“Is there a shepherd there? Surely there are no sheep?”
“There have been a good many sheep there, occasionally. There’s always grass on the Island—a little creek runs through it, fed from a spring—and the feed is quite good. In very dry seasons some of the farmers used to ferry their sheep across, and they did very well there. Then some bright spirits realized that it was an easy place to get mutton, and the sheep began to disappear. That annoyed the owners, so they clubbed together and put a man out there to watch the flock: they built him a stone hut, and used to take him supplies every week. But the seasons have been so good for some years that there has been no need to send sheep across, so the old hut hasn’t been used.”
“What a lonely place for a man to live in!” I commented.
“Oh, it wasn’t too bad. The Island is only a mile in a direct line from the shore, and some of the fishing-boats used to look him up from time to time, besides the weekly supply-boat. And there was always the chance of a scrap with sheep-stealers; the shepherds used to be provided with a gun, though I think only one man ever used it—and then he killed a sheep by mistake! There’s good fishing from the rocks at the far end, too. I don’t fancy a fellow would be too badly off there,” Harry ended. “I think Mother might do worse than go and camp there with her writing: an island is just about what she wants, when a book is worrying her!”
That seemed to me a rather brilliant idea, and I was wondering how it would appear to Mrs. McNab when we drew near to Shepherd’s Island. A shelf of rock at the edge of a deep, tiny bay made a natural landing-place; already two other launches were secured there, their mooring-ropes tied to trees. We ran in gently, Judy at the helm. Several people, Dicky Atherton among them, were waiting for us.
“Thought you were never coming,” he called out. “We’re all stiff with hunger!”
“You’re very lucky to get us at all,” Harry retorted. “Catch the rope, Dick. I hope you’ve got the billy boiling.”
“It ought to be, if it isn’t. Hallo, Miss Earle—you’re the coolest-looking person on this island! We’re all hot and hungry and sunburnt, but we’ve had a great time.” He helped me ashore and introduced me to several people whom I had not seen before. The launch was unloaded, and we set off up the smooth grassy slope to where the main body of the picnickers could be seen gathered under a shady tree. To the left the smoke of their fire drifted lazily upward.
Beryl McNab was cool and aloof, and did not attempt to make me known to any of the strangers. But some of the other girls were kinder, and among the Wootong contingent I discovered an old school-chum, and we fell on each other’s necks with joy: I had not seen Vera Curthois for years, but she was one of those to whom lack of money makes no difference. She introduced me to the people with whom she was staying: merry, friendly girls and boys. Harry and Dicky Atherton superintended lunch, not permitting me to do anything; and presently I seemed to know every one, and managed to forget that I was a kind of housekeeper and paid buffer to Mrs. McNab. It was very refreshing to be simply Doris Earle once more: I enjoyed every minute of the long, cheery luncheon.
We explored the island after everything was packed up and we had rested for awhile under the trees. The shepherd’s cottage was not much to see; a one-roomed hut built of slabs and heavy stones, joined by a kind of rough mortar. Cobwebs festooned it, and birds had nested in the crevices, but it was still water-tight, though the door sagged limply on one hinge. I fancied that Mrs. McNab would prefer her snug retreat in the Tower rooms. It was easy, looking at it, to picture the lonely shepherd who had waited in the darkness, his gun across his knees, for the sound of oars grating in rowlocks as the sheep-stealers’ boats drew near. A man might well get jumpy enough to fire into the gloom and kill his own sheep.