Île mystérieuse. English

Chapter 12

The next day, the 18th of Febru­ary, was de­vot­ed to the ex­plo­ration of all that wood­ed re­gion form­ing the shore from Rep­tile End to Falls Riv­er. The colonists were able to search this for­est thor­ough­ly, for, as it was com­prised be­tween the two shores of the Ser­pen­tine Penin­su­la, it was on­ly from three to four miles in breadth. The trees, both by their height and their thick fo­liage, bore wit­ness to the veg­eta­tive pow­er of the soil, more as­ton­ish­ing here than in any oth­er part of the is­land. One might have said that a cor­ner from the vir­gin forests of Amer­ica or Africa had been trans­port­ed in­to this tem­per­ate zone. This led them to con­clude that the su­perb veg­eta­tion found a heat in this soil, damp in its up­per lay­er, but warmed in the in­te­ri­or by vol­canic fires, which could not be­long to a tem­per­ate cli­mate. The most fre­quent­ly oc­cur­ring trees were knar­ies and eu­ca­lyp­ti of gi­gan­tic di­men­sions.

But the colonists’ ob­ject was not sim­ply to ad­mire the mag­nif­icent veg­eta­tion. They knew al­ready that in this re­spect Lin­coln Is­land would have been wor­thy to take the first rank in the Ca­nary group, to which the first name giv­en was that of the Hap­py Isles. Now, alas! their is­land no longer be­longed to them en­tire­ly; oth­ers had tak­en pos­ses­sion of it, mis­cre­ants pol­lut­ed its shores, and they must be de­stroyed to the last man.

No traces were found on the west­ern coast, al­though they were care­ful­ly sought for. No more foot­prints, no more bro­ken branch­es, no more de­sert­ed camps.

“This does not sur­prise me,” said Cyrus Hard­ing to his com­pan­ions. “The con­victs first land­ed on the is­land in the neigh­bor­hood of Flot­sam Point, and they im­me­di­ate­ly plunged in­to the Far West forests, af­ter cross­ing Ta­dorn Marsh. They then fol­lowed al­most the same route that we took on leav­ing Gran­ite House. This ex­plains the traces we found in the wood. But, ar­riv­ing on the shore, the con­victs saw at once that they would dis­cov­er no suit­able re­treat there, and it was then that, go­ing north­wards again, they came up­on the cor­ral.”

“Where they have per­haps re­turned,” said Pen­croft.

“I do not think so,” an­swered the en­gi­neer, “for they would nat­ural­ly sup­pose that our re­search­es would be in that di­rec­tion. The cor­ral is on­ly a store­house to them, and not a defini­tive en­camp­ment.”

“I am of Cyrus’ opin­ion,” said the re­porter, “and I think that it is among the spurs of Mount Franklin that the con­victs will have made their lair.”

“Then, cap­tain, straight to the cor­ral!” cried Pen­croft. “We must fin­ish them off, and till now we have on­ly lost time!”

“No, my friend,” replied the en­gi­neer; “you for­get that we have a rea­son for wish­ing to know if the forests of the Far West do not con­tain some habi­ta­tion. Our ex­plo­ration has a dou­ble ob­ject, Pen­croft. If, on the one hand, we have to chas­tise crime, we have, on the oth­er, an act of grat­itude to per­form.”

“That was well said, cap­tain,” replied the sailor, “but, all the same, it is my opin­ion that we shall not find the gen­tle­man un­til he pleas­es.”

And tru­ly Pen­croft on­ly ex­pressed the opin­ion of all. It was prob­able that the stranger’s re­treat was not less mys­te­ri­ous than was he him­self.

That evening the cart halt­ed at the mouth of Falls Riv­er. The camp was or­ga­nized as usu­al, and the cus­tom­ary pre­cau­tions were tak­en for the night. Her­bert, be­come again the healthy and vig­or­ous lad he was be­fore his ill­ness, de­rived great ben­efit from this life in the open air, be­tween the sea breezes and the viv­ify­ing air from the forests. His place was no longer in the cart, but at the head of the troop.

