William Golding - Lord of the Flies

At last Ralph cleared his throat and whispered something.

Piggy whispered back.

“What you say?”

Ralph spoke up.

“Simon.”

Piggy said nothing but nodded, solemnly. They continued to sit, gazing with impaired sight at the chief’s seat and the glittering lagoon. The green light and the glossy patches of sunshine played over their befouled bodies.

At length Ralph got up and went to the conch. He took the shell caressingly with both hands and knelt, leaning against the trunk.

“Piggy”

“Uh?”

“What we going to do?”

Piggy nodded at the conch.

“You could—”

“Call an assembly?”

Ralph laughed sharply as he said the word and Piggy frowned.

“You’re still chief.”

Ralph laughed again.

“You are. Over us.”

“I got the conch.”

“Ralph! Stop laughing like that. Look, there ain’t no need, Ralph! What’s the others going to think?”

At last Ralph stopped. He was shivering.

“Piggy—”

“Uh?”

“That was Simon.” “You said that before.”

“Piggy-”

“Uh?”

“That was murder.”

“You stop it!” said Piggy, shrilly. “What good’re you doing talking like that?”

He jumped to his feet and stood over Ralph.

“It was dark. There was that—that bloody dance. There was lightning and thunder and rain. We was scared!”

“I wasn’t scared,” said Ralph slowly, “I was—I don’t know what I was.”

“We was scared!” said Piggy excitedly. “Anything might have happened. It wasn’t—what you said.”

He was gesticulating, searching for a formula.

“Oh, Piggy!”

Ralph’s voice, low and stricken, stopped Piggy’s gestures. He bent down and waited. Ralph, cradling the conch, rocked himself to and fro.

“Don’t you understand, Piggy? The things we did—”

“He may still be—”

“No.”

“P’raps he was only pretending—”

Piggy’s voice trailed off at the sight of Ralph’s face.

“You were outside. Outside the circle. You never really came in. Didn’t you see what we—what they did?”

There was loathing, and at the same time a kind of feverish excitement, in his voice.

“Didn’t you see, Piggy?”

“Not all that well. I only got one eye now. You ought to know that, Ralph.”

Ralph continued to rock to and fro.

“It was an accident,” said Piggy suddenly, “that’s what it was. An accident.” His voice shrilled again. “Coming in the dark—he hadn’t no business crawling like that out of the dark. He was batty. He asked for it. He gesticulated widely again. “It was an accident.”

“You didn’t see what they did—”

“Look, Ralph. We got to forget this. We can’t do no good thinking about it, see?”

“I’m frightened. Of us. I want to go home. Oh God, I want to go home.”

“It was an accident,” said Piggy stubbornly, “and that’s that.”

He touched Ralph’s bare shoulder and Ralph shuddered at the human contact.

“And look, Ralph”—Piggy glanced round quickly, then leaned close—”don’t let on we was in that dance. Not to Samneric.”

“But we were! All of us!”

Piggy shook his head.

“Not us till last. They never noticed in the dark. Anyway you said I was only on the outside.”

“So was I,” muttered Ralph, “I was on the outside too.”

Piggy nodded eagerly.

“That’s right. We was on the outside. We never done nothing, we never seen nothing.”

Piggy paused, then went on.

“We’ll live on our own, the four of us—”

“Four of us. We aren’t enough to keep the fire burning.”

“We’ll try. See? I lit it.”

Samneric came dragging a great log out of the forest. They dumped it by the fire and turned to the pool. Ralph jumped to his feet.

“Hi! You two!”

The twins checked a moment, then walked on.

“They’re going to bathe, Ralph.”

“Better get it over.”

The twins were very surprised to see Ralph. They flushed and looked past him into the air.

“Hullo. Fancy meeting you, Ralph.”

“We just been in the forest–”

“—to get wood for the fire—”

“—we got lost last night.”

Ralph examined his toes.

“You got lost after the…”

Piggy cleaned his lens.

“After the feast,” said Sam in a stifled voice. Eric nodded. “Yes, after the feast.”

“We left early,” said Piggy quickly, “because we were tired.”

“So did we—”

“—very early—”

“—we were very tired.”

Sam touched a scratch on his forehead and then hurriedly took his hand away. Eric fingered his split lip.

“Yes. We were very tired,” repeated Sam, “so we left early. Was it a good—”

The air was heavy with unspoken knowledge. Sam twisted and the obscene word shot out of him. “—dance?”

Memory of the dance that none of them had attended shook all tour boys convulsively.

“We left early.”

When Roger came to the neck of land that joined the Castle Rock to the mainland he was not surprised to be challenged. He had reckoned, during the terrible night, on finding at least some of the tribe holding out against the horrors of the island in the safest place.

The voice rang out sharply from on high, where the diminishing crags were balanced one on another.

“Halt! Who goes there?”

“Roger.”

“Advance, friend.”

Roger advanced.

“The chief said we got to challenge everyone.”

Roger peered up.

“You couldn’t stop me coming if I wanted.”

“Couldn’t I? Climb up and see.”

Roger clambered up the ladder-like cliff.

“Look at this.”

A log had been jammed under the topmost rock and another lever under that. Robert leaned lightly on the lever and the rock groaned. A full effort would send the rock thundering down to the neck of land. Roger admired.

“He’s a proper chief, isn’t he?”

Robert nodded.

“He’s going to take us hunting.”

He jerked his head in the direction of the distant shelters where a thread of white smoke climbed up the sky. Roger, sitting on the very edge of the cliff, looked somberly back at the island as he worked with his fingers at a loose tooth. His gaze settled on the top of the distant mountain and Robert changed the unspoken subject.

“He’s going to beat Wilfred.”

“What for?”

Robert shook his head doubtfully.

“I don’t know. He didn’t say. He got angry and made us tie Wilfred up. He’s been”—he giggled excitedly—”he’s been tied for hours, waiting—”

“But didn’t the chief say why?’

“I never heard him.”

Sitting on the tremendous rocks in the torrid sun, Roger received this news as an illumination. He ceased to work at his tooth and sat still, assimilating the possibilities of irresponsible authority. Then, without another word, he climbed down the back of the rocks toward the cave and the rest of the tribe.

The chief was sitting there, naked to the waist, his face blocked out in white and red. The tribe lay in a semicircle before him. The newly beaten and untied Wilfred was sniffing noisily in the background. Roger squatted with the rest.

“Tomorrow,” went on the chief, “we shall hunt again.”

He pointed at this savage and that with his spear.

“Some of you will stay here to improve the cave and defend the gate. I shall take a few hunters with me and bring back meat. The defenders of the gate will see that the others don’t sneak in.”

A savage raised his hand and the chief turned a bleak, painted face toward him.

“Why should they try to sneak in, Chief?”

The chief was vague but earnest.