“As I am a boatswain,” John Block declared, “we couldn’t have found anything better!”
“I agree,” Fritz replied. “But what worries me is that this beach is absolute desert, and I am afraid the upper plateau may be so too.”
“Let us begin by taking possession of the cave, and we will attend to the rest presently.”
“Oh!” said Frank. “That is not much like our house at Rock Castle, and I don’t even see a stream of fresh water to take the place of our Jackal River!”
“Patience! Patience!” the boatswain answered. “We shall find some spring all right by and by among the rocks, or else a stream coming down from the top of the cliff.”
“Anyhow,” Fritz declared, “we must not think of settling on this coast. If we do not succeed in getting round the base of those bastions on foot we must take the boat and reconnoitre beyond them. If it is a small island we have come ashore upon, we will only stay long enough to set Captain Gould up again. A fortnight will be enough, I imagine.”
“Well, we have the house, at all events,” John Block remarked. “As for the garden, who is to say that it isn’t quite close by—on the other side of this point, perhaps?”
They left the cave and walked down across the beach, so as to get round the bastion.
From the cave to the first rocks washed by the sea at the half-ebb was about two hundred yards. On this side there were none of the heaps of sea-weeds found on the left-hand side of the beach. This promontory was formed of heavy masses of rocks which seemed to have been broken off from the top of the cliff. At the cave it would have been impossible to cross it, but nearer the sea it was low enough to get across.
The boatswain’s attention was soon caught by a sound of running water.