The Lonely Island - Robert Michael Ballantyne (free novel 24 .TXT) 📗

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The sailors glanced at each other and then at the stalwart youths, as if they doubted the truth of the assertion.

"I've heard of that mutiny," said Captain Folger. "It was celebrated enough to make a noise even on our side of the Atlantic. If I remember rightly, most of the mutineers were caught on Otaheite and taken to England, being wrecked and some drowned on the way; the rest were tried, and some acquitted, some pardoned, and some hanged."

"I know nothin' about all that," said Thursday, with an interested but perplexed look.

"But I do, sir," said the man whom we have styled Jack, touching his hat to the captain. "I'm an Englishman, as you knows, an' chanced to be in England at the very time when the mutineers was tried. There was nine o' the mutineers, sir, as went off wi' the _Bounty_ from Otaheite, an' they've never bin heard on from that day to this."

"Yes, yes!" exclaimed Thursday, with sudden animation, "that's _us_. The nine mutineers came to our island here, Pitcairn, an' remained here ever since, an' we've all bin born here; there's lots more of us,--boys and girls."

"You _don't_ say so!" exclaimed the captain, whose interest was now thoroughly aroused. "Are the nine mutineers all on Pitcairn still?"

Thursday's mobile countenance at once became profoundly sad, and he shook his head slowly.

"No," said he, "they're all dead but one. John Adams is his name."

"Don't remember that name among the nine said to be lost," remarked the Englishman.

"I've heard father say he was sometimes called John Smith," said Thursday.

"Ah, yes! I remember the name of Smith," said Jack. "_He_ was one of 'em."

"And is he the only man left on the island?" asked the captain.

"Yes, the only man," replied Thursday, who had never yet thought of himself in any other light than a boy; "an' if you'll come ashore in our canoe, father'll take you to his house an' treat you to the best he's got. He'll be right glad to see you too, for he's not seen a soul except ourselves for nigh twenty years."

"Not seen a soul! D'ye mean to say no ship has touched here for that length of time?" asked the captain in surprise.

"No, except one that only touched an' went off without discovering that we were here, an' none of us found out she had bin here till we chanced to see her sailin' away far out to sea. That was five years ago."

"That's very strange and interestin'. I'd like well to visit old Adams, lad, an' I thank 'ee for the invitation; but I won't run my ship through such a surf as that, an' don't like to risk leavin' her to go ashore in your canoe."

"If you please, sir, I'd be very glad to go, an' bring off what news there is," said Jack, the English sailor, whose surname was Brace.

At first Captain Folger refused this offer, but on consideration he allowed Jack to go, promising at the same time to keep as near to the shore as possible, so that if there was anything like treachery he might have a chance of swimming off.

"So your father is dead?" asked the captain, as he walked with Thursday to the side.

"Yes, long, long ago."

"But you called Adams `father' just now. How's that?"

"Oh, we all calls 'im that. It's only a way we've got into."

"What made your father call you Thursday?"

"'Cause I was born on a Thursday."

"H'm I an' I suppose if you'd bin born on a Tuesday or Saturday, he'd have called you by one or other of these days?"

"S'pose so," said Thursday, with much simplicity.

"Are you married, Thursday?"

"Yes, I'm married to Susannah," said Thursday, with a pleased smile; "she's a dear girl, though she's a deal older than me--old enough to be my mother. And I've got a babby too--a _splendid_ babby!"

Thursday passed ever the side as he said this, and fortunately did not see the merriment which him remarks created.

Jack Brace followed him into the canoe, and in less than half-an-hour he found himself among the wondering, admiring, almost awestruck, islanders of Pitcairn.

"It's a _man_!" whispered poor Mainmast to Susannah, with the memory of Fletcher Christian strong upon her.

"What a lovely beard he has!" murmured Sally to Bessy Mills.

Charlie Christian and Matt Quintal chancing, curiously enough, to be near Sally and Bessy, overheard the whisper, and for the first time each received a painful stab from the green-eyed demon, jealousy.

But the children did not whisper their comments. They crowded round the seaman eagerly.

"You've come to live with us?" asked Dolly Young, looking up in his face with an innocent smile, and taking his rough hand.

"To tell us stories?" said little Arthur Quintal, with an equally innocent smile.

"Well, no, my dears, not exactly," answered the seaman, looking in a dazed manner at the pretty faces and graceful forms around him; "but if I only had the chance to remain here, it's my belief that I would."

Further remark was stopped by the appearance of John Adams coming towards the group. He walked slowly, and kept his eyes steadily, yet wistfully, fastened on the seaman. Holding out his hand, he said in a low tone, as if he were soliloquising, "At last! It's like a dream!" Then, as the sailor grasped his hand and shook it warmly, he added aloud a hearty "Welcome, welcome to Pitcairn."

