And then Tish spoke.
“If you could catch it around the middle you might get rid of it, Lizzie. We really should go back for Aggie.”
“Catch it!” I said, from the roof of the cabin. “It doesn’t stay long enough in one place for me to see it.”
“You could stun it with something.”
“It didn’t stun it perceptibly to go through the bottom of a boat,” I said bitterly. “Well, you’ve got your fish. You’ve learned something about the depths of the sea, and what are you going to do about it?”
All this had taken some little time, but at that moment the fish took another jump and went overboard, and I was enabled to untie Tish. She at once took charge, but what was our horror to find that the miserable creature had broken the tiller rope, and that our boat was completely unmanageable! Also, we had no idea where we were. It was in vain that Tish stopped the engine and called into the darkness. There was no sound whatever from Aggie, and to make matters worse the night was now inky black.
It was indeed a tragic situation, and to add to our anxiety our gasoline was running low. We spoke in low voices of our poor Aggie drifting hither and yon at the mercy of the tides, and Tish, a kindly soul, even spoke well of the Monster.
“He was the victim of an obsession, Lizzie,” she said. “And of course it is possible that he could swim. In that case—”
It was a dreary night, nor did dawn reveal a cheerful prospect. The tide had carried us far into the Gulf, and it was her fear that it had done the same thing with Aggie.
“Bottles placed in the Gulf Stream down here,” she said, “are frequently picked up along the shores of Newfoundland.”
At last we saw land to the east, a number of islands, and were able with the last of our gasoline to reach one of them. Never can I depict the depression of that landing, or of the thought that years later our dear comrade might be washed ashore on some forsaken spot along the Atlantic coast.
But it is not like Tish to despair, and finding that we had one rod remaining, she at once set about fishing for our breakfast, using the fiddler crabs which covered the beach. She had just brought in a fair-sized sheepshead—a very succulent fish—and I was building a fire, when we heard violent sneezing down the beach and looked up to see Aggie, alive and in the flesh, gazing toward us. She was still wearing her life belt, and as she approached we saw that her usual friendly manner had changed.
“Aggie!” I said. “How did you get here?”
“I just drifted id,” she said. “And do thaks to either ob you. To throw be overboard ad thed abadod be. I did’dt thik it of either of you.”
Tish had been eying her.
“Nobody abandoned you,” she said. “But you look abandoned, all right. Where’s your skirt?”
And it was then that Aggie burst into tears.
“A shark took it,” she said, and collapsed onto the beach.
Well, she had really had a difficult time and had taken a bad cold into the bargain. She had floated around for some time, but she had got her chest full of water and couldn’t call out. She heard the Monster swearing frightfully, and at last she heard him swimming, but then everything was quiet. The tarpon bothered her considerably, she said, because they took to jumping all around her and rather knocking her about. But she was really all right until some large fish, she thought a shark, took hold of her skirt and made off with it.
They had gone quite a distance before she managed to unfasten her skirt, but after that things were simpler. She found she was close to land, and at dawn she had succeeded, by using her arms as oars, in rowing herself in.
“But I wadt sobe tea,” she said tearfully. “Sobe hot tea ad toast ad a boiled egg, Tish. I’be cold, ad I’be puckered. Look at be.”
And this was true. Owing to her long immersion in the water her skin was in a wrinkled condition, like a laundress’ hands.
I began at once to fry the fish, for luckily our cooking implements, some sugar, salt and pepper and a jar of salad dressing, had been in the cabin and been saved. But it was sad to watch Aggie when we admitted that we had no gasoline, and were marooned on the island for an indefinite period. Sadder still to admit that our food was gone, and that there were no eggs and no tea.
“Of all the idiotic thigs!” she said angrily. “You might have sat od the food box, Lizzie. If I’be to be drowed all dight ad starved all day—”
Then she stopped and stared up the beach.
“It’s hib!” she said. “The Bodster!” And as she was practically unclothed she had merely time to cover her lower limbs with sand before he was on us.
