CHAPTER XVII
FEVERISH EMPLOYMENTS HALTED
A species of horror attacked the man on whom the truth had flashed. What abominable cruelties and crimes lay back of the business thus finally to some extent revealed, he could only faintly imagine.
He felt quite certain of one or two things, that were not to be told to Elaine. First, he could not for a moment doubt that the barque had been brought to the island with the sole intent and purpose of looting the cave of treasure. He was equally convinced its crew had been foully slaughtered—and their heads removed. This smacked of Dyak atrocities. Finally, there was ample evidence that men of some sort had visited the island long since the wreck was stranded, and probably within the year.
He had not required the warning made "important" on the sheet to urge him to haste in preparing a boat with which to attempt an escape. To learn that the haunting sounds of the tide would at length subside was a new and disquieting addition to what he had previously deduced. He had accurately hit upon the natives' superstitious awe of the sounds to account for the island's desertion.
How long these invaluable shrieks and moans might be counted upon to continue became a vital question. Could they only last till a boat could be completed, launched, provisioned, and directed away to a safer retreat, he would ask for nothing more.
He returned again to an inspection of the "map"—now singularly plain. The island was graphically represented by the three conventional "hills," with the sign for water inscribed at either end. The tree, so conspicuous upon the tallest wall of rock, was no less vividly portrayed.
Below this identifying picture of the place the hill with the tree was repeated, with the cave and design for water, while just to the right the detail of the cavern, with more water signs, indicating both high and low tide, was depicted somewhat enlarged. The cartouch was not so readily comprehended. Grenville was inclined to believe it spelled some crude king's name, while the scarab, or beetle, was, of course, an old Egyptian symbol concerned with life and death.
It would hardly have been human of Grenville not to wonder about the cave or to contemplate a visit there—just to have the merest look about the place. He even went so far as to wonder if its entrance might not be effected from the upper brink, by means of a longer rope ladder than the one he had already made.
He did not, however, seriously contemplate delaying affairs more important to gratify this whim. Indeed, he was fired with new impatience to work night and day against the hour of escape. The thought put him back on his feet, then and there, with the documents stored away. There was no time to lose—not a moment—not even to fool with the tiger!
He left his bomb and its fuse upon the rocks, and carried the water to his clay. To line his hollow-tree furnace as promptly as possible must be his first concern. No boat could be made without suitable tools, and—— He wondered how he should make it, even then.
The log he had found on the day they arrived was such a huge affair to attack with the implements his limited craft made possible, despite all the bronze he could melt. And yet, without it, he was helpless. The raft was far too clumsy for propulsion. It afforded practically nothing transformable into a boat, as he had no nails, no saw, no anything with which it might be first dismembered, and finally reconstructed.
"By Jove!" he exclaimed to himself, aloud, as a new thought crept subtly to his brain. "I can hollow the log with fire!"
He went at once to the straight and ample tree-trunk, lying propped upon a rock. Its ends had already been partially consumed, and thereby rounded, in the flames that had ravaged the place. How he could cover such parts as he must not burn with a plaster of his clay, Grenville instantly conceived. And there was the log already lifted away from the earth, for the fire to be kindled beneath!
The wisdom of starting this process at once, even before his tools were made, was immediately apparent. Back to his clay heap he hastened eagerly, and, pawing it over to form a hollow pyramid, he poured in the water to soak through the mass, and so make it soft enough to use.
A new, unsparing spasm of labor seized the man in that hour, and he worked unremittingly. He felt he had loafed away his time which important requirements demanded.
The task of digging the clay from the pit and fetching it up to his hollow tree in the basket, made of creepers, was interminable. The sticks and wooden "spades" he had managed to fashion, not only broke from over-use and straining, but they were dull and heavy and awkward. The basket was scarcely more convenient than the implements in fulfilling its simple function. He could manage to carry its weight upon his head, but at this he had meager skill.
For three days he worked to get the clay, or to work it up and apply it with his hands. A considerable portion of the fallen log was thus quite promptly covered. He had then to wait for the clay to dry before his fire could be ignited.
