“We’ll drag them to the other side of the island where I was landed, if that will make the matter any better,” Ned replied. “It’ll be a long, hard job, but ’way ahead of feeling that we could never go near the spot again, for now they are in plain sight from where the yacht lies.”
“How will you haul them across?” Roy asked.
“Pull them on to a piece of canvas; roll it up and tie it securely, leaving an end to which a drag-rope can be fastened. It will take the greater portion of the day, and we’d better get about it at once.”
Roy forced himself to put from his mind all that was hideous in the matter and treat it as a necessary, though disagreeable, task which must be accomplished.
He and Ned selected from their stores one of the steamer’s jibs, cut it into such sized pieces as was thought sufficiently large for the purpose, and marched resolutely out to the spot where the boat had been shattered.
Vance was ashamed to remain idle while they were working and after a brief delay joined them.
It devolved upon Ned to secure the bodies, which he did by wading into the surf and passing a noose under and around them.
Then he also was forced to roll them in the canvas shrouds; but after this had been done, and the ghastly freight presented the appearance of merchandise rather than human forms, Vance was ready to assist in the task of dragging them across the island.
“We shall need a couple of shovels,” Ned said when everything was in readiness for the journey. “Vance shall carry them, and he can spell one of us when we’re tired.”
This was a division of labor at which no one could complain, and the fatiguing journey was begun, the heavy weight causing the most severe labor necessary in order to pull them through the sand.