Oranges and lemons

by Mary C. E. Wemyss

“A what?” asked Watkins, his pocket-book ready and pencil poised.

“It’s no time for joking, Hastings,” said Marcus. “A storm in this part of the world can get up in a moment: we’re in for one now, unless I’m very much mistaken and we may be here for hours. What can have happened?”

“We are stranded on a desert island, that’s quite clear,” said Hastings, and he remembered Diana’s words. What had she said about desert islands? She had rather harped on the subject. Was she playing a practical joke? It looked like it. If she had planned a ridiculous game he would play it with her. If she had meant to be funny he would laugh with her. He would enter into the spirit of any joke she chose to perpetrate—be it good, bad, or indifferent; and after all an island is an island, and a man is a boy, and what man is there, who is as much a boy as he ought to be, who can be on an island and not light a fire? or be in a wood and not look for birds’ nests? Being very much of a man he was very much of a boy. Diana had spoken in fun of desert islands. Did she realize how deeply implanted in the heart of every real man is the longing for the primordial life? Not for long, perhaps, but to experience it, for once? Hastings had dreamed all his life of a desert island. He had cooked, he had built, he had slept, on a desert island. He had lain awake under the stars above it, slept, lulled by the wind that rocked it. He had risen with the sun that rose behind it, and had bathed in the noonday heat that scorched it. Did Diana know the lure of those dreams? He set out to explore and at the mouth of the cave he came upon the cairn of her building. He took the paper from under the top stone and he read of the historical one match, with which she dared him to light a fire! It required, she said, the very particular skill of the experienced explorer to light a fire with the last match. “I am sure you can do it,” she wrote. Further she said she knew exactly how a desert island should be furnished—there should, by rights, of course, be a chest of drawers in the cave. She knew how it should be stocked: with what cunning the stores should be hidden; they should stand upon a rock in full view—but she realized how little time there was to spare, how soon Uncle Marcus would tire of a desert island; so she had placed all he should need in a box, and in that box he would find two halves of a cocoanut shell, in which to make soup, and other things, such as whiskey, that should help to keep Uncle Marcus warm and happy for a little while—and sardines that should sustain him. Hastings wished Diana had thought of a funnier joke, but he had vowed he would be amused. He would light the fire; that at least would be good fun, and he would stick faithfully to the one match. He would tell her he had made soup and boiled eggs. He would get Uncle Marcus to swear he had swallowed them; he—Miles—should not be the loser in the end: the joke should be his ... until such time as it should find its way home again to her!

He went out of the cave to gather driftwood. The storm had risen, he was caught by the scudding rain and whipped by the wind. He wished she would come. In a moment the rain was running down his neck and oozing over the tops of his shoes. The joke was beginning to pall, but he said to himself, and truly, that if it had been any one else’s it would have palled long before. He was going back to the cave when he saw at his feet a little bird that looked about to die. “Poor little beggar!” he said. “It’s a poor joke, isn’t it?” And lifting it up he examined it, promising to do what he could to save its funny little life. “You would, would you?” he asked, as the little bird pecked at his finger. “Wait a bit, my little friend, until you are sitting by a warm fire with a speck of whiskey inside you—eh? Come along!”

The joke was not such a bad one after all. A fire has been lighted for worse things than for the warming of a little half-dead bird. “You’re an ugly little beggar—yes, you are!” he said. “Now be quiet while I light a fire with one match—one match, old man, is all that stands between you and death—yes, death!”

To the little bird it must have been an enormous giant that placed him so tenderly in a safe place, under the shadow of a great rock. The little bird watched with interest the arranging of that fire: gasped when the one match nearly went out: blinked when the flame fostered in the hollow of a gigantic hand flared up straight and strong—and yellow, the colour of its mother’s eyes—a colour warm, comforting, and kind. The giant put the flame to the driftwood; it caught here, went out there, blazed up here; the little bird squeaked. “Wait a bit, sonny—it’ll be all right. It’s no joke dying when you’re so young, is it? I had measles myself long ago—here—draw up to the fire, closer—that’s right—now for a little whiskey. Like it, old man? No, no more! True Scotsman that you are—later on, perhaps! Now go to sleep. I’ll go and see what the others are doing—squawk if you’re frightened—I shan’t be far off.”

It wasn’t such a bad joke after all. Bother the rain!

Meanwhile Marcus had taken all the photographs he could take and began to find Diana’s joke—if joke it were—a poor one—and a stupid one. He made no vow to be amused by it—no uncle would. Watkins, anxious to help, said the only thing he could do to while away the time was to recite and he cleared his throat.

“If you would shout instead, I should be very much obliged,” said Marcus; “some one might hear you.”

Shouting was not at all the same thing to Watkins because it was a thing he did with great difficulty. However, he must try and he should be very glad if some one should chance to hear him because his landlady never did, and she always put the blame on his voice. He asked St. Jermyn to shout too, and St. Jermyn shouted.