Chapter Six.
The Earthquake.
One.
They slept so soundly that they did not hear low rolling sounds of thunder or see the moon go out of sight behind a black cloud. Even lightning did not rouse them, but when at last the rain came splashing down over their bare skins they woke up. There was no shelter for them, so they huddled together in a wet heap and waited for the rain to be over and for the morning to come. It was no gentle spring shower.
The water poured down like a deluge. They were very wretched, and Firefly began to cry.
“Now, see here,” Limberleg said to her, “there’s water enough already! You needn’t add your tears, or we shall all be drowned! The rain will be over some time. It won’t hurt you.”
When the lightning flashed, they could see the trees waving and bending in the wind and great breakers rolling up over the sandy beach.
But the rain wasn’t the worst that was to happen. After a while there came a strange shivering feeling in the rocks beneath them. It grew stronger and stronger till the whole earth shook and trembled.
Hawk-Eye and Limberleg had felt earthquakes before, but never one like this. It seemed as if the world were shaking itself to pieces. They huddled closer together and clasped their arms around the Twins.
“Oh,” shrieked Limberleg, “the water gods are angry because we tried to find out the secret of the sun!” She and Hawk-Eye prayed to them at the top of their lungs. “Spare us, oh, spare us,” they cried.
As they prayed, there came a long, fearful cracking noise, and the sound of falling rocks. It was as if the thunder had fallen to the earth and were rumbling round over it. A gigantic wave came roaring against the rocks as if it would dash them to pieces.
The Twins burrowed their heads in their mother’s lap, and shook almost as if they were having little earthquakes of their own.
The great wave marked the crest of the storm. After that the winds grew gradually less violent, the rain ceased, and the waves crept farther and farther away down the beach.
The earth ceased its trembling. The clouds rolled away like great curtains, and the thunder went grumbling off toward the west.
When the grey dawn came stealing over the wet earth and the birds began to sing, Limberleg raised her head.
“Look,” she said, “and listen! The birds are singing! I thought the world had come to an end, but it is still here, and so are we.”
Then they all opened their eyes, which they had kept shut for terror. A wonderful sight met them! Over the water toward the east the sky was blushing like a rose. Little pink clouds were hurrying away to lose themselves in the blue sky. Then the great fiery red disk of the sun rose slowly out of the water!
They watched it in awed silence as it climbed higher and higher into the blue. Then, trembling again with fear, the little group of watchers prostrated themselves before it in a blind impulse of worship.
When the sun was out of the water and up again in its regular place in the sky, all nature seemed so gay and joyous that the Twins and their father and mother forgot the fears of the night, and began to think about breakfast. They found it in the hollow of a rock far down the gorge.
The giant wave which had so frightened them, had left a fish flapping about in a little pool of water. When she saw it, Limberleg shouted: “The water gods aren’t angry, after all! See, they have sent us a fine fish for our breakfast!”
Hawk-Eye quickly climbed down the steep rocks to the pool, caught the fish with his hands, killed it, and brought it back to Limberleg and the Twins.
While they were eating it, Limberleg seemed to be thinking hard. She wasn’t used to thinking, and she screwed up her face almost as if it hurt her. At last she said: “Listen to me! We now know what no one else in the world knows. We have found out what lies beyond the blue hills. We have gone to the end of the world and have looked over the edge, and have discovered the secret of the sun! We alone know that it hides beneath the waters during the darkness. There is no more for us to learn. Perhaps it would not be safe to know more, even if there were more to know! Let us go home.”
“There is more to be learned about the hunting,” said Hawk-Eye.
“We can find that out on our way back,” said Limberleg.
“If there are going to be any more earthquakes, I’d rather be in the cave anyway,” said Firefly. “Besides, I don’t like the rain pouring over me. It’s as bad as falling in the river.”