He was in a towering rage, and he looked very queer. He had no coat and no shoes, and his necktie was hanging in a wet string around his neck. He was shouting at us long before he reached us, and he fixed on Tish at once.
“You—you menace!” he bellowed. “Look at me! Look at your work. I’ve lost my watch. I’ve lost my coat. I’ve lost my pipe and my tobacco. I’ve lost my boat and my fish and a thousand dollars on a bet; and I’ve d——d near lost my life. Killing’s too good for you. Torture! Torture’s what you need.”
He stopped there for breath, and suddenly he saw the fish frying on the fire. That seemed to incense him still further.
“I’ll have you jailed,” he said in a choking voice. “You can all go to jail and rot. You not only leave me to drown; you come here and have a picnic on the strength of it. Well, go on and picnic! I’m going home.”
And with that he waded out into the water and crawled into the boat.
“Now see how you like it,” he shouted. “Maybe I’ll send back for you someday, and maybe I won’t. Probably not. I’ve got a bad memory.”
And with that he tried to start the engine.
He worked over it for twenty minutes, without result, but Tish merely ignored him. We were already eating our frugal breakfast when at last he came ashore. He had the good taste to pass us by and go on, but he took a good look at the food, and I am certain that he hesitated.
“You’ll hear from me later,” he said, and disappeared along the beach.
We were all more cheerful after we had eaten, and Tish pointed out the advantages of our position.
“We have a case of bottled water,” she said, “and if Charlie Sands is correct, there should be plenty of eggs buried along the shore. Also, as we shall need a balanced ration, the heart of a palm tree will provide an excellent salad, for which we have the dressing already prepared. Also we possess an ax to cut down the tree. Sorry as I am to destroy any tree, in this case the end must justify the means. We shall also have coconuts, as I observe a number of them over our heads.”
“Exactly,” said Aggie. “Over our heads. If you thik I’b goig to clibe ode of those trees, Tish Carberry—”
Tish eyed the tree in question thoroughly.
“With coconut milk and eggs, we could have custard,” she said. “There is sugar on the boat, and a bottle of vanilla extract. And if I am not mistaken, there is an oyster bar out there. Oysters, fish, salad, and dessert—no, we shall not starve, Aggie.”
The breakfast had heartened all of us, and as the warm sun came out even Aggie looked less puckered. But she missed her skirt horribly, and as she was threatened with severe sunburn, spent most of the morning in the water once more, standing there rather pathetically, waist-deep. It was not possible to seek shelter in the interior of the island, as we had early discovered that everything in it jagged, including the grass.
Later in the morning Tish and I made a tour of the island, Tish looking for various food possibilities and I watching for a boat that might rescue us. This last was but a faint hope, and it faded when at last, seeing a fishing boat, I waved wildly to it and the fisherman merely waved back cheerfully.
Curiously enough, we saw nothing of the Monster. But this was explained when on our return we found no sign whatever of Aggie, and that the Monster was seated by the remains of our fire, with his head in his hands.
“Great heavens!�
� Tish gasped. “He’s done away with her.”
But his expression as we approached was far from bloodthirsty. He looked up at us, and he was as dejected and sorry an object as I have ever laid eyes on.
“Look here,” he said hollowly. “Maybe I’ve been a little hasty. Anyhow, you people have got to give me some decent water. You’ve got some locked up in that boat.”
“There’s water on the island,” Tish said coldly.
“That pond’s full of wigglers, madam.”
“Then strain it.”
“Strain it? With what? I haven’t even got a handkerchief. Am I to strain it through the seat of my trousers?”
“You needn’t be vulgar,” Tish reproved him. “For that matter, a few wigglers won’t hurt you. And now I’ll ask you to move on. We are only three weak women. You will have to shift for yourself.”
“Shift for myself! Who brought me to this?” he said furiously. “And three weak women! Good God, madam, if you’d been any weaker I’d not be alive this minute. I warn you, I’m desperate. I’m not safe. I need food and water, and I’m ready to break open that boat to get them.”
