Act II. the Island

Two months have elapsed, and the scene is a desert island in the Pacific, on which our adventurers have been wrecked.

The curtain rises on a sea of bamboo, which shuts out all view save the foliage of palm trees and some gaunt rocks. Occasionally Crichton and Treherne come momentarily into sight, hacking and hewing the bamboo, through which they are making a clearing between the ladies and the shore; and by and by, owing to their efforts, we shall have an unrestricted outlook on to a sullen sea that is at present hidden. Then we shall also be able to note a mast standing out of the water—all that is left, saving floating wreckage, of the ill-fated yacht the Bluebell. The beginnings of a hut will also be seen, with Crichton driving its walls into the ground or astride its roof of saplings, for at present he is doing more than one thing at a time. In a red shirt, with the ends of his sailor’s breeches thrust into wading-boots, he looks a man for the moment; we suddenly remember some one’s saying—perhaps it was ourselves—that a cataclysm would be needed to get him out of his servant’s clothes, and apparently it has been forthcoming. It is no longer beneath our dignity to cast an inquiring eye on his appearance. His features are not distinguished, but he has a strong jaw and green eyes, in which a yellow light burns that we have not seen before. His dark hair, hitherto so decorously sleek, has been ruffled this way and that by wind and weather, as if they were part of the cataclysm and wanted to help his chance. His muscles must be soft and flabby still, but though they shriek aloud to him to desist, he rains lusty blows with his axe, like one who has come upon the open for the first time in his life, and likes it. He is as yet far from being an expert woodsman—mark the blood on his hands at places where he has hit them instead of the tree; but note also that he does not waste time in bandaging them—he rubs them in the earth and goes on. His face is still of the discreet pallor that befits a butler, and he carries the smaller logs as if they were a salver; not in a day or a month will he shake off the badge of servitude, but without knowing it he has begun.

But for the hatchets at work, and an occasional something horrible falling from a tree into the ladies’ laps, they hear nothing save the mournful surf breaking on a coral shore.

They sit or recline huddled together against a rock, and they are farther from home, in every sense of the word, than ever before. Thirty-six hours ago, they were given three minutes in which to dress, without a maid, and reach the boats, and they have not made the best of that valuable time. None of them has boots, and had they known this prickly island they would have thought first of boots. They have a sufficiency of garments, but some of them were gifts dropped into the boat—Lady Mary’s tarpaulin coat and hat, for instance, and Catherine’s blue jersey and red cap, which certify that the two ladies were lately before the mast. Agatha is too gay in Ernest’s dressing-gown, and clutches it to her person with both hands as if afraid that it may be claimed by its rightful owner. There are two pairs of bath slippers between the three of them, and their hair cries aloud and in vain for hairpins.

By their side, on an inverted bucket, sits Ernest, clothed neatly in the garments of day and night, but, alas, bare-footed. He is the only cheerful member of this company of four, but his brightness is due less to a manly desire to succour the helpless than to his having been lately in the throes of composition, and to his modest satisfaction with the result. He reads to the ladies, and they listen, each with one scared eye to the things that fall from trees.

ERNEST (who has written on the fly-leaf of the only book saved from the wreck). This is what I have written. ‘Wrecked, wrecked, wrecked! on an island in the Tropics, the following: the Hon. Ernest Woolley, the Rev. John Treherne, the Ladies Mary, Catherine, and Agatha Lasenby, with two servants. We are the sole survivors of Lord Loam’s steam yacht Bluebell, which encountered a fearful gale in these seas, and soon became a total wreck. The crew behaved gallantly, putting us all into the first boat. What became of them I cannot tell, but we, after dreadful sufferings, and insufficiently clad, in whatever garments we could lay hold of in the dark’—

LADY MARY. Please don’t describe our garments.

ERNEST.—’succeeded in reaching this island, with the loss of only one of our party, namely, Lord Loam, who flung away his life in a gallant attempt to save a servant who had fallen overboard.’ (The ladies have wept long and sore for their father, but there is something in this last utterance that makes them look up.)

AGATHA. But, Ernest, it was Crichton who jumped overboard trying to save father.

ERNEST (with the candour that is one of his most engaging qualities). Well, you know, it was rather silly of uncle to fling away his life by trying to get into the boat first; and as this document may be printed in the English papers, it struck me, an English peer, you know—

LADY MARY (every inch an English peer’s daughter). Ernest, that is very thoughtful of you.

ERNEST (continuing, well pleased).—’By night the cries of wild cats and the hissing of snakes terrify us extremely’—(this does not satisfy him so well, and he makes a correction)—’terrify the ladies extremely. Against these we have no weapons except one cutlass and a hatchet. A bucket washed ashore is at present our only comfortable seat’—

LADY MARY (with some spirit). And Ernest is sitting on it.

ERNEST. H’sh! Oh, do be quiet.—’To add to our horrors, night falls suddenly in these parts, and it is then that savage animals begin to prowl and roar.’

LADY MARY. Have you said that vampire bats suck the blood from our toes as we sleep?

ERNEST. No, that’s all. I end up, ‘Rescue us or we perish. Rich reward. Signed Ernest Woolley, in command of our little party.’ This is written on a leaf taken out of a book of poems that Crichton found in his pocket. Fancy Crichton being a reader of poetry. Now I shall put it into the bottle and fling it into the sea.

(He pushes the precious document into a soda-water bottle, and rams the cork home. At the same moment, and without effort, he gives birth to one of his most characteristic epigrams.)

The tide is going out, we mustn’t miss the post.

(They are so unhappy that they fail to grasp it, and a little petulantly he calls for CRICHTON, ever his stand-by in the hour of epigram. CRICHTON breaks through the undergrowth quickly, thinking the ladies are in danger.)

CRICHTON. Anything wrong, sir?

ERNEST (with fine confidence). The tide, Crichton, is a postman who calls at our island twice a day for letters.

CRICHTON (after a pause). Thank you, sir.

(He returns to his labours, however, without giving the smile which is the epigrammatist’s right, and ERNEST is a little disappointed in him.)

ERNEST. Poor Crichton! I sometimes think he is losing his sense of humour. Come along, Agatha.

(He helps his favourite up the rocks, and they disappear gingerly from view.)

CATHERINE. How horribly still it is.

LADY MARY (remembering some recent sounds). It is best when it is still.

CATHERINE (drawing closer to her). Mary, I have heard that they are always very still just before they jump.

LADY MARY. Don’t. (A distinct chapping is heard, and they are startled.)

LADY MARY (controlling herself). It is only Crichton knocking down trees.

CATHERINE (almost imploringly). Mary, let us go and stand beside him.

LADY MARY (coldly). Let a servant see that I am afraid!

CATHERINE. Don’t, then; but remember this, dear, they often drop on one from above.

(She moves away, nearer to the friendly sound of the axe, and LADY MARY is left alone. She is the most courageous of them as well as the haughtiest, but when something she had thought to be a stick glides toward her, she forgets her dignity and screams.)

LADY MARY (calling). Crichton, Crichton!

(It must have been TREHERNE who was tree-felling, for CRICHTON comes to her from the hut, drawing his cutlass.)

CRICHTON (anxious). Did you call, my lady?

LADY MARY (herself again, now that he is there). I! Why should I?

CRICHTON. I made a mistake, your ladyship. (Hesitating.) If you are afraid of being alone, my lady—

LADY MARY. Afraid! Certainly not. (Doggedly.) You may go.

(But she does not complain when he remains within eyesight cutting the bamboo. It is heavy work, and she watches him silently.)