CHAPTER FIVE
BARTY'S bed of leaves was so comfortable that he slept all night like a dormouse and never rolled over once. There is no knowing when he would have opened his eyes if he had been left to himself, but when the sun had risen and begun to make the blue sea look as if it were sparkling with diamonds, he suddenly awakened and sat up to listen to something he had heard in his sleep.
What he had heard was Blue Crest. There she sat on the edge of the cave window, whistling the calling song she had learned from him the day before.
"Hello," said Barty, "I'm glad you've come back. I wondered where you were in the tropical storm." Blue Crest spread her wings and flew into the cave to perch on his wrist. She sang a little song of her own. She was saying "good morning" and letting him know she was glad he had come to the Desert Island. Barty whistled back to her and stroked her feathers with his fingers and lifted her up to put his cheek against her soft wing. Anyone would like to be wakened by a bird who was tame enough to sit on one's wrist and sing.
"But where is the Good Wolf? And I don't see Man Saturday," he said suddenly, looking round the cave.
Blue Crest spread her wings and flew to the cave window again. Barty scrambled down from his leaf bed and followed her. It was a very nice window to look through. You could see so much sea and sky, and the white beach seemed so far below; and when he looked down Barty saw where the Good Wolf and Man Saturday had gone. They were standing in the sands together and looked as if they were very much interested in something lying near them. Barty was just wondering what they were doing when he was so startled by something that he jumped. There was a sudden sound of the flapping of wings and a large white bird rushed past him quite close to his face. It flew out of a round hole in the front of the cliff, and the sight of it made Barty think of something.
"If she were a hen I should know there were eggs there," he said, "and that would be convenient."
The truth was that getting up had made him think of breakfast, and breakfast made him think of eggs. Blue Crest put her head on one side and gave three cheerful chirps. Then she flew to the round hole and disappeared inside. In about a minute she appeared again standing at the entrance, and she whistled Barty's call.
The little boy scrambled out onto the ledge outside the cave window. He knew that she was calling him to come and look at something. By standing on tiptoe he could look into the hole, and when he looked he saw it was full of very white eggs, which was so exciting that he could not help calling out to the Good Wolf and Saturday.
"Hel-lo! Hel-lo!" he shouted. "I'm coming and I've got some eggs for breakfast."
He was putting some into his blouse, which seemed a good place to carry them, when he saw the Good Wolf look up at him and then saw him turn towards the cliff and begin to run. He ran up the green slope so fast that he began to gallop, and he galloped until his tail and his hair streamed straight out behind him as they had done when he was running away from the tropical storm. He was excited.
Barty ran to meet him. He wanted to hear what had happened, so did Blue Crest; she flew after him. When they met the Good Wolf, he was quite out of breath and so was Barty. Blue Crest was not, but she fluttered down for a rest on Barty's shoulder.
"Have you a piece of glass in your pocket?" the Good Wolf panted out.
"Yes," answered Barty, beginning to fumble in his pockets. "At least I had yesterday a piece of grandma's old spectacles. Where is it?" fumbling deeper and deeper. "Oh! I must have lost it! It's gone!"
"I thought so," said the Good Wolf. "It fell out of your pocket onto the beach and something has happened. Come and see what it is." You may be sure Barty did not lose any time. He had to hold his blouse tight so that the eggs would not break when he was running.
When he got to the beach he found Man Saturday standing as he had seen him from the cliff ledge. He was looking very hard at the small pile of something Barty had noticed that they were watching when he first saw them.
"What is it?" he cried out, feeling very much interested himself.
"Don't you see anything curious?" asked the Good Wolf.
Barty drew nearer and the next minute he gave a shout.
"Smoke is beginning to come out of it," he said. "It looks like real smoke. What set it on fire? What is that shining thing? Why, it's my piece of glass," and he made a jump towards it.
"Don't touch it," said the Good Wolf. "The sun has been shining through it onto the leaves and has made it into a burning-glass, and it has lighted a fire. That is what has happened. Now you can cook your eggs."