“Give him the keys, Lizzie. You will find there,” she said to him, “some sugar, salt and pepper, salad dressing, and vanilla extract.”
“Vanilla extract!” he groaned. “Yes, you’d be sure to have vanilla extract! What the devil am I to do with vanilla extract? I tell you, I need food.”
But Tish merely observed that the island was full of food and that he would better move on. We were about to get dinner. He stared at us queerly and got up.
“Very well,” he said. “I’ll move on, all right. I’ll feel safer alone. There’s an alligator on the other side of the island, and I’d rather have him for company anyhow.”
Before he left he asked humbly enough for a few matches.
“For what?” Tish demanded.
“To light a fire, madam. A fire’s cheerful. James and I would enjoy a fire. James is the alligator. For warmth only, of course. We have nothing to cook.”
All this had taken some time, and when he had gone our poor Aggie emerged from the undergrowth as if she had been fired out of a gun. She said she had at last found a tree trunk to sit on, and being weary after her night’s exertion, had dozed lightly. When she wakened a large rattlesnake was sleeping on the tree trunk beside her, and for some time she had not dared to move.
She was quite tremulous, and while Tish and I prepared our midday meal she interred herself once more in the sand and was fairly comfortable, although she complained that a number of small fiddler crabs, appreciating the warmth of her body, were cuddling against her.
Luncheon, always a light meal with us, consisted largely of the delicious stone crabs which were buried along a certain mangrove bank. These Tish brought in, and when boiled and cooled the claws with a French dressing made a delightful meal, and afterward Tish and I left the camp to find if possible a coconut or two on the ground.
We were gone for some hours, and I blame ourselves rather than Aggie for what happened. As we have repeatedly explained to Charlie Sands, Aggie’s situation was desperate. Not only did she feel indecent, but what with mosquitoes and sunburn her lower limbs were in a highly painful condition. As a matter of fact, the Monster was left in no worse condition than hers had been.
It happened as follows:
Tish and I were returning, when we saw a strange figure on the beach. It was not the Monster, being much shorter, but it wore trousers, and Tish at once said that we were saved.
“They have found us, Lizzie,” she said. “There is a boy, coming to get us.”
But I was not so certain. There was something familiar about the walk, and in truth it turned out to be Aggie, clad in the Monster’s trousers.
“Aggie!” Tish said sternly. “If you have made friends with that Monster, that wretch, that unspeakable individual, then—”
But Aggie, who had been sneezing violently with excitement, shook her head.
“Hardly freds, Tish,” she said. “He’s too far out to hear much, but sobe of the thigs he’s called be are terrible.”
“Out where?”
“Od the oyster bar.” Well, it appears that hardly had we started than the Monster appeared again, and Aggie had to retire into the bushes. This time, however, she escaped snakes by climbing a tree, and from there she saw all that happened.
The Monster dug around our ashes and finding the shells of the claws, began to examine them feverishly. But he found nothing, and he then sat down and stared fixedly out to sea. After a time he apparently noticed the oyster bar, and in a moment and to her consternation he was taking off his trousers. Clad thus, in his fishing shirt and underwear, he at once waded out to the bar, and began to detach oysters and breaking them open, to eat them in great numbers. Now and then he looked back at the beach, but as he saw no one he must have felt safe.
But Aggie was struggling against temptation. There on the sand in full view lay protection for her lower limbs, lay warmth at night and decency by day; and at last she succumbed.
Tish was thoughtful during this recital.
“I see no objection,” she said at last, “to an equal distribution; to a day-about arrangement, for example. You have them one day and he the next. If he has any sense of fairness whatever he will agree. After all, you are a woman. Where is he?”
“He’s still od the bar, ad the tide is cobig id.”
This proved to be accurate. Indeed, when after spending some time looking for a palm tree which would be available for salad, we reached our camp again, only his head was above water. But he could still speak. Never in my life, before or since, have I heard such language. Aggie stood with her hands in his pockets, and gazed out at him.
