For the Term of His Natural Life

by Marcus Andrew Hislop Clarke

  In the morning, however, Rufus Dawes was first at work, and made noallusion to the scene of the previous evening. He had already skinnedone of the goats, and he directed Frere to set to work upon another."Cut down the rump to the hock, and down the brisket to the knee," hesaid. "I want the hides as square as possible." By dint of hard workthey got the four goats skinned, and the entrails cleaned ready fortwisting, by breakfast time; and having broiled some of the flesh, madea hearty meal. Mrs. Vickers being no better, Dawes went to see her, andseemed to have made friends again with Sylvia, for he came out of thehut with the child's hand in his. Frere, who was cutting the meat inlong strips to dry in the sun, saw this, and it added fresh fuel to thefire in his unreasonable envy and jealousy. However, he said nothing,for his enemy had not yet shown him how the boat was to be made. Beforemidday, however, he was a partner in the secret, which, after all, was avery simple one.

  Rufus Dawes took two of the straightest and most tapered of thecelery-top pines which Frere had cut on the previous day, and lashedthem tightly together, with the butts outwards. He thus produced aspliced stick about twelve feet long. About two feet from either end henotched the young tree until he could bend the extremities upwards; andhaving so bent them, he secured the bent portions in their places bymeans of lashings of raw hide. The spliced trees now presented a rudeoutline of the section of a boat, having the stem, keel, and stern allin one piece. This having been placed lengthwise between the stakes,four other poles, notched in two places, were lashed from stake tostake, running crosswise to the keel, and forming the knees. Foursaplings were now bent from end to end of the upturned portions of thekeel that represented stem and stern. Two of these four were placedabove, as gunwales; two below as bottom rails. At each intersection thesticks were lashed firmly with fishing line. The whole framework beingcomplete, the stakes were drawn out, and there lay upon the ground theskeleton of a boat eight feet long by three broad.

  Frere, whose hands were blistered and sore, would fain have rested; butthe convict would not hear of it. "Let us finish," he said regardless ofhis own fatigue; "the skins will be dry if we stop."

  "I can work no more," says Frere sulkily; "I can't stand. You've gotmuscles of iron, I suppose. I haven't."

  "They made me work when I couldn't stand, Maurice Frere. It is wonderfulwhat spirit the cat gives a man. There's nothing like work to get rid ofaching muscles--so they used to tell me."

  "Well, what's to be done now?"

  "Cover the boat. There, you can set the fat to melt, and sew these hidestogether. Two and two, do you see? and then sew the pair at the necks.There is plenty of catgut yonder."

  "Don't talk to me as if I was a dog!" says Frere suddenly. "Be civil,can't you."

  But the other, busily trimming and cutting at the projecting piecesof sapling, made no reply. It is possible that he thought the fatiguedlieutenant beneath his notice. About an hour before sundown the hideswere ready, and Rufus Dawes, having in the meantime interlaced the ribsof the skeleton with wattles, stretched the skins over it, with thehairy side inwards. Along the edges of this covering he bored holes atintervals, and passing through these holes thongs of twisted skin,he drew the whole to the top rail of the boat. One last precautionremained. Dipping the pannikin into the melted tallow, he plentifullyanointed the seams of the sewn skins. The boat, thus turned topsy-turvy,looked like a huge walnut shell covered with red and reeking hide,or the skull of some Titan who had been scalped. "There!" cried RufusDawes, triumphant. "Twelve hours in the sun to tighten the hides, andshe'll swim like a duck."

  The next day was spent in minor preparations. The jerked goat-meat waspacked securely into as small a compass as possible. The rum barrel wasfilled with water, and water bags were improvised out of portions ofthe intestines of the goats. Rufus Dawes, having filled these last withwater, ran a wooden skewer through their mouths, and twisted it tight,tourniquet fashion. He also stripped cylindrical pieces of bark, andhaving sewn each cylinder at the side, fitted to it a bottom of the samematerial, and caulked the seams with gum and pine-tree resin. Thus fourtolerable buckets were obtained. One goatskin yet remained, and out ofthat it was determined to make a sail. "The currents are strong," saidRufus Dawes, "and we shall not be able to row far with such oars as wehave got. If we get a breeze it may save our lives." It was impossibleto "step" a mast in the frail basket structure, but this difficulty wasovercome by a simple contrivance. From thwart to thwart two poles werebound, and the mast, lashed between these poles with thongs of raw hide,was secured by shrouds of twisted fishing line running fore and aft.Sheets of bark were placed at the bottom of the craft, and made a safeflooring. It was late in the afternoon on the fourth day when thesepreparations were completed, and it was decided that on the morrow theyshould adventure the journey. "We will coast down to the Bar," saidRufus Dawes, "and wait for the slack of the tide. I can do no more now."

