The Man who Missed the War (25 page)

Gloria caught the sound too and turned a white face towards him. ‘What’s that?’ she asked sharply, although she already knew.

‘It’s some more of those beastly crabs,’ he said, striving to keep out of his voice the uneasiness he was feeling. ‘They won’t do us any harm. It’s the food they’re after. I think we’d better move camp further inland.’

Collecting their things as quickly as they could they trudged up the slope to the top of the nearest sand-dune and, before bothering to re-erect the tent, sat down to finish their meal.

To their annoyance and alarm the respite proved to be a brief one. Within ten minutes of their settling down the clicking sound, which Philip thought must be made by the knocking together of the crabs’ long shell-encased legs, came again from the seaward slope of the dune.

As Gloria stood up Philip signed to her to stay where she was, and grabbing a thick piece of wood that they used for the main strut of the tent he advanced to the brow of the hill. For the past
half-hour night had been coming down, and the rapidity with which it descends in the tropics had left just enough light for him to make out twenty or thirty of the creatures coming up the slope towards him.

The instant they saw him they halted with the precision of well-trained troops at a given word of command, but after a moment first one then another began to come forward again in little furtive rushes. Hoping to scare them off, Philip ran forward and slashed at the nearest of them with the thick stick he was carrying, but the brute dodged the blow with cat-like agility. Meantime the others had all halted once more, but as soon as he ceased his futile blows they came on again, passing out of range of his blows to either side of him.

‘Boy! Oh quickly! Help!’ came a cry from Gloria, and hurrying back to her he found that she was standing between the haversacks and that eight or ten of the crabs had formed a half-circle within four or five feet of her.

They were repulsive beasts, very much like great spiders, nearly a foot in height and considerably more across. Their bodies were small but their legs were long and very hairy, with sharp, dagger-pointed claws. As they crouched there, they remained quite still, except for their mouths which moved continually with a kind of slobbering twitching.

Rushing at them with his stick, Philip drove them from in front of Gloria, but only for them to form up in a series of furtive sidlings behind her, while another dozen or more came scrambling over the brow of the slope to fill the gap he had made. A few more minutes and they were completely encircled by a ring of thirty crabs at least, and others were still appearing out of the surrounding gloom.

‘We must go further inland,’ muttered Philip. ‘They won’t follow us there. They’re filthy-looking brutes but there’s nothing to be frightened of.’

Picking up his things he began to strike out at the crabs again, and they gave back as he moved forward; while Gloria, carrying the other haversack, followed close upon his heels. As they advanced the number of crabs in front of them decreased, but only to swell the ranks of those behind and on either side of them until there was no longer anything left to strike at, and
they were walking across the sand-dunes accompanied by a sickle-moon-shaped phalanx of the crabs that stopped when they stopped and advanced when they advanced, keeping in perfect time with them.

‘What—what’ll we do?’ whispered Gloria in a scared voice, after they had covered the best part of a mile. ‘I’m scared, Boy, and I’m tired. I’m so tired I could drop.’

‘I know. I’m tired, too,’ Philip agreed. ‘But I feel certain the brutes won’t go more than a certain distance from shore. D’you think you can make another mile?’

‘Yeah, I’ll make it somehow,’ she muttered.

They trudged on for a further twenty minutes, then Gloria suddenly pulled up short. ‘It doesn’t seem to be working out,’ she said, casting a frightened glance over her shoulder. ‘There’s just as many of them following us as ever.’

Philip halted beside her. ‘If we could go on walking away from the coast long enough I know we’d shake them off, but the trouble is that I daren’t go too far inland in case when we wake up tomorrow we find that we’re lost in the desert.’

‘A lot I’d care if only I could sit down some place where these things couldn’t get at me.’

‘They won’t attack us—it’s the food they’re after.’

‘Well, they’ll get it when we’re so tired that we just have to quit walking; an’ maybe they’ll go for us too, then.’

