Philip Van Doren Stern (ed) (235 page)

Meanwhile,
he
noticed
one
or
two
curious
facts.
His
clothes,
after eight
weeks'
rough
living,
were
almost
as
good
as
new.
It
was
no longer
necessary
for
him
to
shave
more
than
once
a
week.
And,
once, Judd,
climbing
a
palm
in
search
of
coco-nuts,
had
slipped,
crashing on
his
head
to
what
seemed
certain
death
fifty
feet
below
and
had been
picked
up
suffering
from
nothing
worse
than
slight
concussion. This
accident
shook
his
faith
more
than
anything
else
that
he
saw.

They
lived
comfortably
enough
on
fish,
home-baked
bread,
fruit, coco-nuts,
and
the
flesh
of
young
pigs
found
in
tire
jungle.
Patterson learned
to
shoot
with
a
bow
and
arrow,
and
to
tell
the
time
by
the sun
and
stars.
He
learned
to
be
patient
with
Heywood,
who
was
halfwitted,
and
he
learned
to
search
for
turtles'
eggs
in
a
temperature
of ninety-nine
in
the
shade.
He
learned,
too,
to
treat
Captain
Thunder with
respect
and
Doña
Inés
with
formality.

Sometimes,
the
Captain,
a
reserved,
sour-tempered
man,
would unbend,
and,
fingering
his
cutlass,
tell
stories
of
his
life
as
a
buccaneer on
the
Spanish
Main.
Terrible
stories,
these,
vile,
filthy,
sadistic
stories of
murder
and
vice,
plunder
and
torture,
and
fiendish,
cold-blooded, ferocious
revenge.
Told
in
his
drawling,
affected
voice,
they
became nauseous,
and
yet
Doña
Inés
listened
peacefully
enough,
her
dark eyes
soft
and
velvety,
her
red,
silken
mouth
calmer
than
an
angel's. Sometimes
she
would
look
up
and
nod,
and
say:

"Oh,
yes,
Micah;
I
remember
that,
don't
I?
I
was
with
you
then, wasn't
I?"

"You
were,
my
dove,
my
heart.
If
you
remember,
I
burnt
your
hand in
the
flame
of
my
candle
until
you
swooned,
because
you
affronted me
by
asking
mercy
for
those
dogs."

And
she
would
laugh.

'1
was
foolish,
was
I
not,
Micah?
For
what
did
it
matter?"

Patterson,
loathing
these
conversations,
was,
nevertheless,
forced to
listen
because
at
night
there
was
really
nothing
else
to
do.
Always before
in
his
life
he
had
accepted
books
without
question
as
being quite
naturally
part
of
his
life;
now
that
he
had
none,
the
lack
of
them appalled
him.
He
tried
to
write,
scratching
a
diary
on
strips
of
bark, but
the
effort
was
not
successful.
Nor
did
his
companions
do
much to
ameliorate
the
loneliness
of
his
situation.
He
preferred
Judd
to the
others
because
Judd
was
young
and
gay,
and
comparatively
untouched
by
the
sinister,
dragging
life
of
the
island,
yet
there
were times
when
even
Judd
seemed
to
withdraw
himself,
to
become
watchful,
remote,
secretive.
Patterson
learned
to
recognize
these
as
the
interludes
when
his
friend,
pitifully
afraid,
thought
in
a
panic
of
the future
that
lay
ahead
for
him.

Heywood
was
sulky
and
monosyllabic.
The
Captain,
so
cynical
and depraved,
with
his
vicious
mind,
his
giggle,
and
his
will
of
iron,
had revolted
Patterson
from
the
first.
Only
Doña
Inés,
with
her
vivid
face and
her
beautiful,
empty,
animal
mind,
seemed
to
him
restful
and gracious,
like
some
handsome,
well-behaved
child,
in
this
crazy
world of
sunshine
and
plenty
and
despair.
For
this
reason
she
began
to haunt
him
at
night,
so
that
he
was
unable
to
sleep,
and
he
longed, not
so
much
to
make
love
to
her
as
to
rest
his
head
against
her
and to
feel
her
cool
hand
upon
his
forehead,
soothing
him,
that
he
might forget
for
a
few
hours.
But
Doña
Inés
was
watched
so
carefully
that it
seemed
impossible
to
speak
to
her
alone.