"Let us roast them," said Barty. "Roasted eggs make you feel just like a picnic."
Man Saturday gave him a cunning little look and then began to be very busy indeed. He ran and brought more sticks and leaves and Barty knelt down and blew the tiny flame until it grew into a bigger one, and then he fanned with his hat until the chips and twigs were snapping.
In a few minutes there was fire enough to cook anything and then began the breakfast making. It was like a picnic. They put the eggs in the hot sand to roast and found some crystals of salt dried in the crannies of the rocks. Man Saturday brought some young cocoanuts and some of the roots that were like a potato, and they were roasted too. Man Saturday ran about chattering and imitated everything Barty did. He seemed quite delighted with the idea of roasting things in hot ashes, and when Barty and the Good Wolf went together to their swimming pool to have a bath while the breakfast was cooking, he sat beside the fire and watched it, with his arms hugging his knees and his eyes twinkling. "He always looks as if he were thinking very hard indeed," Barty said. "Perhaps he is thinking now how queer it is that a piece of glass can set things on fire. I dare say he never saw fire before."
Barty splashed about splendidly in the clear green water of the swimming pool and before his bath was ended he could swim ever so much better than he had swam the day before. He came out of the sparkling water all rosy and laughing with delight. But when he was putting on his clothes he stopped with a stocking half way on and began to think.
"It is very queer," he said in a puzzled voice, "but I keep thinking of something and I don't know what it is I'm thinking about."
"That's queer," said the Good Wolf.
"The Desert Island is beautiful, and the cave, and Man Saturday, and Blue Crest, and the swimming, but I feel as if I want to tell somebody about it and I don't know who it is. I can't remember."
"You'll remember in time," said the Good Wolf, "if you don't bother about it. I think the eggs must be roasted enough by now."
They went to see and found them all beautifully done. It was a lovely breakfast. They drank cocoanut milk out of cocoanut shells, instead of coffee, and the roasted eggs tasted exactly like a picnic.
Man Saturday ate a cocoanut and seemed to enjoy it very much. After he had finished he began to walk up and down the beach and to look out at the sea as if he were keeping watch. Barty thought he looked anxious about something.
"What do you think he is looking for?" he asked the Good Wolf. Just at that minute Man Saturday stopped walking up and down and stood quite still shading his eyes with his small black paw. The Good Wolf watched him for a few minutes.
"I think," he said, "that he must be looking out for ships."
"What does he want them for?" said Barty.
"He doesn't want them," answered the Good Wolf. "He is afraid of them."
"Why," said Barty, "what sort of ships?"
"Pirates," said the Good Wolf.
That made Barty feel just a little uncomfortable.
"Pirates are almost as bad as cannibals, aren't they?" he said.
"Sometimes worse," said the Good Wolf, "though of course it depends upon the kind of pirates."
Man Saturday was not looking out from under his hand any more; he was running quickly across the beach to the cliff. When he got there he began to climb up the face of it. Only a monkey could have done it. He caught hold of tiny bushes and twigs and clumps of green things and pulled himself up like lightning. In a few minutes he was as high as the cave and he stood on the ledge and looked out from there, shading his eyes again with his black paw.
"He can see round the point from there," said the Good Wolf.
"Do you feel at all nervous?" asked Barty.
"I had a good night's sleep and I have had an excellent breakfast," the Good Wolf said, "and I am prepared for almost anything – but Pirates and Cannibals are known to be very disagreeable."
"But they are adventures, if they don't catch you," said Barty, cheering himself up.
"They are adventures if they do catch you," answered the Good Wolf.
"The Best Adventure is finding out how to get away," said Barty.
"Well, you see a person comes to a desert island for adventures," said the Good Wolf.
Barty sat and hugged his knees and looked rather serious.
"Robinson Crusoe had a good many," he said. "He had to be shipwrecked before he could get to his island."
"Look at Man Saturday!" he said the next minute. Man Saturday was dancing up and down on the ledge and looking very much excited. He kept pointing round the headland and they could see that he was chattering though they could not hear him.