  Sylvia, who had seated herself on a rock at a little distance, calledto them. Her strength was restored by the fresh meat, and her childishspirits had risen with the hope of safety. The mercurial little creaturehad wreathed seaweed about her head, and holding in her hand a long twigdecorated with a tuft of leaves to represent a wand, she personified oneof the heroines of her books.

  "I am the Queen of the Island," she said merrily, "and you are myobedient subjects. Pray, Sir Eglamour, is the boat ready?"

  "It is, your Majesty," said poor Dawes.

  "Then we will see it. Come, walk in front of me. I won't ask you torub your nose upon the ground, like Man Friday, because that would beuncomfortable. Mr. Frere, you don't play?"

  "Oh, yes!" says Frere, unable to withstand the charming pout thataccompanied the words. "I'll play. What am I to do?"

  "You must walk on this side, and be respectful. Of course it is onlyPretend, you know," she added, with a quick consciousness of Frere'sconceit. "Now then, the Queen goes down to the Seashore surrounded byher Nymphs! There is no occasion to laugh, Mr. Frere. Of course, Nymphsare very different from you, but then we can't help that."

  Marching in this pathetically ridiculous fashion across the sand, theyhalted at the coracle. "So that is the boat!" says the Queen, fairlysurprised out of her assumption of dignity. "You are a Wonderful Man,Mr. Dawes!"

  Rufus Dawes smiled sadly. "It is very simple."

  "Do you call this simple?" says Frere, who in the general joy hadshaken off a portion of his sulkiness. "By George, I don't! This isship-building with a vengeance, this is. There's no scheming aboutthis--it's all sheer hard work."

  "Yes!" echoed Sylvia, "sheer hard work--sheer hard work by good Mr.Dawes!" And she began to sing a childish chant of triumph, drawing linesand letters in the sand the while, with the sceptre of the Queen.

  "Good Mr. Dawes! Good Mr. Dawes! This is the work of Good Mr. Dawes!"

  Maurice could not resist a sneer.

  "See-saw, Margery Daw, Sold her bed, and lay upon straw!" said he.

  "Good Mr. Dawes!" repeated Sylvia. "Good Mr. Dawes! Why shouldn't I sayit? You are disagreeable, sir. I won't play with you any more," and shewent off along the sand.

  "Poor little child," said Rufus Dawes. "You speak too harshly to her."

  Frere--now that the boat was made--had regained his self-confidence.Civilization seemed now brought sufficiently close to him to warrant hisassuming the position of authority to which his social position entitledhim. "One would think that a boat had never been built before to hearher talk," he said. "If this washing-basket had been one of my olduncle's three-deckers, she couldn't have said much more. By the Lord!"he added, with a coarse laugh, "I ought to have a natural talent forship-building; for if the old villain hadn't died when he did, I shouldhave been a ship-builder myself."

  Rufus Dawes turned his back at the word "died", and busied himself withthe fastenings of the hides. Could the other have seen his face, hewould have been struck by its sudden pallor.

  "Ah!" continued Frere, half to himself, and half to his companion,"that's a sum of money to lose, isn't i
t?"

  "What do you mean?" asked the convict, without turning his face.

  "Mean! Why, my good fellow, I should have been left a quarter of amillion of money, but the old hunks who was going to give it to me diedbefore he could alter his will, and every shilling went to a scapegraceson, who hadn't been near the old man for years. That's the way of theworld, isn't it?"

  Rufus Dawes, still keeping his face away, caught his breath as if inastonishment, and then, recovering himself, he said in a harsh voice, "Afortunate fellow--that son!"

  "Fortunate!" cries Frere, with another oath. "Oh yes, he was fortunate!He was burnt to death in the Hydaspes, and never heard of his luck. Hismother has got the money, though. I never saw a shilling of it." Andthen, seemingly displeased with himself for having allowed his tongueto get the better of his dignity, he walked away to the fire, musing,doubtless, on the difference between Maurice Frere, with a quarter of amillion, disporting himself in the best society that could be procured,with command of dog-carts, prize-fighters, and gamecocks galore; andMaurice Frere, a penniless lieutenant, marooned on the barren coast ofMacquarie Harbour, and acting as boat-builder to a runaway convict.

