Peak's Island / A Romance of Buccaneer Days

by Anna W. Ford Piper

"I see; everything is exactly as you say," replied Anna, "and now let me ask you a favor. I am stronger physically than you are, and I beg you to allow me to undertake the heavier share of our occupation. Let me do all that requires to be done outside the castle, such as getting wood and water, and whatever we may want from the wreckage, and you take charge of the inside of our present home, in which you must allow me to help you. I understand you already, and I believe you would do everything and endure all the fatigue without a murmur, but that is impossible; you have not the strength, and you must try to be well for the sake of your dear child."

Mrs. Carleton endeavored to remonstrate with Miss Vyvyan about the division of the toil, which was so new and strange to each of them, for she was born with a great generous heart that was ready and willing to do and die for others; but Anna would not listen to her sweet pleadings, although in her soul she admired them.

"Bow wow," said the little one, pointing down to the forest.

The ladies looked over the battlements and, to their horror, saw three wolves creeping stealthily along under the shadow of the great pines below. They thought instantly of the fallen door at the entrance, and hastened down the tower stairs as far as the room hung with green velvet tapestry, where they had passed the night, and which they decided should in future be their sitting-room, so they named it the green parlor. As they entered, the glow of the cheerful fire on the hearth, the beautiful prospect of forest and sea from the windows, and the child's butterflies, glancing here and there, gave a bright and pleasant air to the room, but the ladies felt much disturbed by the discovery of wolves so near them, and the knowledge of the open door in the passage below.

"Miss Vyvyan," said Mrs. Carleton, "there are other doors of entrance to this, castle; I saw them, we will go and see if we can open one of them; and then we will close up the door below altogether."

At the end of a passage leading from the tower, and not far from the green parlor, they found a massive door, strongly barred and bolted inside. They drew the bolts, and on opening it led down on the outside, by a long flight of stone stairs to the grass below, and very near to the place on which they stood on their arrival from the beach.

"We shall be safe in one respect now," said Mrs. Carleton, "for no animal can break this door and we can keep it bolted."

The first thing to be done now was to close up the entrance down stairs. The ladies went down and out through the door by which they had entered the castle at the north end. Quickly gathering up some of the wood which lay round about them, they set fire to it, in order to scare away any wolves which might be prowling near, and at once went to work, carrying stones from the ruins of the fallen tower, and by their joint strength replacing the door. They next piled up such a barrier of great stones behind it, that they were sure that no wolves could enter that way. They had finished their first attempt at building and were about to go up again to the green parlor, when the child with a little laugh and in its sprightly way cried out,

"Kitta, kitta, see kitta." At the same instant running as fast as her tiny feet could go, after two small white kittens which the next moment disappeared down the half-dark stairs, that they had noticed when they first arrived, but were too tired to investigate at that time.

They now looked down them and in the dim light, saw only a passage which led in the direction of the fallen tower. They satisfied themselves that there was no opening from that to the outside of the building, and concluded that the immense pile of ruins completely stopped up all means of ingress that way, so they decided not to go to the bottom of the gloomy staircase for mere curiosity, when time was so precious to them, for they felt as Mrs. Carleton had remarked that winter might be upon them very soon. They passed all the remainder of the day in bringing up from the beach such supplies as they most needed, and decided to devote a portion of each day to this occupation as long as the weather permitted.