Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (1813 page)

“I’ll tell you what,” says I, “if us two keep company any longer, we shan’t get on smoothly together. You’re the oldest man — and you stop here, where we know there is shelter. We will divide the stores fairly, and I’ll go and shift for myself at the other end of the island. Do you agree to that?”

“Yes,” says he; “and the sooner the better.”

I left him for a minute, and went away to look out on the reef that had wrecked us. The splinters of the Peruvian, scattered broadcast over the beach, or tossing up and down darkly, far out in the white surf, were all that remained to tell of the ship. I don’t deny that my heart sank, when I looked at the place where she struck, and saw nothing before me but sea and sky.

But what was the use of standing and looking? It was a deal better to rouse myself by doing something. I returned to Mr. Clissold — and then and there divided the stores into two equal parts, including everything down to the matches in my pocket. Of these parts I gave him first choice. I also left him the whole of the tarpaulin to himself — keeping in my own possession the medicine-chest, and the pistol; which last I loaded with powder and shot, in case any sea-birds might fly within reach. When the division was made, and when I had moved my part out of his way and out of his sight, I thought it uncivil to bear malice any longer, now that we had agreed to separate. We were cast away on a desert island, and we had death, as well as I could see, within about three weeks’ hail of us — but that was no reason for not making things reasonably pleasant as long as we could. I was some time (in consequence of my natural slowness where matters of seafaring duty don’t happen to be concerned) before I came to this conclusion. When I did come to it, I acted on it.

“Shake hands, before parting,” I said, suiting the action to the word.

“No!” says he; “I don’t like you.”

“Please yourself,” says I — and so we parted.

Turning my back on the west, which was his territory according to agreement, I walked away towards the south-east, where the sides of the island rose highest. Here I found a sort of half rift, half cavern, in the rocky banks, which looked as likely a place as any other — and to this refuge I moved my share of the stores. I thatched it over as well as I could with scrub, and heaped up some loose stones at the mouth of it. At home in England, I should have been ashamed to put my dog in such a place — but when a man believes his days to be numbered, he is not over-particular about his lodgings, and I was not over-particular about mine.

When my work was done, the heavens were fair, the sun was shining, and it was long past noon. I went up again to the high ground, to see what I could make out in the new clearness of the air. North, east, and west there was nothing but sea and sky — but, south, I now saw land. It was high, and looked to be a matter of seven or eight miles off. Island, or not, it must have been of a good size for me to see it as I did. Known or not known to mariners, it was certainly big enough to have living creatures on it — animals or men, or both. If I had not lost the boat in my second attempt to reach the vessel, we might have easily got to it. But situated as we were now, with no wood to make a boat of but the scattered splinters from the ship, and with no tools to use even that much, there might just as well have been no land in sight at all, so far as we were concerned. The poor hope of a ship coming our road, was still the only hope left. To give us all the little chance we might get that way, I now looked about on the beach for the longest morsel of a wrecked spar that I could find; planted it on the high ground; and rigged up to it the one shirt I had on my back for a signal. While coming and going on this job, I noted with great joy that rain water enough lay in the hollows of the rocks above the sea line, to save our small store of fresh water for a week at least. Thinking it only fair to the supercargo to let him know what I had found out, I went to his territories, after setting up the morsel of a spar, and discreetly shouted my news down to him without showing myself. “Keep to your own side!” was all the thanks I got for this piece of civility. I went back to my own side immediately, and crawled into my little cavern, quite content to be alone. On that first night, strange as it seems now, I once or twice nearly caught myself feeling happy at the thought of being rid of Mr. Lawrence Clissold.

According to my calculations — which were made by tying a fresh knot every morning in a piece of marline — we two men were just a week, each on his own side of the island, without seeing or communicating, anyhow, with one another. The first half of the week, I had enough to do with cudgelling my brains for a means of helping ourselves, to keep my mind steady.

I thought first of picking up all the longest bits of spars that had been cast ashore, lashing them together with ropes twisted out of the long grass on the island, and trusting to raft-navigation to get to that high land away in the south. But when I looked among the spars, there were not half a dozen of them left whole enough for the purpose. And even if there had been more, the short allowance of food would not have given me time sufficient, or strength sufficient, to gather the grass, to twist it into ropes, and to lash a raft together big enough and strong enough for us two men. There was nothing to be done, but to give up this notion — and I gave it up. The next chance I thought of was to keep a fire burning on the shore every night, with the wood of the wreck, in case vessels at sea might notice it, on one side — or the people of the high land in the south (if the distance was not too great) might notice it, on the other. There was sense in this notion, and it could be turned to account the moment the wood was dry enough to burn. The wood got dry enough before the week was out. Whether it was the end of the stormy season in those latitudes, or whether it was only the shifting of the wind to the west, I don’t know — but now, day after day, the heavens were clear and the sun shone scorching hot. The scrub on the island (which was of no great account) dried up — but the fresh water in the hollows of the rocks (which was, on the other hand, a serious business) dried up too. Troubles seldom come alone; and on the day when I made this discovery, I also found out that I had calculated wrong about the food. Eke it out as I might with scurvy grass and roots, there would not be above eight days more of it left when the first week was past — and, as for the fresh water, half a pint a day, unless more rain fell, would leave me at the end of my store, as nearly as I could guess, about the same time.