That was just what Philip had been thinking. He knew nothing of the habits of the African land-crab, but he remembered hearing stories of shipwrecked sailors having been attacked in their sleep and eaten by land-crabs in some of the Pacific islands.

‘Perhaps we’d better give them the food, then,’ he said after a moment, ‘but we haven’t got anything like enough loose food to satisfy this lot—nearly everything we’ve got is in tins.’

‘You’ll have to keep them off with your stick while I’ll be diggin’ a hole in each of the tins with the opener. If they can smell the food they’ll worry the tins with those long spikey claws until they’ve got out every morsel.’

‘That’s the idea, and the longer it takes them to get the food out the better. You realise though that if we give these devils all our food we’ll never be able to reach Kedda without
assistance? Neither of us is up to marching a hundred miles on nothing but water.’

‘Sure; but we could go on for another day and maybe we’d come upon a village.’

The crabs had now formed a thick, rustling, clicking circle round them, and it seemed to undulate with a peculiar life of its own as Philip lunged forward with his stick.

Without more ado they set down the packs and, while Gloria crouched at Philip’s feet, fear lending speed and strength to her fingers as she jabbed the opener into tin after tin, he moved round and round her, swiping at the more daring of the brutes as they pressed forward, and throwing out each of the tins as she handed them to him at the spot where the crush of crabs seemed densest.

As they worked he talked all the time, partly with the idea of trying to keep Gloria’s mind occupied and partly to sort out his own thoughts as to what was the best thing to do. His conclusion was that as soon as most of the crabs were occupied they should break out of the ring with any food they had left. But the problem was: which way to run? He decided, since they had no idea how far the crabs might follow them inland, that it would be best to get back to the beach. Land-crabs, he believed, did not go into the sea; so, if necessary, they could throw them off by wading out into the shallow water.

The starlight was now sufficiently bright for them to see the results of their appeasement measure. Each thing they had thrown out was instantly pounced upon by a number of the crabs, but apparently the brutes were endowed with sufficient intelligence to realise that there was more stuff in the knapsacks, and the bulk of them seemed content to wait until something was thrown near enough for them to be fairly sure of getting at it before it was submerged under the hard, hairy bodies of some of their companions. In consequence, Gloria had nearly used up her supplies before even half the crabs had been given something to occupy them.

As soon as Philip realised the situation he said: ‘Save what’s left and we’ll make a break for the beach. If they come after us we can throw the rest of the things out as we go, to delay them.’

‘Give me a minute now, to stab holes in the rest of the tins,’ said Gloria quickly. ‘Then, when I say the word, we’ll go.’

They managed the break-out as the crabs drew back immediately Philip began to thrash about with his big stick; but, as he had feared, all of them that were not busy eating came clicking and rustling on their heels.

For the first half-mile they ran, but within two minutes of dropping into a walk the crabs caught up with them, so they began to throw out the rest of their supplies. These were soon exhausted but provided them with a spell which enabled them to run on again. When next the crabs caught up with them Gloria started to throw all the other things out of her knapsack, regardless of their future value.

‘Steady on!’ cried Philip, as he saw one of their precious water containers crash on the scaly form of one of the great spider like creatures. ‘If you do that there’ll be no going on tomorrow.’

‘Who cares!’ she sobbed. ‘They’ll eat us if we can’t get clear. I know they will!’

Philip had an uneasy feeling that she was not just giving way to panic, but was right. The crabs might not be bold enough to attack them so long as they were able to remain on their feet, and put up a fight, but would do so the moment they sat down or showed any signs of exhaustion. Throwing out the food had greatly reduced their numbers, and a few more remained behind to tear at each of the things that Gloria was now sacrificing, so he began to follow her example.

By the time they reached the beach all their water bottles, utensils, torches and other impedimenta, including the two haversacks and the tent, had gone; but they were at least now free of their encumbrances and not more than a dozen crabs were still grimly sticking to the chase. For the past ten minutes they had been alternating between a fast walk and a jog-trot. Now, by making a final effort, they left the remaining crabs well behind and, after running a last quarter of a mile southward along the shore, turned west to splash out through the shallow water until it was up to their knees.