"Thank 'ee, thank 'ee," said Jack Brace, not less heartily; "an' may I ax if you _are_ one o' the _Bounty_ mutineers, an' no mistake?"

"The old tone," murmured Adams, "and the old lingo, an' the old cut o' the jib, an'--an'--the old toggery."

He took hold of a flap of Jack's pea-jacket, and almost fondled it.

"Oh, man, but it does my heart good to see you! Come, come away up to my house an' have some grub. Yes, yes--axin' your pardon for not answerin' right off--I _am_ one o' the _Bounty_ mutineers; the last one--John Smith once, better known now as John Adams. But where do you hail from, friend?"

Jack at once gave him the desired information, told him on the way up all he knew about the fate of the mutineers who had remained at Otaheite, and received in exchange a brief outline of the history of the nine mutineers who had landed on Pitcairn.

The excitement of the two men and their interest in each other increased every moment; the one being full of the idea of having made a wonderful discovery of, as it were, a lost community, the other being equally full of the delight of once more talking to a man--a seaman--a messmate, he might soon say, for he meant to feed him like a prince.

"Get a pig cooked, Molly," he said, during a brief interval in the conversation, "an' do it as fast as you can."

"There's one a'most ready-baked now," replied Mrs Adams.

"All right, send the girls for fruit, and make a glorious spread-- outside; he'll like it better than in the house--under the banyan-tree. Sit down, sit down, messmate." Turning to the sailor, "Man, _what_ a time it is since I've used that blessed word! Sit down and have a glass."

Jack Brace smacked his lips in anticipation, thanked Adams in advance, and drew his sleeve across his mouth in preparation, while his host set a cocoa-nut-cup filled with a whitish substance before him.

"That's a noo sort of a glass, John Adams," remarked the man, as he raised and smelt it; "also a strange kind o' tipple."

He sipped, and seemed disappointed. Then he sipped again, and seemed pleased.

"What is it, may I ax?"

"It's milk of the cocoa-nut," answered Adams.

"Milk o' the ko-ko-nut, eh? Well, now, that is queer. If you'd 'a called it the milk o' the cow-cow-nut, I could have believed it. Hows'ever, it ain't bad, tho' raither wishy-washy. Got no stronger tipple than that?"

"Nothin' stronger than that, 'xcept water," said John, with one of his sly glances; "but it's a toss up which is the strongest."

"Well, it'll be a toss down with me whichever is the strongest," said the accommodating tar, as he once more raised the cup to his lips, and drained it.

"But, I say, you unhung mutineer, do you mean for to tell me that all them good-lookin' boys an' girls are yours?"

He looked round on the crowd of open-mouthed young people, who, from six-foot Toc down to the youngest staggerer, gazed at him solemnly, all eyes and ears.

"No, they ain't," answered Adams, with a laugh. "What makes you ask?"

"'Cause they all calls you father."

"Oh!" replied his host, "that's only a way they have; but there's only four of 'em mine, three girls an' a boy. The rest are the descendants of my eight comrades, who are now dead and gone."

"Well, now, d'ye know, John Adams, _alias_ Smith, mutineer, as ought to have bin hung but wasn't, an' as nobody would have the heart to hang now, even if they had the chance, this here adventur is out o' sight one o' the most extraor'nar circumstances as ever did happen to me since I was the length of a marlinspike."

As Mainmast here entered to announce that the pig was ready for consumption, the amazed mariner was led to a rich repast under the neighbouring banyan-tree. Here he was bereft of speech for a considerable time, whether owing to the application of his jaws to food, or increased astonishment, it is difficult to say.

Before the repast began, Adams, according to custom, stood up, removed his hat, and briefly asked a blessing. To which all assembled, with clasped hands and closed eyes, responded Amen.

This, no doubt, was another source of profound wonder to Jack Brace, but he made no remark at the time. Neither did he remark on the fact that the women did not sit down to eat with the males of the party, but stood behind and served them, conversing pleasantly the while.

After dinner was concluded, and thanks had been returned, Jack Brace leaned his back against one of the descending branches of the banyan-tree, and with a look of supreme satisfaction drew forth a short black pipe.

At sight of this the countenance of Adams flushed, and his eyes almost sparkled.

"There it is again," he murmured; "the old pipe once more! Let me look at it, Jack Brace; it's not the first by a long way that I've handled."

Jack handed over the pipe, a good deal amused at the manner of his host, who took the implement of fumigation and examined it carefully, handling it with tender care, as if it were a living and delicate creature. Then he smelt it, then put it in his mouth and gave it a gentle draw, while an expression of pathetic satisfaction passed over his somewhat care-worn countenance.

"The old taste, not a bit changed," he murmured, shutting his eyes. "Brings back the old ships, and the old messmates, and the old times, and Old England."

"Come, old feller," said Jack Brace, "if it's so powerful, why not light it and have