This was a bad look-out — but I don’t think the prospect of it upset me in my mind, so much as the having nothing to do. Except for the gathering of the wood, and the lighting of the signal-fire, every night, I had no work at all, towards the end of the week, to keep me steady. I checked myself in thinking much about home, for fear of losing heart, and not holding out to the last, as became a man. For the same reasons I likewise kept my mind from raising hopes of help in me which were not likely to come true. What else was there to think about? Nothing but the man on the other side of the island — and be hanged to him!

I thought about those words I heard him say in his sleep; I thought about how he was getting on by himself; how he liked nothing but water to drink, and little enough of that; how he was eking out his food; whether he slept much or not; whether he saw the smoke from my fire at night, or not; whether he held up better or worse than I did; whether he would be glad to see me, if I went to him to make it up; whether he or I would die first; whether if it was me, he would do for me, what I would have done for him — namely, bury him, with the last strength I had left. All these things, and lots more, kept coming and going in my mind, till I could stand it no longer. On the morning of the eighth day, I roused up to go to his territories, feeling it would do me good to see him and hear him, even if we quarrelled again the instant we set eyes on each other.

I climbed up to the grassy ground — and, when I got there, what should I see but the supercargo himself, coming to
my
territories, and wandering up and down in the scrub through not knowing where to find them!

It almost knocked me over, when we met, the man was changed so. He looked eighty years old; the little flesh he had on his miserable face hung baggy; his blue spectacles had dropped down on his nose, and his eyes showed over them wild and red-rimmed; his lips were black, his legs staggered under him. He came up to me with his eyes all of a glare, and put both his hands on my breast, just over the pocket in which I kept that flask of ginger-brandy which he had tried to steal from me.

“Have you got any of it left?” says he, in a whisper.

“About two mouthfuls,” says I.

“Give us one of them, for God’s sake,” says he.

Giving him one of those mouthfuls was just about equal to giving him a day of my life. In the case of a man I liked, I would not have thought twice about giving it. In the case of Mr. Clissold, I did think twice. I would have been a better Christian, if I could — but just then, I couldn’t.

He thought I was going to say, No. His eyes got cunning directly. He reached his hands to my shoulders, and whispered these words in my ear:

‘I’ll tell you what I know about the five hundred pound, if you’ll give me a drop.”

I determined to give it to him, and pulled out the flask. I took his hand, and poured the drop into the hollow of it, and held it for a moment.

“Tell me first,” I said, “and drink afterwards.”

He looked all round him, as if he thought there were people on the island to hear us. “Hush!” he said; “let’s whisper about it.” The next question and answer that passed between us, was louder than before on my side, and softer than ever on his. This was the question:

“What do you know about the five hundred pound?”

And this was the answer:

“It’s
Stolen Money!”

My hand dropped away from his, as if he had shot me. He instantly fastened on the drop of liquor in the hollow of his hand, like a hungry wild beast on a bone, and then looked up for more. Something in my face (God knows what) seemed suddenly to frighten him out of his life. Before I could stir a step, or get a word out, down he dropped on his knees, whining and whimpering in the high grass at my feet.

“Don’t kill me!” says he; “I’m dying — I’ll think of my poor soul. I’ll repent while there’s time — ”

Beginning in that way, he maundered awfully, grovelling down in the grass; asking me every other minute for “a drop more, and a drop more;” and talking as if he thought we were both in England. Out of his wanderings, his beseechings for another drop, and his miserable beggar’s-petitions for his “poor soul,” I gathered together these words — the same which I wrote down on the morsel of paper, and of which nine parts out of ten are now rubbed off!

The first I made out — though not the first he said — was that some one, whom he spoke of as “the old man,” was alive; and “Lanrean” was the place he lived in. I was to go there, and ask, among the old men, for “Tregarthen — ”

(At the mention by me of the name of Tregarthen, my brother, to my great surprise, stopped me with a start; made me say the name over more than once; and then, for the first time, told me of the trouble about his sweetheart and his marriage. We waited a little to talk that matter over; after which, I went on again with my story, in these words:)

Well, as I made out from Clissold’s wanderings, I was to go to Lanrean, to ask among the old men for Tregarthen, and to say to Tregarthen, “Clissold was the man. Clissold bore no malice: Clissold repented like a Christian, for the sake of his poor soul.” No! I was to say something else to Tregarthen. I was to say, “Look among the books; look at the leaf you know of, and see for yourself it’s not the right leaf to be there.” No! I was to say, “The right leaf is hidden, not burnt. Clissold had time for everything else, but no time to burn that leaf. Tregarthen came in when he had got the candle lit to burn it. There was just time to let it drop from under his hand into the great crack in the desk, and then he was ordered abroad by the House, and there was no chance of doing more.” No! I was to say none of these things to Tregarthen. Only this, instead: “Look in Clissold’s Desk — and, if you blame anybody, blame miser Raybrock for driving him to it.” And, oh, another drop — for the Lord’s sake, give him another drop!

So he went on, over and over again, till I found voice enough to speak, and stop him.

“Get up, and go!” I said to the miserable wretch. “Get back to your own side of the island, or I may do you a mischief, in spite of my own self.”

“Give me the other drop, and I will” — was all the answer I could get from him.

I threw him the flask. He pounced upon it with a howl. I turned my back — for I could look at him no longer — and climbed down again to my cavern on the beach.