PART III
CHAPTER XXV
ON RATIONS
After the great November storm was over, Ellen realized that her problem—for the present—had been taken out of her hands. Even if the pigeon were sent now, the White Chief would not risk bringing a schooner to the Island of Kon Klayu; there was no boat built that could make a landing on its reef-guarded shores during the winter season. It was too late. They were marooned until spring at least. She would keep the bird until then. Further than that she refused to think.
As she accepted the inevitable she felt a sense of peace settle upon her, and with it came new strength. As Kayak had said they were up against it, and knowing now what she had to fight, she was ready.
Her mind turned at once to the pitifully meager supply of provisions. With all the shrewdness of a general preparing to withstand an indeterminate siege, she planned her rations so that they might last the longest period of time. If the party could exist until spring, a cannery boat, a whaler, a ship of adventure, might call in and get them, even though the White Chief did not come. Ellen made a mental vow that they would live until spring.
On the fourteenth of November she made the entry in her log:
We have the following provisions on hand:
Flour—damaged—enough for eight months
Bacon, 1 slab
Dried onions, 1 pound
Beans, enough for five months if we have them once a week
Rice—damaged—for five months, once a week
Lemon Extract, 1 bottle
Salt and Pepper
Worcestershire sauce, 1 bottle
Dried bear meat
Bear fat, rancid
Rolled oats—mouldy—four months
Tea and Coffee
Three boxes candles
Two jars canned plums from mother's
That afternoon, on a pretense of his looking for pay-sand, she sent Loll down on the beach, and, calling the others together, summed up the problem that confronted them. She read her list of provisions and set forth her plan of rations. In conclusion she urged that each one take a turn hunting for sea-food on the rocks and stranded fish on the beach. If they could supplement their ration thus, they might, by confining themselves strictly to it, exist until some boat came in the spring. Harlan, she decided, must take his meals at the cabin.
"Jean and I will begin gathering shellfish tomorrow, while you men start to lay in a supply of firewood for the winter months," she finished. Even Shane agreed that existence, now, instead of gold, was their main concern on the Island of Kon Klayu, although his was the logic which still insisted that their desertion by Kilbuck could not be true simply because it seemed so intolerable.