Part 20 (1/2)
A few days later he was upon his highest hill watching the horizon when he saw a dark spot appear in the southwest. At first he was hopeful that it was a sail, but as he saw it grow he knew it to be a cloud. Then he hurried toward the house, quite sure a storm was coming. Knowing how the southern seas were swept by hurricanes, it was surprising that none had come sooner, and he ran as fast as he could for the shelter of the house.
Robert made the door just in time. Then the day had turned almost as dark as night and, with a rush and a roar, wind and rain were upon him.
Evidently the slaver had known those regions, and so he had built a house of great strength, which, though it quivered and rattled under the sweep of the hurricane, nevertheless stood up against it.
The building had several small windows, closed with strong shutters, but as wind and rain were driving from the west he was able to open one on the eastern side and watch the storm. It was just such a hurricane as that which had wrecked the shattered schooner. It became very dark, there were tremendous displays of thunder and lightning, which ceased, after a while, as the wind grew stronger, and then through the dark he saw trees and bushes go down. Fragments struck against the house, but the stout walls held.
The wind kept up a continuous screaming, as full of menace as the crash of a battle. Part of the time it swept straight ahead, cutting wide swathes, and then, turning into b.a.l.l.s of compressed air, it whirled with frightful velocity, smas.h.i.+ng everything level with the ground as if it had been cut down by a giant sword.
Robert had seen more than one hurricane in the great northern woods and he watched it without alarm. Although the house continued to rattle and shake, and now and then a bough, wrenched from its trunk, struck it a heavy blow, he knew that it would hold. There was a certain comfort in sitting there, dry and secure, while the storm raged without in all its violence. There was pleasure too in the knowledge that he was on the land and not the sea. He remembered the frightful pa.s.sage that he and the slaver had made through the breakers, and he knew that his escape then had depended upon the slimmest of chances. He shuddered as he recalled the rocks thrusting out their savage teeth.
The storm, after a while, sank into a steady rain, and the wind blew but little. The air was now quite cold for that region, and Robert, lying down on the couch, covered himself with a blanket. He soon fell asleep and slept so long, lulled by the beat of the rain, that he did not awaken until the next day.
Then he took the dinghy and rowed around to the other side of the island. As he had expected, the schooner was gone. The storm had broken her up, and he found many of her timbers scattered along the beach, where they had been brought in by the waves. He felt genuine sadness at the s.h.i.+p's destruction and disappearance. It was like losing a living friend.
Fortunately, the tarpaulin and heavy sails with which he had covered his heap of stores high up the beach, weighting them down afterward with huge stones, had held. Some water had entered at the edges, but, as the goods were of a kind that could not be damaged much, little harm was done. Again he resolved to preserve all that he had acc.u.mulated there, although he did not know that he would have any need of them.
When he rowed back in the dinghy he saw a formidable fin cutting the water again, and, laying down the oars, he took up the rifle which he always carried with him. He watched until the shark was almost on the surface of the water, and then he sent a bullet into it. There was a great splas.h.i.+ng, followed by a disappearance, and he did not know just then the effect of his shot, but a little later, when the huge body of the slain fish floated to the surface he felt intense satisfaction, as he believed that it would have been a man-eater had it the chance.
CHAPTER VIII
MAKING THE BEST OF IT
After his return in the dinghy Robert decided that he would have some fresh beef and also a little sport. Although the island contained no indigenous wild animals of any size, there were the wild cattle, and he had seen they were both long of horn and fierce. If he courted peril he might find it in hunting them, and in truth he rather wanted a little risk. There was such an absence of variety in his life, owing to the lack of human companions.h.i.+p, that an attack by a maddened bull, for instance, would add spice to it. The rifle would protect him from any extreme danger.
He knew he was likely to find cattle near the larger lake, and, as he had expected, he saw a herd of almost fifty grazing there on a flat at the eastern edge. Two fierce old bulls with very long, sharp horns were on the outskirts, as if they were mounting guard, while the cows and calves were on the inside near the lake.
