Arthur Ransome - Swallows and Amazons (Complete Series)

“I see it. I see it,” cried Roger.

“Shut up. Be quiet,” hissed the mate.

“That’s it, all right,” whispered Captain John.

On the front of the big open boathouse, high up over the entrance, cut out of wood and painted staring white were a huge skull and cross-bones big enough to have belonged to an elephant.

“Can you see in,” asked Captain John.

“There’s a big boat in there,” said Roger.

“They said there would be. That’ll be the launch that belongs to the natives. Will our mast clear that beam? Gently now, gently.”

Swallow slid into the big dark boathouse as Susan brought her oars in.

“There’s a rowing boat,” whispered Roger loudly.

“Look out. Don’t bump the launch,” whispered Susan.

“There’s nothing else,” said Roger. “The Amazon isn’t here.”

John was standing in the stern of the Swallow, holding on to the gunwale of the launch. He pulled out his pocket torch. “They won’t be able to see the light from the house,” he said, and pressed down the button.

The bright light wavered round the boathouse. It showed a rowing skiff and the big launch and an empty space on the further side. It was clear that a boat was usually moored there. Pinned to the wooden stage that ran along that wall of the boathouse there was a big envelope, white in the light of the torch.

Captain John pushed at the launch and Swallow moved across towards the wall. Roger grabbed the envelope.

“Give it to me,” said the mate, and the boy obediently gave it.

The captain and the mate examined the envelope by the light of the torch. There was a skull and cross-bones on it, done in red pencil. Under that, in blue pencil, was written, “To the Swallows.” John tore the envelope open. Inside there was a sheet of paper with another skull and cross-bones, done in blue. Under them in red were the words “Ha! Ha!” written very large, and under them were the words, “The Amazon Pirates,” and two names, “Nancy Blackett, Captain” and “Peggy Blackett, Mate” also written in red.

Captain John thought for a moment.

“It’s quite simple,” he said. “They’ve hidden her up the river. It’s an old pirate trick. We know they haven’t put to sea, for we’ve been watching all day. Come on.” He shut off the torch.

They pushed out.

Out of doors it seemed quite light after the darkness of the big boathouse.

“Now, Mister Mate, lay to your oars,” said Captain John. “There’s still light enough to find her if we’re quick.”

Mate Susan bent to her oars and Swallow moved fast up the river. John, staring as hard as he could into the dusk, kept her clear of the reeds. In another minute they were round a bend in the river.

Again there was a splash in the deep reed beds at the river’s mouth. Again a duck quacked loudly. It quacked two or three times, until a voice said sternly, “Stow it, you goat. Don’t overdo things.”

The nose of a boat pushed its way out from among the reeds. Just above the nose of the boat was the head of Captain Nancy Blackett. She watched for a moment and listened.

“All clear,” she said. “They’ve gone up river. That’ll give us a bit more start. Come on.”

There was more splashing in the reeds as Peggy Blackett poled over the stern. The boat came out of the reeds into the mouth of the river and drifted out towards the lake. Captain Nancy took the oars. She rowed hard for a minute or two.

“Safe enough now,” she said. “I’m going to step the mast. Lucky we thought of taking it down, or they’d have seen it over the reeds. Hang on to the main-sheet, you son of a sea-cook,” she said with great good temper and satisfaction. She hoisted the sail.

“Now then, my hearties,” she said as she clambered aft. “Wild Cat Island and Amazons for ever! We’ve done them fairly brown.”

Table of Contents

After mother had gone, Able-seaman Titty thought it well to go all over her island. Everything was as it should be. The dipper had come back to a stone outside the harbour and bobbed to her again and again, and Able-seaman Titty bobbed to him in return, but this time was so far away that he did not fly off but stood on his stone, bobbing two or three times a minute. She watched him flop into the water and fly out again, and then she went on with her patrol. At last she came back to the camp and put some more wood on the fire.

Then she remembered that Robinson Crusoe kept a log, and that she had brought an exercise book in which to do the same. She sat down in the sunlight at the mouth of her tent and wrote “LOG” in capital letters at the top of a page. It was a pity that she had not been keeping count of the days by making notches on a stick, but as there was only one day to put in the log that did not really matter. So she wrote:—

“Twenty-five years ago this day I was wrecked on this desolate place. Wind south-west. Sea slight. Fog at dawn. Met a polite bird. I saw him flying underwater. I found a native canoe on the shore. The native was friendly. Her name was Man Friday. In her country there are kangaroos. Also bears. It was a joy to me in my lonely state to hear a human voice, though savage. Man Friday cooked our dinner. Pemmican cakes with tea. She went away in her canoe to the mainland where the natives are. She . . .”

Able-seaman Titty could think of no more to say. She had caught up with herself. There was nothing else to say until something more happened. She began looking through Robinson Crusoe, not exactly reading, for she had read it all many times before, but looking from page to page. She came first on the bit about sleeping in a tree for fear of ravenous beasts.

“I went to the tree, and getting up into it, endeavoured to place myself so as that if I should sleep I might not fall; and having cut me a short stick like a truncheon for my defence, I took up my lodging, and having been excessively fatigued, I fell fast asleep, and slept as comfortably as, I believe, few could have done in my condition, and found myself the most refreshed with it that I think I ever was on such an occasion.”

She wondered whether Robinson Crusoe had often slept in trees, and then whether there was any tree on the island that would be good for sleeping in. But then, there were no ravenous beasts.

Then she read the part about the footprint in the sand and remembered a number of things that she might have said to Man Friday.

Then, turning this way and that through the book she came on a passage which reminded her of Captain Flint.

“All the while I was at work,” wrote Robinson Crusoe, “I diverted myself with talking to my parrot, and teaching him to speak; and I quickly learned him to know his own name, and at last to speak it out pretty loud . . . Poll . . . which was the first word I ever heard spoken in the island by any mouth but my own. . . .”

Of course, if only she had a parrot, the island would be perfect. She thought of the green parrot on the rail of the houseboat. Then she remembered the jays that had flown chattering through the trees on the day when the Swallows had visited the charcoal-burners. The jays, like the green parrot, brought her mind back to Captain Flint, for she remembered the message that the old men had sent to the Amazons. She remembered the message, that the old men thought that some one was going to break into the houseboat and that Captain Flint ought to put a lock on it. Then she remembered that John had tried to give the message and that Captain Flint had been too cross to listen to it, besides calling John a liar. And now there was mother wanting to send a message to Captain Flint by writing to the mother of the Amazons. And there was John gone to the Amazon River, not to see the Amazons, but to capture their ship. So the message would not be given to the Amazons until to-morrow.