“Now we haven’t even a radio,” he thought. It was strange how the jigsaw puzzle of his life appeared to fit together.
“I have always had my violin,” he thought. “And I still have one,” he reminded himself, with a start.
When midnight came and went with no sign of life on the island, he at last took the violin from its case and began playing “Ave Maria” softly.
“Ave Maria.” How strange it sounded there in the silent night.
He played on. For a full hour he was lost to his surroundings. The simple things he had played as a small boy came back to him. So, too, did the more difficult selections he had played with the college orchestra in his home town, and the one that had won first place for him in the state high-school contest.
“That’s all in the past,” he thought once. But he wasn’t sure. He sat on a fallen palm tree, with the violin across his knee, and dreamed of a great concert orchestra and of a funny little conductor with a shock of white hair—a very fine musician. And in that dream he saw himself playing as the soloist of the performance.
Then he took up his violin and played again. Though his strings were muted, the low melodies carried far in the still night. It was during the playing of his last piece that two figures appeared on the ledge far above him. Standing there in the moonlight, their light garments turned them into ghosts. Realizing this, perhaps, they moved back into the shadow of a great rock, but still they lingered. All unconscious of this, Jack played on. Then suddenly he was wakened from his dream by a wild shout from Stew, a cry of pain and fright.
The two figures on the rocks darted away so quickly that they loosened a stone which went tumbling down to stop with a crash a short distance from the spot where Jack sat.
“Stew! What’s up?”
“It was a Jap!” Stew exclaimed. “He tried to carve me up.”