"Hurray!" cried Tommy. "What is it, Bess?"
"It"s just this. We must act as if we were going to stay on this island for ever."
Tommy gasped, and a look of dismay came into her eyes.
"Don"t you think we"ll be rescued, then?" she asked.
"Oh, I don"t give up hope. We may be seen from a ship any day, or Uncle may come for us; but we can"t depend on it. Plenty of men and boys have been shipwrecked like us on a lonely island, and have managed to shift for themselves. Why shouldn"t we? We"re used to outdoor work: at least, _I_ am, and it would be an odd thing if we couldn"t manage to make ourselves comfortable on an island like this, with half our work already done for us."
"What do you mean?" asked Mary.
"Why, if you"re right about there being plenty of fruit--and I don"t see why you shouldn"t be--we shan"t have to grow our food, and that"s the chief thing. So we shall have more time for other things. The first thing is to see just what we"ve got. Here"s mine."
She turned out her pocket, and displayed two handkerchiefs, a thimble, a small whistle and her jack-knife.
"That"s not a great deal," she said, smiling. "Now, Mary."
"There"s my knife, and a hanky, and my little pen-knife, and hurray! my housewife."
And as she suddenly remembered that on the night before the storm she had been mending her uncle"s clothes, the recollection almost moved her to tears.
"I"ve got the most," said Tommy, with a laugh. "Look here--scissors, hanky, some bits of string, my match-box, jack-knife, picture postcard of an aeroplane--wish we had an aeroplane!--and----"
She had unfolded a much-worn sc.r.a.p of paper; now she folded it again and replaced it in her pocket.
"What is it?" asked Elizabeth.
"It"s only that stupid old receipt for b.u.t.terscotch: no good to us here."
They all smiled.
"Well, we can"t boast of much in the way of personal possessions," said Elizabeth; "but we have the boat, two oars, a boat-hook, the painter, a few cups and things, my string bag, that"s a lucky find--and our macintoshes. More than Crusoe had."
"Not so much, Bess," said Mary. "You don"t remember. I always think Crusoe was jolly lucky."
"I dare say you are right. Well, we"ve taken stock. That"s one good thing done. Now what do you say to building a hut?"
"What! With scissors and knives?" asked Mary.
"You"ll see. We ought to try, I think. The weather is lovely now, but I shouldn"t care about sleeping in the boat in a rainstorm, even under a macintosh. And you know how it rains in these tropical parts."
"It"ll be great fun," said Tommy, "but I don"t see how it"s to be done."
"We"ll have to cut down some saplings with our jack-knives. I don"t quite see myself what we shall do next, but that will be a start, anyway, and I dare say ideas will come as we go along."
"That doesn"t sound much like an architect," said Tommy, "but let"s try. It will give us something to do and keep us from getting catty."
Elizabeth smiled as she saw her intentions thus realized.
"We must choose our site," she said. "Surveying, don"t they call it?"
"All settlements are made near running water," said Mary, "so it ought to be near the stream."
They followed with their eyes the course of the bright little stream as it flowed out of the woodland down to the sh.o.r.e. There was no suitable spot for the hut near at hand, and to find one involved going farther than they had yet ventured to go. But having now a definite object in view they found themselves a little more courageous, and springing up they set off along the bank of the stream towards the higher ground.
They walked cautiously and in silence, looking about them with wide-open eyes, ready to flee at the slightest alarming sight or sound.
Suddenly Tommy said in a whisper--
"Here! this is the very place."
She indicated a gra.s.sy knoll some ten or twelve feet above the bed of the stream. The girls stopped at its edge and looked at it. On the inland side it was fringed with a row of small trees; seaward the view was uninterrupted.
"It looks nice," said Mary. "Let"s measure it."
Elizabeth, being the tallest, stepped the gra.s.sy plot from end to end and from side to side.
"I make it about twenty feet by sixteen," she said, "just about the size of our dining-room at home. I think it will do splendidly.
There"s water close at hand; there are plenty of saplings in the woods beyond; and the hillside will protect us from storms, unless they come from the sea."
"And what a lovely outlook it has!" said Mary, turning towards the sea.
"We couldn"t have a nicer place."
"Then we will fix on it," said Elizabeth. "Now who"s to be architect?"
"Oh, you, Bess!" said Tommy; "we"re no good at that."
"I"m afraid I"m not either," said Elizabeth, laughing. "But I suppose we ought to put up some posts for the walls, and weave rushes and things between them. Anyway, the first thing is to cut down some stout saplings that will be strong enough."
"Well, there are plenty in the woods; quite close too," said Tommy.
"But how can we cut them down?" asked Mary; "we haven"t axes or saws."
"We have our knives, though," said Tommy. "Come on, let"s begin."
They went into the wood, where the trees at the edge were not at all dense, and selected several saplings of about the same height and thickness. Then each dropped on her knees before one of the saplings, scratched a circular line on the bark and began to hack away at this with the knife. For some time nothing was heard but the slight sounds made by the knives; each girl worked hard as though engaged in a compet.i.tion. But presently Tommy straightened her back, and uttered a sort of sighing grunt.
"How are you getting on?" asked Elizabeth, without desisting from her task.
"All right," cried Tommy, stooping and setting to work furiously.
"They shan"t beat me," she said to herself.
But in a few minutes Mary gave a plaintive little exclamation, dropped her knife, and rubbed her right hand with her left.
"You"re _soon_ tired," said Tommy, working harder than ever.
"I think my tree must be a specially tough one," said Mary. "I don"t seem to make much impression, and my wrist does ache so."
"Take a rest, dear," said Elizabeth. "Shouldn"t we get on better if two worked at the same tree while the other rested? We could take it in turns. When we have cut down the first, we shall have something to show for our work."
"A good idea!" said Tommy, springing up and running to Elizabeth"s tree. "You take first spell off, Mary."