war canoes.
Despite this, the young husband, Captain Watson had set up his home on Dolphin Island.
His business was collecting and selling sea cucumbers, or
běche-de-mer
, the ugly, sausagelike creatures that crawled sluggishly in every coral pool. The
Chinese paid high prices for the dried skins, which they valued for medical purposes.
Soon the island’s supplies of
běche-de-mer
were exhausted, and the Captain had to search farther and farther from home. He was
away in his small ship for weeks at a time, leaving his young wife to look after the
house and their newborn son, with the help of two Chinese servants.
It was while the Captain was away that the savages landed. They killed one of the
Chinese houseboys and seriously injured the other, before Mary Watson drove them off
with rifle and revolver. But she knew that they would return—and that her husband’s
ship would not be back for another month.
The situation was desperate, but Mary Watson was a brave and resourceful woman. She
decided to escape from the island, with the baby and the houseboy, in a small iron
tank used for boiling
běche-de-mer
, hoping to be picked up by one of the ships plying along the Reef.
She stocked her tiny, unstable craft with food and water, and paddled away from her
home. The houseboy was gravely injured and could give her little help, and her four-month-old
son must have needed constant attention. She had just one stroke of luck, without
which the voyage would not have lasted ten minutes: the sea was perfectly calm.
The next day they grounded on a neighboring reef and remained there for two days,
hoping to see a boat. But no ships came in sight, so they pushed off again and eventually
reached a small island, forty-two miles from their starting point.
And it was from this island that they saw a steamer going by, but no one on board
noticed Mrs. Watson frantically waving her baby’s shawl.
Now they had exhausted all their water, and there was none on the island. Yet they
survived another four days, slowly dying of thirst, hoping for rains that never came
and for ships that never appeared.
Three months later, quite by chance, a passing schooner sent men ashore to search
for food. Instead, they found the body of the Chinese cook, and, hidden in the undergrowth,
the iron tank. Huddled inside it was Mary Watson, with her baby son still in her arms.
And beside her was the log of the eight-day voyage, which she had kept to the very
end.
“I’ve seen it in the Museum,” said Mick, very solemnly. “It’s on half a dozen sheets
of paper, torn out of a notebook. You can still read most of it, and I’ll never forget
the last entry. It just says: ‘No water—nearly dead with thirst.’”
For a long time, neither boy said anything. Then Johnny looked at the broken spoon
he was still holding. It was foolish, of course, but he
would
put it back, out of respect for Mary Watson’s gallant ghost. He could understand
the feelings of Mick and his people toward her memory. He wondered how often, on moonlit
nights, the more imaginative islanders did believe that they had seen a young woman
pushing an iron box out to sea….
Then another, and much more disturbing, thought suddenly struck him. He turned toward
Mick, wondering just how to put the question. But it was not necessary, for Mick answered
without prompting.
“I feel pretty bad about the whole thing,” he said, “even though it was such a long
time ago. You see, I know for a fact that my grandfather’s grandfather helped to eat
the other Chinaman.”
Chapter 14
Every day now, Johnny and Mick would go swimming with the two dolphins, trying to
find the limits of their intelligence and their cooperation. They now tolerated Mick
and would obey his requests when he was using the communicator, but they remained
unfriendly to him. Sometimes they would try to scare him, by charging him with teeth
showing, then
Despite this, the young husband, Captain Watson had set up his home on Dolphin Island.
His business was collecting and selling sea cucumbers, or
běche-de-mer
, the ugly, sausagelike creatures that crawled sluggishly in every coral pool. The
Chinese paid high prices for the dried skins, which they valued for medical purposes.
Soon the island’s supplies of
běche-de-mer
were exhausted, and the Captain had to search farther and farther from home. He was
away in his small ship for weeks at a time, leaving his young wife to look after the
house and their newborn son, with the help of two Chinese servants.
It was while the Captain was away that the savages landed. They killed one of the
Chinese houseboys and seriously injured the other, before Mary Watson drove them off
with rifle and revolver. But she knew that they would return—and that her husband’s
ship would not be back for another month.
The situation was desperate, but Mary Watson was a brave and resourceful woman. She
decided to escape from the island, with the baby and the houseboy, in a small iron
tank used for boiling
běche-de-mer
, hoping to be picked up by one of the ships plying along the Reef.
She stocked her tiny, unstable craft with food and water, and paddled away from her
home. The houseboy was gravely injured and could give her little help, and her four-month-old
son must have needed constant attention. She had just one stroke of luck, without
which the voyage would not have lasted ten minutes: the sea was perfectly calm.
The next day they grounded on a neighboring reef and remained there for two days,
hoping to see a boat. But no ships came in sight, so they pushed off again and eventually
reached a small island, forty-two miles from their starting point.
And it was from this island that they saw a steamer going by, but no one on board
noticed Mrs. Watson frantically waving her baby’s shawl.
Now they had exhausted all their water, and there was none on the island. Yet they
survived another four days, slowly dying of thirst, hoping for rains that never came
and for ships that never appeared.
Three months later, quite by chance, a passing schooner sent men ashore to search
for food. Instead, they found the body of the Chinese cook, and, hidden in the undergrowth,
the iron tank. Huddled inside it was Mary Watson, with her baby son still in her arms.
And beside her was the log of the eight-day voyage, which she had kept to the very
end.
“I’ve seen it in the Museum,” said Mick, very solemnly. “It’s on half a dozen sheets
of paper, torn out of a notebook. You can still read most of it, and I’ll never forget
the last entry. It just says: ‘No water—nearly dead with thirst.’”
For a long time, neither boy said anything. Then Johnny looked at the broken spoon
he was still holding. It was foolish, of course, but he
would
put it back, out of respect for Mary Watson’s gallant ghost. He could understand
the feelings of Mick and his people toward her memory. He wondered how often, on moonlit
nights, the more imaginative islanders did believe that they had seen a young woman
pushing an iron box out to sea….
Then another, and much more disturbing, thought suddenly struck him. He turned toward
Mick, wondering just how to put the question. But it was not necessary, for Mick answered
without prompting.
“I feel pretty bad about the whole thing,” he said, “even though it was such a long
time ago. You see, I know for a fact that my grandfather’s grandfather helped to eat
the other Chinaman.”
Chapter 14
Every day now, Johnny and Mick would go swimming with the two dolphins, trying to
find the limits of their intelligence and their cooperation. They now tolerated Mick
and would obey his requests when he was using the communicator, but they remained
unfriendly to him. Sometimes they would try to scare him, by charging him with teeth
showing, then
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