บทที่ บทที่ 21 · ALONE WITH THE BEAST FOLK.

. ALONE WITH THE BEAST FOLK.

I faced these people, facing my fate in them, single-handed

now,—literally single-handed, for I had a broken arm. In my pocket was

a revolver with two empty chambers. Among the chips scattered about the

beach lay the two axes that had been used to chop up the boats. The

tide was creeping in behind me. There was nothing for it but courage. I

looked squarely into the faces of the advancing monsters. They avoided

my eyes, and their quivering nostrils investigated the bodies that lay

beyond me on the beach. I took half-a-dozen steps, picked up the

blood-stained whip that lay beneath the body of the Wolf-man, and

cracked it. They stopped and stared at me.

“Salute!” said I. “Bow down!”

They hesitated. One bent his knees. I repeated my command, with my

heart in my mouth, and advanced upon them. One knelt, then the other

two.

I turned and walked towards the dead bodies, keeping my face towards

the three kneeling Beast Men, very much as an actor passing up the

stage faces the audience.

“They broke the Law,” said I, putting my foot on the Sayer of the Law.

“They have been slain,—even the Sayer of the Law; even the Other with

the Whip. Great is the Law! Come and see.”

“None escape,” said one of them, advancing and peering.

“None escape,” said I. “Therefore hear and do as I command.” They stood

up, looking questioningly at one another.

“Stand there,” said I.

I picked up the hatchets and swung them by their heads from the sling

of my arm; turned Montgomery over; picked up his revolver still loaded

in two chambers, and bending down to rummage, found half-a-dozen

cartridges in his pocket.

“Take him,” said I, standing up again and pointing with the whip; “take

him, and carry him out and cast him into the sea.”

They came forward, evidently still afraid of Montgomery, but still more

afraid of my cracking red whip-lash; and after some fumbling and

hesitation, some whip-cracking and shouting, they lifted him gingerly,

carried him down to the beach, and went splashing into the dazzling

welter of the sea.

“On!” said I, “on! Carry him far.”

They went in up to their armpits and stood regarding me.

“Let go,” said I; and the body of Montgomery vanished with a splash.

Something seemed to tighten across my chest.

“Good!” said I, with a break in my voice; and they came back, hurrying

and fearful, to the margin of the water, leaving long wakes of black in

the silver. At the water’s edge they stopped, turning and glaring into

the sea as though they presently expected Montgomery to arise therefrom

and exact vengeance.

“Now these,” said I, pointing to the other bodies.

They took care not to approach the place where they had thrown

Montgomery into the water, but instead, carried the four dead Beast

People slantingly along the beach for perhaps a hundred yards before

they waded out and cast them away.

As I watched them disposing of the mangled remains of M’ling, I heard a

light footfall behind me, and turning quickly saw the big Hyena-swine

perhaps a dozen yards away. His head was bent down, his bright eyes

were fixed upon me, his stumpy hands clenched and held close by his

side. He stopped in this crouching attitude when I turned, his eyes a

little averted.

For a moment we stood eye to eye. I dropped the whip and snatched at

the pistol in my pocket; for I meant to kill this brute, the most

formidable of any left now upon the island, at the first excuse. It may

seem treacherous, but so I was resolved. I was far more afraid of him

than of any other two of the Beast Folk. His continued life was I knew

a threat against mine.

I was perhaps a dozen seconds collecting myself. Then cried I, “Salute!

Bow down!”

His teeth flashed upon me in a snarl. “Who are _you_ that I should—”

Perhaps a little too spasmodically I drew my revolver, aimed quickly

and fired. I heard him yelp, saw him run sideways and turn, knew I had

missed, and clicked back the cock with my thumb for the next shot. But

he was already running headlong, jumping from side to side, and I dared

not risk another miss. Every now and then he looked back at me over his

shoulder. He went slanting along the beach, and vanished beneath the

driving masses of dense smoke that were still pouring out from the

burning enclosure. For some time I stood staring after him. I turned to

my three obedient Beast Folk again and signalled them to drop the body

they still carried. Then I went back to the place by the fire where the

bodies had fallen and kicked the sand until all the brown blood-stains

were absorbed and hidden.