“He cad swib,” she said. “It’s only false pride, Tish. He’d let be go about exposed id a bathig suit, but he’s too proud to be seed id his shirt. He’s got udderwear too, which I hadd’t.”
Well, the tide was still coming in, and finally he did swim to shore, landing at some distance away on a point. There he stood for some time, shaking his fists at us and apparently jumping up and down; but at last he turned and went away, and we were left to peace and a beautiful sunset.
With the coconut milk and some turtle eggs which we found buried in the sand I was able to prepare a very fair omelet for dinner, serving it in the large shells which were scattered over the beach; and as Tish had managed to cut down a young palm, Aggie chilled a salad dressing for it in the sea. Also by grating the coconut into some of its own milk we had a truly delicious drink. Thus fed and comfortable, we slept very well.
But as I have said, coconut gives me indigestion, and toward daybreak it roused me. The night had turned cold, and there was quite a wind. I sat up, and in the starlight I saw a strange and desperate figure. It was bending over Aggie!
With a shriek I roused the others, and the figure quickly departed. We felt, however, that it was not fair to Aggie to sleep again, and we kept watch until morning.
The next two days passed without incident. Our diet, although monotonous, was plentiful, and was varied by a school of mackerel which came in close to shore. With her usual consideration, however, Tish insisted that we leave the beach each afternoon, to allow the Monster to reach the oyster bar, and also was careful to leave the salt and pepper where he could see them.
It was on the third day, I believe, that he seemed to tire of the oysters. Returning a little earlier than usual, we were in time to see him reach the bar and stand there for some time, looking down at the oysters. He seemed to shake his head in a melancholy manner, and then he turned and waded back without touching any of them.
Tish, observing him narrowly, commented on the fact that this process was carried through in silence.
“He is growing gentler,” she observed. “He no longer leaps and shouts. In a few hours he will be open to negotiations.”
The nature of the negotiations she did not divulge, but I desire to call attention to the shr
ewdness of that prophecy. It was indeed but a few hours; at the time of our evening meal, in fact.
We were eating an excellent supper at the time, and his voice, when it came, showed that he was sheltered in underbrush behind us.
“Ladies,” he said, “things being as they are, I must ask you not to look around. But I have come to appeal to your better natures. I shall not mention the affair of my trousers. It is a delicate matter. But I have come to speak of food. I find that I am surfeited, fed up, with oysters. Today it was all I could do to face that bar. Once I was fond of oysters, but that is gone. Gone forever.”
He seemed to shudder, and Aggie looked at me pitifully. She is very sympathetic. But Tish was uncompromising.
“Lizzie, I’ll have a little more of the boiled mackerel,” she said, and proceeded to eat it calmly.
“It’s like this,” he went on in a plaintive voice. “I apologize for everything. Only don’t ask me to face that oyster bar again.”
“It’s your stomach that speaks, not your heart,” said Tish firmly.
He seemed to be surprised at that.
“My heart?” he inquired. “What’s my heart got to do with it? You don’t expect me to be sorry for those d——d oysters, do you?”
And then Tish told him certain uncomplimentary truths.
“You’ve been a violent man all your life, probably,” she said. “A nuisance and a pest. It is likely that you have had money, and that your employees cringe when they confront you. Aggie, I’ll have the salad now, please. Yes, undoubtedly they hate you as well as fear you. And you’re a bully; your own daughter—”
“What do you know about my daughter?” he asked in amazement.
“Enough. I know that she is in love, and that you have thwarted that love. Your conduct has indeed been brutal. She is brokenhearted.”
He was silent for a moment or so, and I remember now that he seemed almost too astonished to speak.
“In love?” he said at last. “Are you sure of that?”
“She has told me so.”
“Curious,” he observed. “I didn’t know you knew her. I thought the young man—but never mind about that. I don’t suppose you intend to starve me to death as well as steal my pants because my daughter’s in love?”
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