Part 27 (1/2)
”That awful thing plunged from the underbrush upon me so suddenly that I was almost paralyzed,” he said soberly. ”I didn't have much time to think, and I don't know what I should have done if it had not been for this excellent club, which I had cut for a rather inglorious purpose.
With one of the very best strokes a golfer ever made I cracked his skull.”
”His skull!”
”Likewise his neck. Then I cut his throat.”
”Oh, Hugh!” breathlessly.
”And I'm going back after breakfast to carve him up into roasts, steaks and soups enough to last us for a month.”
”Oh, it must have been something gigantic. Was it a rhinoceros?” she cried ecstatically.
”Rhinoceros soup!” he exclaimed in disgust. She was properly contrite.
”I'll tell you what I killed, if you'll promise to endure the shock--and not tell any one else.” He placed his lips close to her little ear and whispered in awe-struck tones, ”A turtle!”
”A turtle! Why, a baby could kill a turtle. You are no longer a hero.
Enough to last a month! Hugh Ridgeway, are you delirious?” she exclaimed in fine scorn.
”Wait till you see him. He weighs a ton,” he said proudly.
After their breakfast of nuts, fruit and water they started for the little beach, Lady Tennys vastly excited. Her exclamations on seeing the sea monster amused Hugh beyond measure.
”I never dreamed a turtle could be so immense,” she cried. ”This one must be a thousand years old.”
”If he is, we'll have tough steaks,” observed he grimly. Later on he carved several fine steaks from the turtle and cleaned the upper sh.e.l.l carefully, wisely concluding to retain it for the usefulness it was sure to afford sooner or later. ”There is one thing to be done,” said he, when they sat down to rest. ”I must climb up that mountain and plant a white flag to show that we are here if a s.h.i.+p should pa.s.s. I'll do that as soon as I have rested, provided I can find anything white that is large enough to be seen from a distance.”
She looked far out over the harbor for a minute, a tinge of red running to her ears.
”A handkerchief would be too small, wouldn't it?” she asked.
”I'm afraid so,” he answered glumly.
Soon afterward she left him and went to the cave, bidding him to await her return. When she came back she carried in her hand a broad piece of white cloth, which she laid before him on the gra.s.s. There was a look of modest reluctance in her eyes when he glanced quickly up at them. A cherished underskirt, ripped ruthlessly from waistband to ruffle, making one broad white flag of the finest texture, was her offering.
”Use that, Hugh.” She could not resist smiling as she pointed to it.
”It will be the very thing,” he said, arising and taking the garment from the ground somewhat carefully.
”It won't hurt you,” she said, laughing frankly; whereupon he waved it rudely above his head and pointed to the pinnacle of the rock.
”With this I shall scale the rock and skirt the bay!”
Within ten minutes he was on his way up the incline, carrying his stout stick in his hand, another heavier and stronger one being bound to his back with the white signal attached. She accompanied him to the point where the ascent became difficult and full of danger.
”Be careful, Hugh,” she said; ”it looks so dangerous. If you find there is any possibility of falling, don't attempt to go to the top. You are so daring, you Americans, that you do not recognize peril at all Promise me, or I shall not allow you to go on.”
He looked down into her serious upturned eyes and promised. Then he resumed the ascent, with a queer flutter of adulation in his heart.
From time to time he paused to rest. In each instance he looked below, waving his hand encouragingly to the anxious one who watched him so closely. On, over fierce crags, around grim towers, along steep walls, higher and higher he crawled. Twice he slipped and fell back several feet. When he glanced down, cold perspiration standing on his forehead, he saw her bending with averted face, her hands pressed to her eyes as if she expected his body to come cras.h.i.+ng to her feet. With recovered energy he shouted to her, and the quick, glad glance upward was enough to make the remainder of the ascent glorious to him. At last, his hands and knees bleeding, he crawled upon the small, flat top of the mountain, five hundred feet above the breakers, three hundred feet above the woman he had left behind.