I dismissed my three serfs with a wave of the hand, and went up the

beach into the thickets. I carried my pistol in my hand, my whip thrust

with the hatchets in the sling of my arm. I was anxious to be alone, to

think out the position in which I was now placed. A dreadful thing that

I was only beginning to realise was, that over all this island there

was now no safe place where I could be alone and secure to rest or

sleep. I had recovered strength amazingly since my landing, but I was

still inclined to be nervous and to break down under any great stress.

I felt that I ought to cross the island and establish myself with the

Beast People, and make myself secure in their confidence. But my heart

failed me. I went back to the beach, and turning eastward past the

burning enclosure, made for a point where a shallow spit of coral sand

ran out towards the reef. Here I could sit down and think, my back to

the sea and my face against any surprise. And there I sat, chin on

knees, the sun beating down upon my head and unspeakable dread in my

mind, plotting how I could live on against the hour of my rescue (if

ever rescue came). I tried to review the whole situation as calmly as I

could, but it was difficult to clear the thing of emotion.

I began turning over in my mind the reason of Montgomery’s despair.

“They will change,” he said; “they are sure to change.” And Moreau,

what was it that Moreau had said? “The stubborn beast-flesh grows day

by day back again.” Then I came round to the Hyena-swine. I felt sure

that if I did not kill that brute, he would kill me. The Sayer of the

Law was dead: worse luck. They knew now that we of the Whips could be

killed even as they themselves were killed. Were they peering at me

already out of the green masses of ferns and palms over yonder,

watching until I came within their spring? Were they plotting against

me? What was the Hyena-swine telling them? My imagination was running

away with me into a morass of unsubstantial fears.

My thoughts were disturbed by a crying of sea-birds hurrying towards

some black object that had been stranded by the waves on the beach near

the enclosure. I knew what that object was, but I had not the heart to

go back and drive them off. I began walking along the beach in the

opposite direction, designing to come round the eastward corner of the

island and so approach the ravine of the huts, without traversing the

possible ambuscades of the thickets.

Perhaps half a mile along the beach I became aware of one of my three

Beast Folk advancing out of the landward bushes towards me. I was now

so nervous with my own imaginings that I immediately drew my revolver.

Even the propitiatory gestures of the creature failed to disarm me. He

hesitated as he approached.

“Go away!” cried I.

There was something very suggestive of a dog in the cringing attitude

of the creature. It retreated a little way, very like a dog being sent

home, and stopped, looking at me imploringly with canine brown eyes.

“Go away,” said I. “Do not come near me.”

“May I not come near you?” it said.

“No; go away,” I insisted, and snapped my whip. Then putting my whip in

my teeth, I stooped for a stone, and with that threat drove the

creature away.

So in solitude I came round by the ravine of the Beast People, and

hiding among the weeds and reeds that separated this crevice from the

sea I watched such of them as appeared, trying to judge from their

gestures and appearance how the death of Moreau and Montgomery and the

destruction of the House of Pain had affected them. I know now the

folly of my cowardice. Had I kept my courage up to the level of the

dawn, had I not allowed it to ebb away in solitary thought, I might

have grasped the vacant sceptre of Moreau and ruled over the Beast

People. As it was I lost the opportunity, and sank to the position of a

mere leader among my fellows.

Towards noon certain of them came and squatted basking in the hot sand.

The imperious voices of hunger and thirst prevailed over my dread. I

came out of the bushes, and, revolver in hand, walked down towards

these seated figures. One, a Wolf-woman, turned her head and stared at

me, and then the others. None attempted to rise or salute me. I felt

too faint and weary to insist, and I let the moment pass.

“I want food,” said I, almost apologetically, and drawing near.

“There is food in the huts,” said an Ox-boar-man, drowsily, and looking

away from me.

I passed them, and went down into the shadow and odours of the almost

deserted ravine. In an empty hut I feasted on some specked and

half-decayed fruit; and then after I had propped some branches and

sticks about the opening, and placed myself with my face towards it and

my hand upon my revolver, the exhaustion of the last thirty hours

claimed its own, and I fell into a light slumber, hoping that the

flimsy barricade I had erected would cause sufficient noise in its

removal to save me from surprise.