Chapter Twenty Eight.
A bit of a Scare.
That night as I lay in the dark, with the beach outside lit-up by the moon, and listened to the strange noises of the forest behind the hut, I felt over and over again ready to awaken my uncle or Ebo, so sure was I that I could hear wild beasts on the move.
Should there be tigers, or leopards, or even wild boars, what chance should we have if they attacked? Or it might be that one of the huge serpents of which I had read so much might creep in at the open door.
I wanted to be brave, but somehow that night I felt horribly afraid, even the humming buzz of some night-flying beetle making me start. Perhaps I was over-excited, or perhaps, as my uncle would have said, I had eaten too much. At all events, be it what it may, I could not go to sleep, but lay there turning hot and cold and wishing it was morning. The silence seemed so dreadful, and the idea of this being an uninhabited island, instead of being delightful as it had felt in the bright sunshine, now appeared horrible, and I lay thinking of our being far from all human help, and that if our boat happened to drift away we should be left to starve.
Of course this was all nonsense, for with such a clever savage as Ebo and our own ingenuity and tools we could have built another boat—not such a good one as we had arrived in, but quite strong enough to bear us over a calm sea to one or the other of the islands where trading vessels came.
Then I grew hot and seemed to be dripping with perspiration, and my horror increased. What would become of us when our food and powder and shot were gone? We should starve to death. And I began to tremble and wish I had not come, feeling as if I would give anything to be back at home in my old bedroom, with the gas outside in the road and the policeman’s heavy foot to be heard now and then as he went along his beat on the look-out for burglars. I should have been ready to meet Aunt Sophia the next morning and receive the severest scolding I had ever had—anything to be away from where I was.
Then I tried to reason with myself and to think that even if our powder and shot were gone we could make bows and arrows, and set traps, and as food ran short we could always make fishing-lines and catch the scaly creatures that swarmed amongst the rocks all round the shore. Besides which there were cocoa-nuts in plenty, with abundance of other fruit.