"He sees something coming round the point," said the Good Wolf. "This is beginning to look serious."
"But in adventures people always do get away," said Barty, cheering himself up again. "You see they couldn't write the adventures if they didn't."
"There, you have thought of the right thing at the right time again," said the Good Wolf. "It's a most valuable habit. Do I see a ship with black sails coming round the point?"
"Yes," answered Barty, "you do, because I see it myself. It is a very fierce looking ship, with guns sticking out through holes, and there are black flags as well as black sails, and white bones and skulls are painted on them. It is a very fierce ship indeed."
"Man Saturday is beckoning to us to go to the cave," the Good Wolf said, "perhaps we would better go."
Barty thought so, too, so they had another run back up the green slope and Blue Crest flew with them. They ran as fast as they had run in the storm, and when they got to the creeping in place they were inside in two minutes.
Man Saturday had clambered in through the window and he was chattering as fast as he could. He jumped onto Barty's shoulder and put his arm round his neck as if he intended to protect him. Blue Crest perched on the leaf bed and sang a little thrilling song which Barty knew was meant to be encouraging and was also full of good advice if he could have understood it.
Then all four went to the window and looked out.
The Pirate ship had come quite close to the shore by this time. Barty could see that there was a crowd of men on the deck and that they looked as fierce as the ship. They had big hats, and big beards, and big moustaches, and big sharp-looking crooked swords at their sides. Some of them had taken their swords out of their scabbards and were flourishing them about.
"That biggest one is feeling the edge of his to see if it is sharp," said Barty. "I think he must be the captain. It would be so nice to stay in here and watch them if they wouldn't come and find us."
"Chattery-chattery – chat-chat chatterdy," said Man Friday, pointing to make them look at something which was happening at the side of the ship.
He was pointing at some of the pirates who were letting down a boat into the sea. As soon as it was in the water they let down a rope ladder and half a dozen of them swarmed down it. Then the captain walked to the side and climbed down too. He took a seat and sat with his bare crooked sword across his knees. He waved his arm fiercely to the other pirates and they began to row towards the shore.
"Don't let us look out of the window any more," said Barty. "They might see us."
"I am afraid they saw us when we ran up the hill," said the Good Wolf.
Barty rather gasped. You would have gasped yourself, you know, if you had been in a cave on a desert island and a boat full of pirates was being rowed very fast to the shore, just at the foot of the cliff where your cave was.
"Well," said Barty, "this is an adventure. I hope it will end right. But I do wish there weren't so many pirates and they did not look so fierce."
And he sat down quite flat on the cave floor, and so did the Good Wolf, and so did Man Saturday. Blue Crest sat on Barty's shoulder and really hung her head and drooped her wings.
CHAPTER SIX
BARTY and the Good Wolf and Saturday and Blue Crest sat very quiet indeed. It is always best to sit very quiet when pirates are landing on the beach just below your cave. You never can tell what will happen if you do something that attracts their attention.
But after a few minutes Barty could not help whispering a little.
"I have only read one book about pirates," he whispered, "and they blindfolded prisoners and made them walk out on a plank until they tumbled into the sea. They slashed heads off, too. Will they take us prisoners?"
"If they take us at all they will take us as prisoners," said the Good Wolf.
Barty looked round the cave and thought what a nice place it was and how comfortable the leaf bed had been.
"I can't help thinking about that thing which I can't remember," he said to the Good Wolf. "I'm thinking very hard about it just now. I wonder what it is."
The Good Wolf had no time to answer because they heard the pirates shouting so loudly as they tried to pull their boat upon the beach that he had to go to the window and peep to see what they were doing.
"They look fiercer than ever, now that they are nearer," he whispered. "They have such crooked swords and such curly black mustaches. You would better come and peep yourself."
So Barty went and peeped. He did it very carefully so that only the least bit of his curly head was above the cave window-ledge and it only stayed there for a mite of a minute.