  Rufus Dawes was also lost in reverie. He leant upon the gunwale ofthe much-vaunted boat, and his eyes were fixed upon the sea, welteringgolden in the sunset, but it was evident that he saw nothing of thescene before him. Struck dumb by the sudden intelligence of his fortune,his imagination escaped from his control, and fled away to thosescenes which he had striven so vainly to forget. He was looking faraway--across the glittering harbour and the wide sea beyond it--lookingat the old house at Hampstead, with its well-remembered gloomy garden.He pictured himself escaped from this present peril, and freed from thesordid thraldom which so long had held him. He saw himself returning,with some plausible story of his wanderings, to take possession of thewealth which was his--saw himself living once more, rich, free, andrespected, in the world from which he had been so long an exile. He sawhis mother's sweet pale face, the light of a happy home circle. He sawhimself--received with tears of joy and marvelling affection--enteringinto this home circle as one risen from the dead. A new life openedradiant before him, and he was lost in the contemplation of his ownhappiness.

  So absorbed was he that he did not hear the light footstep of the childacross the sand. Mrs. Vickers, having been told of the success which hadcrowned the convict's efforts, had overcome her weakness so far asto hobble down the beach to the boat, and now, heralded by Sylvia,approached, leaning on the arm of Maurice Frere.

  "Mamma has come to see the boat, Mr. Dawes!" cries Sylvia, but Dawes didnot hear.

  The child reiterated her words, but still the silent figure did notreply.

  "Mr. Dawes!" she cried again, and pulled him by the coat-sleeve.

  The touch aroused him, and looking down, he saw the pretty, thin faceupturned to his. Scarcely conscious of what he did, and still followingout the imagining which made him free, wealthy, and respected, hecaught the little creature in his arms--as he might have caught his owndaughter--and kissed her. Sylvia said nothing; but Mr. Frere--arrived,by his chain of reasoning, at quite another conclusion as to the stateof affairs--was astonished at the presumption of the man. The lieutenantregarded himself as already reinstated in his old position, and withMrs. Vickers on his arm, reproved the apparent insolence of the convictas freely as he would have done had they both been at his own littlekingdom of Maria Island. "You insolent beggar!" he cried. "Do you dare!Keep your place, sir!"

  The sentence recalled Rufus Dawes to reality. His place was that of aconvict. What business had he with tenderness for the daughter of hismaster? Yet, after all he had done, and proposed to do, this harshjudgment upon him seemed cruel. He saw the two looking at the boat hehad built. He marked the flush of hope on the cheek of the poor lady,and the full-blown authority that already hardened the eye of MauriceFrere, and all at once he understood the result of what he had done. Hehad, by his own act, given himself again to bondage. As long as escapewas impracticable, he had been useful, and even powerful. Now he hadpointed out the way of escape, he had sunk into the beast of burden onceagain. In the desert he was "Mr." Dawes, the saviour; in civilized lifehe would become once more Rufus Dawes, the ruffian, the prisoner, theabsconder. He stood mute, and let Frere point out the excellences of thecraft in silence; and then, feeling that the few words of thanks utteredby the lady were chilled by her consciousness of the ill-advised freedomhe had taken with the child, he turned on his heel, and strode up intothe bush.

  "A queer fellow," said Frere, as Mrs. Vickers followed the retreatingfigure with her eyes. "Always in an ill temper." "Poor man! He hasbehaved very kindly to us," said Mrs. Vickers. Yet even she felt thechange of circumstance, and knew that, without any reason she couldname, her blind trust and hope in the convict who had saved their liveshad been transformed into a patronizing kindliness which was quiteforeign to esteem or affection.

  "Come, let us have some supper," says Frere. "The last we shall eathere, I hope. He will come back when his fit of sulks is over."

  But he did not come back, and, after a few expressions of wonder at hisabsence, Mrs. Vickers and her daughter, rapt in the hopes and fearsof the morrow, almost forgot that he had left them. With marvellouscredulity they looked upon the terrible stake they were about toplay for as already won. The possession of the boat seemed to them sowonderful, that the perils of the voyage they were to make in it werealtogether lost sight of. As for Maurice Frere, he was rejoiced thatthe convict was out of the way. He wished that he was out of the wayaltogether.

  CHAPTER XVI. THE WRITING ON THE SAND.