Robert felt sure that the animals, although unharried by man, would prove wary. For the sake of sport he hoped that it would be so, and, using all the skill that he had learned in his long a.s.sociation with Willet and Tayoga, he crept down through the woods. The bulls would be too tough, and as he wanted a fat young cow it would be necessary for him to go to the very edge of the thickets that hemmed in the little savanna on which they were grazing.
The wind was blowing from him toward the herd and the bulls very soon took alarm, holding up their heads, sniffing and occasionally shaking their formidable horns. Robert picked a fat young cow in the gra.s.s almost at the water's edge as his target, but stopped a little while in order to disarm the suspicion of the wary old guards. When the two went back to their pleasant task of grazing he resumed his cautious advance, keeping the fat young cow always in view.
Now that he had decided to secure fresh beef, he wanted it very badly, and it seemed to him that the cow would fulfill all his wants. A long experience in the wilderness would show him how to prepare juicy and tender steaks. Eager to replenish his larder in so welcome a way, he rose and crept forward once more in the thicket.
The two bulls became suspicious again, the one on the right, which was the larger, refusing to have his apprehension quieted, and advancing part of the way toward the bushes, where he stood, thrusting forward angry horns. His att.i.tude served as a warning for the whole herd, which, becoming alarmed, began to move.
Robert was in fear lest they rush away in a panic, and so he took a long shot at the cow, bringing her down, but failing to kill her, as she rose after falling and began to make off. Eager now to secure his game he drew the heavy pistol that he carried at his belt, and, dropping his rifle, rushed forward from the thicket for a second shot.
The cow was not running fast. Evidently the wound was serious, but Robert had no mind for her to escape him in the thickets, and he pursued her until he could secure good aim with the pistol. Then he fired and had the satisfaction of seeing the cow fall again, apparently to stay down this time.
But his satisfaction was short. He heard a heavy tread and an angry snort beside him. He caught the gleam of a long horn, and as he whirled the big bull was upon him. He leaped aside instinctively and escaped the thrust of the horn, but the bull whirled also, and the animal's heavy shoulder struck him with such force that he was knocked senseless.
When Robert came to himself he was conscious of an aching body and an aching head, but he recalled little else at first. Then he remembered the fierce thrusts of the angry old bull, and he was glad that he was alive. He felt of himself to see if one of those sharp horns had entered him anywhere, and he was intensely relieved to find that he had suffered no wound. Evidently it had been a collision in which he had been the sufferer, and that he had fallen flat had been a lucky thing for him, as the fierce bull had charged past him and had then gone on.
Robert was compelled to smile sourly at himself. He had wanted the element of danger as a spice for his hunting, and he had most certainly found it. He had been near death often, but never nearer than when the old bull plunged against him. He rose slowly and painfully, shook himself several times to throw off as well as he could the effect of his heavy jolt, then picked up his rifle at one point and his pistol at another.
The herd was gone, but the cow that he had chosen lay dead, and, as her condition showed him that he had been unconscious not more than five minutes, there was his fresh beef after all. As his strength was fast returning, he cut up and dressed the cow, an achievement in which a long experience in hunting had made him an expert. He hung the quarters in a dense thicket of tall bushes where vultures or buzzards could not get at them, and took some of the tenderest steaks home with him.
He broiled the steaks over a fine bed of coals in front of the house and ate them with bread that he baked himself from the s.h.i.+p's flour. He enjoyed his dinner and he was devoutly grateful for his escape. But how much pleasanter it would have been if Willet and Tayoga, those faithful comrades of many perils, were there with him to share it! He wondered what they were doing. Doubtless they had hunted for him long, and they had suspected and sought to trace Garay, but the cunning spy doubtless had fled from Albany immediately after his capture. Willet and Tayoga, failing to find him, would join in the great campaign which the British and Americans would certainly organize anew against Canada.
It was this thought of the campaign that was most bitter to Robert. He was heart and soul in the war, in which he believed mighty issues to be involved, and he had seen so much of it already that he wanted to be in it to the finish. When these feelings were strong upon him it was almost intolerable to be there upon the island, alone and helpless. All the world's great events were pa.s.sing him by as if he did not exist. But the periods of gloom would not last long. Despite his new gravity, his cheerful, optimistic spirit remained, and it always pulled him away from the edge of despair.