I was so thoroughly tired that I fell asleep at once, and slept soundly; and when I woke it was already broad daylight, and as I opened my eyes I saw a tall form bending over me with a face painted red and white in broad, horizontal stripes, and thought that cannibals were coming to kill and eat me. I sprang up with a yell, and called to Tom and Bill that our hour was come, and that I was being killed. However, I was relieved by the painted face which had so frightened me relaxing into a broad grin, and hearing Calla say, for it was he,—
“What for you make big bobbery all same man die? Me Calla.”
I sat up, rubbed my eyes, and looked round. Tom was sitting by Bristol Bob’s side, who was tossing restlessly on his bed and groaning, and Bill was at the door of the hut washing himself.
Calla had come over from the mainland of Aneitou to inquire after us, and to say that his father, Wanga, wished us to come over to his village in the course of the day.
I got up and went over to where Bristol Bob was lying, followed by Calla, who, looking at him, said,—
“What make him sick? Plenty time him drink no be like this.”
Tom explained as well as he was able how we had found that the patient was wounded, and the subsequent treatment, and how he had drunk a whole bottle of spirits.
“Make see what thing make hole,” said Calla.
Tom, after some little hunting about, found the splinter of bone which he had cut out in the corner of one of his pockets, and gave it to Calla, who examined it eagerly.
After some minutes he said, pointing to the wounded man,—
“Him lib for die. Piece along of him inside.”
“What!” said Tom; “is there a bit inside him yet?”
“You watch,” said Calla; and giving a whistle, a man who had come over to the little islet with him came into the hut.
To him Calla said something, and he went away, but presently returned, bringing with him a quiver made of basket-work ornamented with shells and sharks’ teeth, which he gave to Calla, who opened it and carefully drew an arrow tipped with a splinter of bone, and putting the piece that had been cut out of Bristol Bob by it, said,—
“You see make same here,” pointing to the middle of the head of the arrow.
Looking carefully, we saw that the bone tip in its entirety was about four inches long, and beautifully worked up, so that the end of it, for more than an inch, was scarcely thicker than a pin, and that then it was cut nearly through.
“You see him piece?” pointing to this long thin part. “Live along Bob. Him die for sure. Plenty bad.”
“Can’t we cut it out as we did the other?” asked Bill.
“No pican white man,” said Calla. “Him along a bone. No can see or catch.”
This sentence of death passed upon the poor fellow affected us very much, and we were intensely disgusted when Calla quite coolly proposed to knock him on the head at once, as he would suffer great pain, and would not again recover consciousness, or, as Calla put it, “Peak along man sabey it.”
To this, of course, we would not consent, and also told Calla that we could not leave the wounded man to go and see his father.
Calla seemed very much displeased about this, and said,—
“Make plenty bobbery along man no lib. He no fit for kiki. What you want?” But seeing that we were determined to remain, he went away and left us to ourselves.
“Not much civilization about that fellow,” I said. “Although he makes out he ‘live along of white man plenty time,’ I believe he’s just as big a cannibal as the rest of them.”
“Yes,” said Tom. “And though he may think for a time of our having saved his life, if it runs with his interests to kill us after a time, he will do so.”
In this we afterwards found we wronged poor Calla.
“Well, mate,” I said, “what are we to do?”
“Why, first and foremost, we must look after this poor fellow, and when he’s dead, bury him decent like; and after that we must see about getting away. I daresay somewhere down these islands we may find a missionary settlement or a decent trader; anyways, we mustn’t let these people think we’re going, or they’ll find means to stop us. Now, one of you go and find the old woman that gave us supper last night, and make her understand we should like some breakfast.”
I went out to look for the woman, and found that now several men had come to the island, who were the husbands of the women we had seen the day before; and one of them, who possessed a very scanty stock of English, informed me he was “Massa’s bos’n,” and that the others were his “sailor men.”
Bos’n, as he was always called, when I said we wanted “kiki,” called to some women, and I soon had the satisfaction of seeing the cooking operations in full progress, and then followed Bos’n to a place where he was evidently very anxious that I should come.
Judge of my surprise, on reaching the spot, which was on the shore of the islet, to find, under a thatched roof which covered her, and in a dock cut out of the coral rock, a cutter of about seven tons, with a mast fitted to lower and raise like that of a Thames barge, and with all her sails, spars, and rigging carefully stowed and in good order.
In such a craft I knew that one could easily make a voyage of almost any distance; and lifting up a hatch that covered a sort of well, I found that her below-deck arrangements were as good as those above, and that she had a couple of eighteen-gallon casks for storing water, while on her deck were ring-bolts and fittings for a small gun—doubtless the one which Bristol Bob had taken with him in the war-canoe in the fight against the people of Paraka.
Full of this discovery, I hastened back to the hut, and told my companions of it. They were both delighted, and said that we should, if necessary, be able to make our escape in her more comfortably and easily than in our old craft, which was but a clumsy contrivance after all.
While we were talking, Bristol Bob raised himself up in his bed, and said,—
“Hallo! Who are you, and what d’ye want? What ship d’ye come from?”
Tom at once asked him if he did not remember the fight of the day before, and his being wounded. After some time he said he did, and then Tom told him of what Calla said about his wound.
“Well, just have a look, will you? But I expects I has my walking ticket anyways.”
Tom took the dressings off the wound; but it was now so painful that Bristol Bob refused to allow him to probe it properly or handle it, so he put fresh dressings on.
B............