Firetop said: “I’d like to get back to tell Squaretoes what I’ve seen. He’s all the time telling about the wonderful things he can do. He’s never seen the tree-people nor had an earthquake in his whole life. I guess I can make his eyes stick out.”
Hawk-Eye said nothing, but he picked up the wet skins, shook them, bound them with thongs, and tied them to the shoulders of the others. Then each took his own weapons and they were ready to start.
Two.
From the point where they had spent the night, a chain of hills ran back inland. They followed these hills to the north for some miles and then, still keeping to the hill-tops, turned toward the west. In the late afternoon, under Hawk-Eye’s skillful leadership, they came again to the place where they had crossed the isthmus that connected them with the mainland.
Hawk-Eye was some distance ahead of the others when he came out upon the high bluff that overlooked the channel and the isthmus. Suddenly he stopped with a cry of astonishment and stood still, his eyes staring.
Limberleg and the Twins rushed to his side.
“What is the matter?” they cried. For answer Hawk-Eye only pointed. Before them there was nothing but open water! A whole section of the neck of land which they had crossed only the day before had been swallowed up by the sea!
Where it had been, a mile of blue water now sparkled in the sun! They were completely shut off from the main land. When she realised what had happened, Limberleg sat heavily down on a log.
“The world isn’t the same after all,” she cried. “It’s broken! Part of it has sunk beneath the waters!”
“Won’t it ever get mended?” asked Firefly anxiously.
“Shan’t we ever get back to the cave, then?” cried Firetop.
“No,” sobbed Limberleg. “We’ll have to stay here till we die.”
Firefly whimpered a little and crept close to her mother on the log, but Firetop noticed that his father wasn’t crying, so he swallowed several large lumps in his throat and sat up straight. For some time they stayed on the bluff and looked down the steep banks of broken earth and rocks into the deep water below.
Great logs were floating about and huge trees, uprooted from the banks, were lying with their tops in the water.
At last Limberleg said in a discouraged voice, “Well, what shall we do?”
“The first thing to do,” said Hawk-Eye, “is to go down to the beach and see what we can find to eat.”
Beyond the steep cliffs on which they stood there was a bay with a wide beach. Beyond the bay great rocks extended in a chain out into the water. If you have been to England, you may have passed those very rocks. They are called “The Needles.”
Hawk-Eye and Limberleg and the Twins climbed down to the beach. They were so hungry that they were almost ready to eat sand and pebbles, like chickens, if they could find nothing else.
But there was plenty of seaweed on the
beach and they found little mussels clinging to it. They ate both the seaweed and the mussels, as they walked along.
“See all the little holes in the sand,” cried Firetop, when they were quite far out on the beach. “Water spurts out of them every time I step.”
“Let’s dig down and see what does it,” said Firefly. “Maybe it’s something good to eat.”
They took a large shell and scraped away the sand. They had never seen clams before, and Firefly got her finger pinched. Hawk-Eye opened a shell and ate one. He smacked his lips, and then he said, “Dig as many as you can, while I make a fire. Our supper is right here.”
The Twins worked like beavers, while Hawk-Eye and Limberleg made a drift-wood fire far back on the beach in a sheltered place near the cliffs.
Then Limberleg made a bed of seaweed in the coals and put in the clams as fast as the children brought them up from the sand. They must have steamed at least half a bushel! They ate every one, and I am quite sure this was the very first clam-bake that any one ever had in this world.
As they rested beside the fire after supper, warmed and fed, they began to feel more cheerful. Hawk-Eye said: “Anyway, we shall never be hungry while we stay here. Perhaps we shall like it just as well as we liked our forest cave.”
Then Limberleg had a happy thought. “Do you know,” she said, “I believe the water gods were lonesome and are glad that we came! They don’t want us to go away again, and so they made the piece of land fall into the water to keep us here! You remember about that fish! I’m not afraid. I think they mean to take care of us.”
And that was such a comforting thought that they went to sleep and slept soundly all night beside their drift-wood fire.
