Arthur Ransome - Swallows and Amazons (Complete Series)

“It can’t really be a canoe,” said John, interrupting his reading. “It’s a rowing boat. Canoes haven’t got transoms. They’re pointed at each end.”

“Their natives may have their own kind of canoes,” said Titty. “Not all natives have the same.”

John went on reading.

“EMBARK WITHOUT FEAR AND DROP DOWN THE RIVER TO THE LAGOON. YOU KNOW IT. THE ONE WHERE ROGER THOUGHT THERE WERE OCTOPUSES.”

“I knew they were flowers afterwards,” said Roger. “Water-lilies.”

“Don’t interrupt the captain,” said Titty. “Do go on.”

John read on.

“CROSS THE LAGOON, RUN THE WAR CANOE INTO THE RUSHES ON THE RIGHT BANK OF THE RIVER. LAND ONE SCOUT IN THE WOOD. LET HIM CREEP THROUGH THE WOOD, GIVE THE OWL CALL AND WAIT. TRAVEL LIGHT BUT WITH TWO DAYS’ FOOD AND BAGS FOR SLEEPING AT NIGHT. KANCHENJUNGA BECKONS. WE’VE GOT A ROPE. WE’RE HIDING THE WAR CANOE FOR YOU TO-NIGHT. BY THE OAK. YOU CAN’T MISS IT. DON’T BE SEEN BY THE NATIVES. PRETTY GOOD THE PARROT. HE ALWAYS CHEWS UP ARROWS IF THEY HAVE HIS FEATHERS IN THEM. DO NOT FAIL US.

CAPTAIN NANCY BLACKETT

MATE PEGGY BLACKETT

PRISONERS OF WAR. BUT NOT FOR LONG.

SWALLOWS AND AMAZONS FOR EVER!”

“Is that the end?” said Roger.

“That’s all,” said John.

The explorers looked at each other.

“Do you think it’s all right?” said Susan at last.

“Well, what could be wrong?” said John. “It’s all on dry land. There won’t be any night sailing. It doesn’t make any difference where we sleep so long as the able-seaman and the boy get to bed in proper time.” He knew at once what were the sort of questions that were bothering Susan.

The able-seaman and the boy listened breathlessly.

“Then there’s the milk,” said Susan. “It’s no good carrying two days’ milk with us, especially if it’s as hot as it’s been to-day.”

“There must be lots of farms in the valley of the Amazon,” said John, “and Nancy and Peggy are sure to know them. We can get milk anywhere, only we may have to take our own can.”

“But what about leaving the camp for a whole night.”

“We won’t,” said Titty. “Peter Duck’ll look after it. We’ll stow everything in Peter Duck’s cave. It’ll be safe enough there.”

“What about the parrot?”

“He’ll keep Peter Duck company. I’ll leave him a tremendous lot of food and water and put him in the cave, too. He won’t mind having a little extra sleep, just for once. Or he’ll keep watch and watch about with Peter Duck. I expect he’s lived in lots of caves before, real pirate ones.”

“And you know we’ve never tried sleeping in the bags without any tents. What if it pours?”

“So long as it doesn’t rain, it’ll be all right. If it looks like rain, we won’t go.” John dived into his tent and came out again at once. “The barometer’s as steady as it can be. And there’s another thing. Captain Flint would never have finished the mast up and left a message for me to hurry with the polishing and oiling if Swallow wasn’t nearly ready. Painted, I should think. And in weather as hot as this she’ll dry fast. We may have her any day. And we can’t climb mountains and sail at the same time. If we’re going to climb Kanchenjunga at all it would be a good thing to do it while we’re up here.”

“Mother did say she didn’t see why we shouldn’t climb it if we wanted to,” said Susan, and the others knew that she was coming round.

Just before settling down for the night they went to the Watch Tower Rock, climbed its steepest side, just for practice, and stood on the top of it, all four of them, looking over the moorland towards the distant hills. The sun was dropping behind them. Already the peak of Kanchenjunga began to look as if it had been cut out of dark purple cardboard. To the right and to the left of it were other hills, and somewhere over the edge of the moor the explorers knew they would find the valley of the Amazon River. Farther round to the right they could see the edges of the forest, and far beyond them glimpses of the lake and the hills behind Rio.

“When the Amazons came over the moor, we saw them first over there, beyond that rock,” said Titty, pointing to a jagged rock about half a mile away in the heather.

“But not so near,” said Roger.

“That’s the way we’ll go,” said John. “It’s just about in a line between here and the northern side of Kanchenjunga.” He laid the compass on the rock and waited till the needle steadied. “North-north-west’s about it. We’ll go to the rock and then strike north.”

High overhead there was a creaking noise, like someone very quickly swinging a big door that needs oil in its hinges. They looked up.

“Swans,” said John at once.

There were five of them, great white birds with their long necks outstretched before them, flying fast with steady, powerful wing-flaps towards the setting sun.

“Where are they going?” said Roger.

“There’s another lake somewhere over there,” said John.

Over there to the west there were far dim hills beyond the rim of heather that shut them in like the horizon at sea. Beyond the heather was the unknown.

“Perhaps the swans can see the water,” said Titty, “flying as high as that.”

“I expect they can,” said John.

The swans seemed to fall into the distance, and when they could be seen no more, the explorers climbed down from the Watch Tower Rock and walked gravely back to the camp in Swallowdale, thinking of what was before them.

They sat talking round the fire much later than usual. As Susan said, it was always the way on the night before an early start. There was so much to think of that it would have been useless to try to sleep. The stars were clear in the sky before they went to bed.

Long after the lantern in each tent had been blown out, John sat up, took his knapsack and crawled out again into the open. He pulled his sleeping-bag after him. Rummaging under the clothes in his knapsack he found the thin waterproof covering of the sleeping-bag which, in the tent, he did not use. He put the sleeping-bag into it, so that he would not need a groundsheet. He got back into his sleeping-bag, wriggled about in it till he had found a comfortable place for his bones, and settled down once more. His knapsack, which was still pretty well stuffed, made his pillow.

“What are you doing?” This was Susan’s voice in the dark.

“Trying what it’s going to be like without tents.”

“Let’s all try,” said Roger.

“Why aren’t you asleep?” said Susan.

“Can you see the stars?” asked Titty.

“Yes,” said John.

“I wonder if the prisoners of war can see them from their cells.”

“They aren’t in cells at all,” said John.

“If they can’t get out when they want, I expect it feels as if they were.”

“Good night,” said John.

“Good night, good night, good night,” came from the three tents in which there were still explorers. The fourth tent was empty, and John, lying comfortably stretched in his sleeping-bag, with his head on his knapsack, was looking up at the stars and feeling less like sleep than ever. At least he thought he did not feel like sleep.

After a bit he wondered whether counting stars would work as well as counting sheep going through a gap in a hedge. That was what mother used to tell him to do when he was a little boy. He snuggled down in the sleeping-bag, so that only his nose was over the edge of it and began to count the stars in the Milky Way. But he had not time, really, to count the bigger stars in more than a few inches of it. It may have been the counting that closed his eyes for him, or it may have been the hard day’s work on the new mast with the sandpaper and the linseed oil.