The supply of clay he had managed to amass was clearly insufficient. He paused, on one of those warm and breathless afternoons, to set a number of traps in the animal pathways, and construct an awning for Elaine. This was merely a structure before her cave, to support a roof of leaves and grasses. It afforded a shade, however, that was exceedingly grateful.
There were numerous interruptions, also, for procuring meat and fruits. Grenville had brought down a pheasant with the last of his two remaining arrows. And not even a quill, supplied by the wings, had blown away from his "store." He had cut new shafts by his evening fire, and tipped them with points of sharpened wood. Elaine had feathered them skillfully, after once being properly directed.
Not a sign, all this time, had Grenville seen of the tiger, still haunting the jungle. He had been too industriously engrossed, either to wonder or to care where the brute had recently been lurking.
On the fourth warm morning of his toil about the furnace, the reminder came home with a jolt. Some few yards away from the clay pit's edge lay the master murderer's kill. It was part of a freshly eaten boar.
Grenville was neither revolted nor angered by the sight. He was suddenly excited with a new hope of getting a certain robe to lay at the feet of Elaine. It never occurred to his eager mind that the brute who bore it might be lying near, in a mood to resent his intrusion here, where the kingly banquet had been left for a sitting again that night.
His first concern was to keep away, as far as possible, lest the smell of his boots offend the lordly brute when he finally returned. Meantime such preparations as the scene made possible must not be unduly delayed.
The trees above the reddened spot afforded more choice for his necessary perch than he had found on the previous occasion. He rapidly sketched his plans for the night with mental notes and observations. Where the bomb could lie, to prove most efficacious, and still at the same time offer no great menace to himself, was readily determined. The ladder required for ascending to his stand would better be hung on the side most removed from the trail, for which he must a little clear the thicket.
His club, without which the visit here at sunset was not to be undertaken, could lean on the tree-trunk while he sat above, since there, should any need arise, he could find it in the dark.
He abandoned all thought of treading back and forth from the clay pit to his smelter, and carried his basket away. The ladder he brought at once from the spring, and, expending an hour in more careful preparation for his comfort than had even been possible before, he finally departed from the site of the tiger's gory refreshment, well satisfied with all he had been able to accomplish.
He returned to the camp, made a careful examination of the bomb and its fuse, and selected the wood to be finally used in preserving his essential spark of fire. Then, willing at last to turn his attention again to his daily occupation, he once more descended to his clay-covered log and found the plaster sufficiently dry upon it for the first of the burning to be started. He called to Elaine, who threw him down some glowing embers, from the fire always burning near his shelter.
All day he found abundant employment, working with flame and clay. The eating away of the log in a manner to leave a hollow shell, could not, he found, be accomplished as swiftly as he had hoped. Moreover, the fires required his constant attention, lest they burn too deeply to right or left, and thus destroy, or considerably impair, the walls he desired to protect.
In the afternoon he permitted this fire to die. Until more clay could be plastered about and the blackly charred portions of the wood removed with a tool, the process must be halted. He had still a small section inside his natural smelter to cover before he could undertake the melting of his metal, but his heap of clay was gone.
Once more, as he had on the previous occasion, he informed Elaine in the late afternoon of his intentions for the night. Her look of alarm was the only sign that escaped her resolute being. She had silently noted his earlier activity with the bomb and his fire-preserving wood; she was not surprised by his plans.
"I shall not be down at the spring," he said, "but over there nearer the clay pit. I have found a place where I rather expect our friend to arrive at a decently early hour."
Her eyes were startled and wide.
"Do you mean he sleeps where you have been walking every day?"
"No—certainly not. But I'm sure he was there last night—and I hope he'll come again."
She was quick to divine the unpleasant truth that Grenville was striving to avoid.
"You mean—he's been eating there—and left some awful——"
"Good pork," he agreed, as he took up his bomb; "a fine wild boar—enough to have done us for a week."
She resumed her work of knitting, on a small, round basket-like affair.
"I hope there are more of those hogs for him to get," she told him, quietly. "I hope they are easy prey."
"Right ho! But I trust he'll not be off with the old pig before he is on with the new. I want him to come to the party there to-night."
Elaine looked up for a moment, and thrilled to the look in his eyes.
"Yes," she said, "I suppose you do."