“Ah, yes; to be sure. How is he?” murmured the girl.
“He’s about the same this morning. But he got a little sleep. Keep him dosed with all the hot broth he’ll take. And say, roust me out at noon. I’ve had my breakfast. Now I’ll have a snooze. So long!”
He nodded, and crawled under the shade of the nearest bush, too drowsy to observe her look of dismay.
At noon, having learned that Winthrope’s condition showed little change, Blake ate a hearty meal, and at once set off down the cleft. He did not reappear until nightfall; though at intervals Miss Leslie had heard his step as he came up the ravine with his loads of thorn-brush.
This course of action became the routine for the following ten days. It was broken only by three incidents, all relating to the important matter of food supply. Winthrope had soon tired of broth, and showed such an insatiable craving for cocoanut milk that the stock on hand had become exhausted within the week.
The day after, Blake took the rope ladder, as he called the tangle of knotted creepers, and went off towards the north end of the cleft. When he returned, a little before dark, the lower part of his trousers was torn to shreds, and the palms of his hands were blistered and raw; but he carried a heavy load of cocoanuts. After a vain attempt to climb the giant palms on the far side of the river, he had found another grove near at hand, in the little plain, and had succeeded in reaching the tops of two of the smaller palms.
Under his directions, Miss Leslie clarified a bowl of bird fat–goose-grease, Blake called it,–and dressed his hands. Yet even with the bandages which she made of soft inner bark and the handkerchiefs, he was unable to handle the thorn-brush the following day. Unfortunately for him, he was not content to sit idle. During the night he had cut a bamboo fishing-pole and lengthened Miss Leslie’s line of plaited cocoanut-fibre with a long catgut leader. In the afternoon he completed his outfit with a hairpin hook and a piece of half-dried meat.
He was back an hour earlier than usual, and he brought with him a dozen or more fair-sized fish. His mouth was watering over the prospective feast, and Miss Leslie showed herself hardly less eager for a change from their monotonous diet. As the fish were already dressed, she raked up the coals and quickly contrived a grill of green bamboos.
When the odor of the broiling fish spread about in the still air, even Winthrope sniffed and turned over, while Blake watched the crisping delicacies with a ravenous look. Unable to restrain himself, he caught up the smallest fish, half cooked, and bolted it down with such haste that he burnt his mouth. He ran over to the spring for a drink, and Winthrope cackled derisively.
Miss Leslie was too absorbed in her cooking to observe the result of Blake’s greediness. She had turned the fish for the last time, and was about to lift them off the fire, when Blake came running back, and sent grill and all flying with a violent kick.