Hawai looked relieved, and his eyes glowed as they rested on her.
"You have my story, but you have not told me yours," she burst out.
"Mine is similar to yours. I sailed on another ship of Hagoth's only we floundered around in the waste of waters in search of land for so long, that all the crew except three died of famine before she foundered." He dismissed the subject with a shrug of the shoulders, as if unwilling to fill the night with further horrors.
"You must sleep now, and gain some rest, for tomorrow we go on a foraging expedition," he added with gentle raillery.
Loa's eyelids were already drooping, and, soothed with the grateful warmth, she lay down and was soon fast asleep. Hawai piled dry brush on the camp fire until it roared and crackled, and then, like a sentinel on guard, he sat looking moodily into the blaze for hours.
The day dawned auspiciously, and Loa led Hawai down toward the place where she had seen his compan-ions lying. Suddenly she drew back with a little cry. At the exact spot where the mariner had lain, reclined an immense devil fish, with its tentacles wrapped around something. Hawai watched it a moment. He thought perhaps that explained the disappearance of the other two bodies. He silently led Loa away.
They went into the woods to hunt for food, and Loa in helping him soon got back her spirits. They found raspberries and a strange apple, both of which Hawai pronounced good. The man who first tasted the tomato had more courage than did Columbus. He decried the date palm afar off, and remarked that they should soon fare like princes. The man cut sugar cane, and showed Loa how to chew the pulp and extract the sweetness thereof.
That was but the beginning of their rambles. Every day they sauntered forth to gain new strength, and came home laden with their treasures. One night they dragged in armfuls of bamboo. Another time Hawai brought a mealy root which he had found by accident. It proved a novelty in their diet, for it was the sweet potato. One day they skirted the coast and found a secluded beach where the turtles had come to lay their eggs. The latter they gathered eagerly, while Hawai jocularly remarked that, when they had something to cook it in they could have turtle soup. They had gradually gone over the whole island, and on the night that completed the circuit, and proved conclusively that they were the only human beings there, despair descended on them. They had traveled far that day, and the dusk overtook them, but Hawai insisted on cutting armfuls of a tough rush that grew in a swamp.
"What do you want that for?" inquired Loa.
The man was a born woodsman, and was very clever.