For the best part of an hour they stood there supporting themselves first on one foot and then on the other; miserable, dejected and so tired that they could have cried. Yet they did not dare to wade ashore.

A million stars twinkled brightly in the velvet sky overhead,
but their light was not enough to show the beach clearly at that distance, and many patches of shadow might be hiding groups of their repulsive and terrifying enemies. The only sound was the murmur of the great combers on a reef further out, on which the ceaseless Atlantic swell broke its force before lapping the foreshore. Every muscle of their bodies ached and their legs seemed about to fail under them. Their anger and despondency were further increased by the knowledge that they had had their journey for nothing. Having abandoned their water bottles they could not now go on the next day; instead, they were faced with a long and tiring trek back to the raft.

At last the moon came up, and its strong silvery light showed that many of the frightening patches of shadow on the beach were due only to inequalities in its surface. Cautiously, and still keeping a sharp lookout for the least movement, they splashed their way ashore; but nothing stirred, and, sighing with relief, they flung themselves down on the soft sand just above the tidemark.

Philip still feared that the crabs might reappear and attack them if they were both asleep, so he determined to remain on watch for as long as possible, but he made Gloria put her head in his lap. Almost at once she fell into the heavy slumber of exhaustion. He managed to keep his eyes open for another hour or so, but he was afraid to move in case he disturbed her, and having to remain still proved too much of a handicap for him as a sentry. His chin slumped on to his chest, and he gradually slipped forward until, without knowing anything about it, he was faintly snoring.

In spite of his fatigue, owing to his uncomfortable position he woke early, and, immediately he recalled that the day held for them a twenty-mile journey without food, water, or even shelter from the sun, he roused Gloria, so that they could make the most of the early morning hours. There was no breakfast for them to cook and no equipment to be packed, so, after washing their hands and faces in the sea to freshen themselves up, they set out to retrace their footsteps of the day before.

As they were now free of burdens they travelled much more comfortably and swiftly for the first part of the journey, but their troubles began soon after ten o’clock. With a power which now
seemed to increase every minute, the sun shone full in their faces, and in all that desolate landscape there was nowhere that offered shelter from its rays. When they felt they could no longer face it they took refuge for an hour in a dip behind the highest sand-dune they could find, lying flat in its bottom, but in less than an hour the sun had uncovered the whole hollow, and the sand round them became almost scorching to their touch. By midday the sea seemed to be the only place where they could get relief for their parched bodies, so they undressed and went in.

By contrast the water seemed, at first, ice-cold and made them gasp, but it refreshed them enormously as well as alleviating, to some extent, their thirst, which had been troubling them considerably for the past hour or more. After a little they fetched their hats and put them on, before sitting down in the shallows, submerged up to their necks; but even so they remained acutely uncomfortable until they judged that the worst of the day was over and came out to dress and resume their journey at about four o’clock.

The last half dozen miles were grim going, as, although both of them had had ample opportunity to get hardened to the sun during the past few weeks, they had never before had to remain exposed to it for a whole day; and its heat on the raft had always been greatly tempered by the surrounding water, whereas on land it not only scorched down from overhead but was also reflected upwards from the shimmering sand. Both of them knew that they had been badly sunburnt from the way their skins were hotting up, and the painful scorching set in long before they reached the raft.

At last, as they dragged their weary feet over a small promontory, the raft came into view. Philip silently thanked all his gods as it was now no longer an uncomfortable makeshift quarter which had been the means of saving their lives in a desperate situation. It was drink and food in abundance, shelter, cleanliness, comfort and all the amenities for which two castaways could reasonably ask. It was home, and something more even than that, because they both knew now that without it they would have been condemned to die of thirst and exposure to a merciless sun, becoming food for the crabs, perhaps even before death overtook them, on that grim and inhospitable shore.