The pirates dragged their boat up on the beach with savage shouts and songs, and then they stood and looked all about them as if they were searching for something. They looked up the beach and down the beach, and then they began to look at the cliff and talk to each other about it. Barty could see they were talking to each other about it.
"I believe they know we are here and are trying to find out where we are hidden," he said. It certainly looked as if they were. They looked and looked and talked and talked. At last the Captain walked ahead a few dozen yards and climbed upon the rock and stood there staring up at the cliff-front as hard as ever he could; then he took a spy-glass out of his satchel and he looked through that.
"It seems as if he is looking right at the window," said Barty, rather shaking, "I'm sure he must see it."
He did see it that very minute, because he began to shout to the other pirates and to wave his hat and his sword.
"There's a cave!" he yelled. "There's a cave! They are hiding in there."
Then he jumped down from the rock and ran with the other pirates to the place where the green slope began. Barty and the Good Wolf and Saturday could hear their shouts as they ran, and they knew they were running fast though they could not see them from the cave window.
I will not say that Barty did not turn a little pale. A desert island is a most interesting place and adventures are most exciting, but pirates chasing up a green slope to your cave, waving swords and shouting and evidently intending to search for you, seems almost too dangerous.
"I can't help thinking of that thing I can't remember properly," he said to the Good Wolf. "I wonder what it is."
"Come and stand by me," said the Good Wolf. "Whatever happens we ought to stand by one another."
Barty went and stood by him and put his arm tight round his furry neck. There was something about the Good Wolf which comforted you even when pirates were coming.
They were coming nearer and nearer, and louder and louder their shouts sounded. They had come up the green slope very fast indeed, and Barty and the Good Wolf could even hear what they were saying.
"A little boy and a wolf," they heard. "They ran up the hill. They must have hidden somewhere." Then after a few minutes they heard the pirate crew on the ledge not far from the window.
"There must be a way in," the Captain called out. "Swords and blood and daggers! We must find it. Daggers and blood and swords! Where can it be?"
Barty stood by the Good Wolf and Saturday stood by Barty and Blue Crest stood by Saturday, so they were all in a row prepared to meet their fate.
Suddenly there was a great big savage shout and there stood the pirates, all in a row, too, six of them staring in at the window. It was enough to frighten any one just to look at them, with their dark-skinned faces and white, sharp teeth gleaming, and their black eyes and beards, and their hats on one side.
"Swords and blood and daggers!" said the Captain, when he saw Barty and the Good Wolf and Saturday and Blue Crest standing in a row looking at him. "Blood and daggers and swords!" and he jumped over the window ledge right into the cave and all the other five jumped after him. After they were all inside, there was just one minute in which both rows stood and stared at each other. Barty wondered, of course, what would happen next. No one could help wondering. Would they begin to chop with the crooked swords? But they did not. They did something quite different. This is what they did:
The Captain took off his big hat with a great flourish and made a bow right down to the ground, then the second pirate took off his big hat with a great flourish and made a bow right down to the ground, then the third pirate took off his hat, and the fourth and the fifth, until all six had taken off their hats with a flourish and made the most magnificently polite bow any one had ever seen.
"I beg your pardon," said the Captain in a most fierce voice. "I hope we are not disturbing you. I apologize most sincerely – I trust you will excuse us – I really do."
Barty's eyes and mouth opened quite wide. His mouth looked like a very red, round O. "Why?" he gasped out, "how polite you are."
"Thank you extremely," roared the Captain. "We appreciate the compliment. We are not known anywhere but on this particular desert island, but if we were known, we should be known for our politeness. We are the Perfectly Polite Pirates," and his row of pirates made six bows again.
"I – I didn't know pirates were ever polite," said Barty.
"They never are," answered the Captain. "They are rude, all but ourselves. We were rude until a few years ago – when we met the Baboo Bajorum, and he would not stand it any longer."
"Who is he?" asked Barty.
The Perfectly Polite Pirate Captain made a splendid bow to Saturday.
"He is a relation of this gentleman," he said, "only he is twenty times as big and twenty times as strong, and if you do anything he does not like he can break you into little pieces and throw you away."