Arthur Ransome - Swallows and Amazons (Complete Series)

“Welcome, welcome,” shouted the others.

There was a general scramble. Mother might be a native, but it was all right to kiss her none the less.

The female native counted the Swallows after she had kissed them. “One, two, three, four,” she said. “No one drowned yet. That’s a good thing, because it’s somebody’s birthday.”

“Whose? Whose?” they shouted. “It can’t be John’s, because he’s just had one.”

“No, it isn’t John’s.”

“Is it mine?” said Roger.

“No,” said mother.

“Is it mine?” said Titty.

“No.”

“It can’t be mine,” said Susan, “because mine’s on New Year’s Day, and this is summer.”

“Whose is it?” they asked.

“Vicky’s, of course,” said the female native. “She’s two. Rather too young for a birthday, really, so I’ve brought a present for each of you.”

“What about Vicky?” said Susan.

“Vicky’s got a lamb and an elephant. I took her to the shop, and she chose them herself. Now then, help me out with the hamper, so that nurse and Vicky can come ashore.”

“It’s a very heavy hamper,” said Titty.

“The presents are not,” said the female native. “The presents are very small.”

“Then what’s in the hamper?” said Roger.

“Birthday feast, of course,” said the female native.

“Hurrah, no cooking,” said Susan.

“Aha,” laughed the female native. “I thought you’d get tired of that. But I must say you seem to have managed very well. No illness in the camp?”

“None at all,” said Susan, “and I’m not sick of cooking, but it’s jolly not to have to just for once.”

“Of course we’ve had plague and yellow fever and Black Jack and all the other illnesses belonging to desert islands,” said Titty. “But we cured them all at once.”

“That’s right,” said the female native, “never let an illness linger about.”

They carried the hamper up to the camp. Nurse brought Vicky ashore, and they all wished her many happy returns. Vicky had the elephant with her. She forgot her lamb in the boat, and it had to be fetched later. Vicky liked the elephant better than the lamb because it was smaller. The lamb was so large it was always being put down and forgotten.

The female native opened the hamper. On the top, well wrapped up in tissue paper, was a birthday cake, a huge one with Victoria written in pink sugar on the white icing and two large cherries in the middle, because Vicky was two years old. Then there was a cold chicken. Then there was a salad in a big pudding-basin. Then there was an enormous gooseberry tart. Then there was a melon. Then there was a really huge bunch of bananas which the female native tied in a tree as if it was growing there. “You can pick them just as you want them,” she said.

Then there were more ordinary stores, a tin of golden syrup, two big pots of marmalade and a great tin of squashed-fly biscuits. Squashed-fly biscuits are those flat biscuits with currants in them, just the thing for explorers. Then there were three bunloaves and six bottles of ginger beer.

“Hurrah for the grog,” said Titty.

“But where are the presents?” said Roger.

“I told you they were very little ones,” said the female native. “Here they are.”

She dug down at the bottom of the hamper and brought up four small brown paper parcels, each about as big as an ordinary envelope and as fat as a matchbox.

“The nights are getting very dark now,” she said, “with no moon, so I thought perhaps you could do with some electric torches. You mustn’t keep them lit for long at a time or they’ll soon wear out. But for signalling, or looking for something in the dark. . . .”

“Mother,” cried Captain John, “how did you guess we were wanting them? They’ve come exactly at the right moment.”

The others were flashing their torches at once, but they were not much good in the sunlight. Roger and Titty went into the mate’s tent and crawled under the groundsheet to get some darkness.

When they came back, rubbing the mud from their knees, for under the groundsheet it had been very damp and sticky, the female native said, “I’ve had a letter from daddy, and he reminded me of something. Can Roger swim yet?”

“He swam on his back for the first time to-day,” said John. “Three good strokes. Once he can do that he will be able to swim on his front quite easily.”

“Shall I show you?” said Roger, and was for running down to the landing-place at once.

“Before we go home,” said the female native. “Not this minute. Well, daddy said that Roger was to have a knife of his own as soon as he could swim, and I brought it with me in case he could.”

She dipped into the hamper for the last time and pulled out a knife with a good big blade. Roger was off with it at once, trying it on the trees. “Now I can make blazes, just like Titty,” he shouted.

“If you can really swim three strokes both on your back and on your front, you can keep it,” said the female native. “If not, I must take it back to-night and bring it again next time.”

“I’m sure I can do it,” said Roger, wiping the blade on his knickerbockers.

“You’ll have to show me,” said the female native. “No feet on the bottom, you know.”

“Not even one toe,” said Roger.

Then came the birthday feast. There is no need to say anything about that. It was a good one. No one had much time for talking. It ended after Roger had been sent to pick some bananas from the new banana tree.

“I hear you’ve had some visitors,” said mother.

The Swallows stared at her. It really was astonishing how news flew about among these natives.

“Mrs. Blackett called on me yesterday and told me her little girls had met you on the island. She seemed very jolly. How did you get on with the girls?”

“Beautifully,” said Susan. “One is called Nancy and the other is called Peggy.”

“Really,” said mother. “I thought the elder one was called Ruth.”

“That’s only when she is with the natives,” said Titty. “She is the captain of the Amazon pirates, and when she’s a pirate her name is Nancy. We call her Nancy.”

“I see,” said mother. “Mrs. Blackett said they were a couple of tomboys, and she was afraid they might be too wild for you.”

“They aren’t any wilder than we are,” said Titty.

“I hope not,” said mother, laughing.

Then she said, “Their uncle lives during the summer in that houseboat we saw. You haven’t been meddling with it, have you?”

“No,” said John, gloomily. “But he thinks we have.”

“I know,” said mother, “Mrs. Dixon told me. I said I was sure you hadn’t.”

“But he thinks we have. He’s been here. He came when we were all away and left this.” John pulled out the note and gave it to mother.

Mother looked at it. “Who is Captain Flint,” she asked.

“He is,” said Titty.

“Oh,” said mother.

Then John told her of what the charcoal-burners had said, and of how he had gone to give the message himself, because there was no wind and he could not give it to the Amazons.

“You did quite right,” said mother, “but Mrs. Dixon said he was going away for a night or two.”

“He was just going when I saw him this morning,” said John.

“Wasn’t he pleased to get the message?” said mother.

“He wouldn’t listen to me,” said John. “He called me a liar.” The whole trouble of the morning loomed up again.

“He wouldn’t have called you that if he knew you,” said mother. “It doesn’t matter what people think or say if they don’t know you. They may think anything. What did you do?”

“I came away,” said John.