and went to the door.
“They are very noisy,” he said, listening. “There are a lot of them coming this way. I expect they are going to hold a meeting outside the Yams—a demonstration. They’ll probably call for you, papa. They half suspect, you know, that you had something to do with grandmamma’s performance this morning—knew of it anyhow. I told them you didn’t.”
“I? Indeed, no. It is your Uncle Denis they should blame for that, not me.”
“They do blame Uncle Denis, for being a fool, and probably tipsy. But they don’t suspect him of knowing of grandmamma’s plot. Uncle Denis is pretty popular, you see, on the whole, so far as any Smith can be. It’s you they seem so down on —after grandmamma, who’s out of action now.… Anyhow they’re coming this way. Listen!”
There were confused noises without.
“I shall not,” said Mr. Smith, squaring his shoulders and throwing out his chest, “take the slightest notice.”
All the evening and far into the night the noise of demonstration rolled. Hindley Smith-Rimski, playing chess with Mr. Thinkwell at Belle Vue, heard it, and said, “The populace appear to clamour for my family’s blood. I can’t say I’m surprised. Where are your offspring?”
Mr. Thinkwell looked vaguely round the room.
“They seem to be all out. I suppose, like Paul and Merton, they are watching the evening’s doings. I can’t say, myself, that mere demonstrations of excitement interest me greatly. Persons carried away by feeling are, as a rule, at their least interesting.”
“Besides,” said Hindley, “being in deucedly bad form. Knight takes your rook.… I suppose your daughter will be all right?”
“I imagine so,” said Mr. Thinkwell. “She is no doubt with her brothers.”
As a matter of fact, Rosamond was not with her brothers, for William was on the shore pursuing the zoological investigations which the misconduct of the convicts had abruptly interrupted in the morning, and Charles had walked up into the hills. Rosamond was with Captain Paul, who, tucking her hand firmly into his arm, was taking care of her, as they strolled about listening to the conversations, demonstrations, and music. Rosamond had no great inclination to be taken care of, and would have preferred solitude, but Captain Paul thought that unsafe for young females on such a night as this.
“Might meet with unpleasantness,” he said.
Meet with unpleasantness! Rosamond thought, that would be dreadful. It sounded so sinister, unpleasantness in the abstract, a creature stalking along the roads, that one might meet at any turning face to face. One would run for one’s life, but Unpleasantness would run faster, hurrying in a horrid lumbering gallop.… No, one must not meet Unpleasantness. So Rosamond submitted to having her hand tucked into Captain Paul’s arm, and to being escorted about her own island.
She could not help feeling a little happy to-day, deep in her soul, despite the disaster that had befallen them all, and that had so vexed some of the islanders, and, in particular, her dear Flora. Of course it was very vexing for them, to lose their Promised Land at a blow, like this. Vexing, too, for her father, who had his work in Cambridge, to which he was so oddly attached. One might not be able to understand how any one could prefer work in Cambridge to idleness on a coral island, but still, fathers are odd, and there it was. Rosamond was not so selfish as to desire her father to be permanently marooned and the islanders permanently disappointed, but, as this would appear to have occurred, for herself she could not but feel rather pleased, though the thought of her dog Peter somewhat distressed her.
“Some kind of sufficiently navigable craft might be built, possibly,” Captain Paul speculated aloud to himself. “Though the Lord alone knows how.…”
Rosamond reflected that the Lord’s alone knowing would not help them very much. In her view, it could not be done. No one on desert islands ever escaped from them in boats—not even in real boats saved from the ship. Even Masterman Ready (who was so clever that he could build houses, stockades, turtle traps, anything, for poor, stupid Mr. Seagrave, who could not help him at all), had known that he could not hope to do that. Even Jack, Ralph, and Peterkin, who had made a wonderful boat of chestnut planks, with nothing but an axe, had only used it to voyage round the island, and, on the one occasion when they went further, had been very nearly wrecked in a storm. Even Robinson Crusoe, so busy, persevering, and helped by Providence, had failed here. No; obviously it could not be done. Elsewhere one built ships, but not on desert islands. One waited for ships instead, and, if ships did not come, one went on waiting.
“I expect,” said Rosamond, “we shall have to wait to be rescued.”