Whiz! Away it went, bend first, and rose against the wind till the impetus ceased, when it hung a moment on the air, and slid to the right, falling near the summer-house. Next time it turned to the left, and fell in the hedge; another time it hit the hay-rick: nothing could make it go straight. Mark tried his hardest, and used it both ways, but in vain--the boomerang rose against the wind, and, so far, acted properly, but directly the force with which it was thrown was exhausted, it did as it liked, and swept round to the left or the right, and never once returned to their feet.
"A boomerang is a stupid thing," said Bevis, "I shall chop it up. I hate it."
"No; put it upstairs," said Mark, taking it from him. So the boomerang was added to the collection in the bench-room. A crossbow was the next thing, and they made the stock from a stout elder branch, because when the pith was taken out, it left a groove for the bolt to slide up. The bow was a thick briar, and the bolt flew thirty or forty yards, but it did not answer, and they could hit nothing with it. A crossbow requires delicate adjustment, and to act well, must be made almost as accurately as a rifle.
They shot a hundred times at the sparrows on the roof, who were no sooner driven off than they came back like flies, but never hit one; so the crossbow was hung up with the boomerang. Bevis, from much practice, could shoot far better than that with his bow and arrow. He stuck up an apple on a stick, and after six or seven trials. .h.i.t it at twenty yards.
He could always. .h.i.t a tree. Mark was afraid to throw his bone-headed harpoon at a tree, lest the head should break off; but he had another, without a bone head, to cast; and he too could generally hit a tree.
"Now we are quite savages," said Bevis, one evening, as they sat up in the bench-room, and the sun went down red and fiery, opposite the little window, filling the room with a red glow and gleaming on their faces.
It put a touch of colour on the pears, which were growing large, just outside the window, as if they were ripe towards the sunset. The boomerang on the wall was lit up with the light; so was a parcel of canvas, on the floor, which they had bought at Latten town, for the sails of their ship.
There was an oyster barrel under the bench, which was to contain the fresh water for their voyage, and there had been much discussion as to how they were to put a new head to it.
"We ought to see ourselves on the sh.o.r.e with spears and things when we are sailing round," said Mark.
"So as not to be able to land for fear."
"Poisoned arrows," said Mark. "I say, how stupid! we have not got any poison."
"No more we have. We must get a lot of poison."
"Curious plants n.o.body knows anything about but us."
"n.o.body ever heard of them."
"And dip our arrows and spear"s in the juice."
"No one ever gets well after being shot with them."
"If the wind blows hard ash.o.r.e and there are no harbours it will be awful with the savages all along waiting for us."
"We shall see them dancing and shouting with bows and throw-sticks, and yelling."
"That"s you and me."
"Of course. And very likely if the wind is very hard we shall have to let down the sails, and fling out an anchor and stay till the gale goes down."
"The anchor may drag."
"Then we shall crash on the rocks."
"And swim ash.o.r.e."
"You can"t. There"s the breakers and the savages behind them. I shall stop on the wreck, and the sun will go down."
"Red like that," pointing out of window.
"And it will blow harder still."
"Black as pitch."
"Horrible."
"No help."
"Fire a gun."
"Pooh!"
"Make a raft."
"The clouds are sure to break, or something."
"I say," said Bevis, "won"t all these things,"--pointing to the weapons--"do first-rate for our war?"
"Capital. There will be arrows sticking up everywhere all over the battle-field."
"Broken lances and horses without riders."
"Dints in the ground."
"Knights with their backs against trees and heaps of soldiers chopping at them."
"Flashing swords! the ground will shake when we charge."
"Trumpets!"
"Groans!"
"Gra.s.s all red!"
"Blood-red sun like that!" The disc growing larger as it neared the horizon, shone vast through some distant elms.
"Flocks of crows."
"Heaps of white bones."
"And we will take the shovels and make a tumulus by the sh.o.r.e."
The red glow on the wall slowly dimmed, the colour left the pear, and the song of a thrush came from the orchard.
"I want to make some magic," said Bevis, after a pause. "The thing is to make a wand."
"Genii are best," said Mark. "They do anything you tell them."
"There ought to be a black book telling you how to do it somewhere,"
said Bevis; "but I"ve looked through the bookcase and there"s nothing."