The next day, the 19th of Febru­ary, the colonists, leav­ing the shore, where, be­yond the mouth, basalts of ev­ery shape were so pic­turesque­ly piled up, as­cend­ed the riv­er by its left bank. The road had been al­ready part­ly cleared in their for­mer ex­cur­sions made from the cor­ral to the west coast. The set­tlers were now about six miles from Mount Franklin.

The en­gi­neer’s plan was this:–To minute­ly sur­vey the val­ley form­ing the bed of the riv­er, and to cau­tious­ly ap­proach the neigh­bor­hood of the cor­ral; if the cor­ral was oc­cu­pied, to seize it by force; if it was not, to en­trench them­selves there and make it the cen­ter of the op­er­ations which had for their ob­ject the ex­plo­ration of Mount Franklin.

This plan was unan­imous­ly ap­proved by the colonists, for they were im­pa­tient to re­gain en­tire pos­ses­sion of their is­land.

They made their way then along the nar­row val­ley sep­arat­ing two of the largest spurs of Mount Franklin. The trees, crowd­ed on the riv­er’s bank, be­came rare on the up­per slopes of the moun­tain. The ground was hilly and rough, very suit­able for am­bush­es, and over which they did not ven­ture with­out ex­treme pre­cau­tion. Top and Jup skir­mished on the flanks, spring­ing right and left through the thick brush­wood, and em­ulat­ing each oth­er in in­tel­li­gence and ac­tiv­ity. But noth­ing showed that the banks of the stream had been re­cent­ly fre­quent­ed–noth­ing an­nounced ei­ther the pres­ence or the prox­im­ity of the con­victs. To­wards five in the evening the cart stopped near­ly 600 feet from the pal­isade. A semi­cir­cu­lar screen of trees still hid it.

It was nec­es­sary to re­con­noi­ter the cor­ral, in or­der to as­cer­tain if it was oc­cu­pied. To go there open­ly, in broad day­light, when the con­victs were prob­ably in am­bush, would be to ex­pose them­selves, as poor Her­bert had done, to the firearms of the ruf­fi­ans. It was bet­ter, then, to wait un­til night came on.

How­ev­er, Gideon Spilett wished with­out fur­ther de­lay to re­con­noi­ter the ap­proach­es to the cor­ral, and Pen­croft, who was quite out of pa­tience, vol­un­teered to ac­com­pa­ny him.

“No, my friends,” said the en­gi­neer, “wait till night. I will not al­low one of you to ex­pose him­self in open day.”

“But, cap­tain–” an­swered the sailor, lit­tle dis­posed to obey.

“I beg of you, Pen­croft,” said the en­gi­neer.

“Very well!” replied the sailor, who vent­ed his anger in an­oth­er way, by be­stow­ing on the con­victs the worst names in his mar­itime vo­cab­ulary.

The colonists re­mained, there­fore, near the cart, and care­ful­ly watched the neigh­bor­ing parts of the for­est.

Three hours passed thus. The wind had fall­en, and ab­so­lute si­lence reigned un­der the great trees. The snap­ping of the small­est twig, a foot­step on the dry leaves, the glid­ing of a body among the grass, would have been heard with­out dif­fi­cul­ty. All was qui­et. Be­sides, Top, ly­ing on the grass, his head stretched out on his paws, gave no sign of un­easi­ness. At eight o’clock the day ap­peared far enough ad­vanced for the re­con­nais­sance to be made un­der fa­vor­able con­di­tions. Gideon Spilett de­clared him­self ready to set out ac­com­pa­nied by Pen­croft. Cyrus Hard­ing con­sent­ed. Top and Jup were to re­main with the en­gi­neer, Her­bert, and Neb, for a bark or a cry at a wrong mo­ment would give the alarm.

“Do not be im­pru­dent,” said Hard­ing to the re­porter and Pen­croft, “you have not to gain pos­ses­sion of the cor­ral, but on­ly to find out whether it is oc­cu­pied or not.”

“All right,” an­swered Pen­croft.

And the two de­part­ed.

Un­der the trees, thanks to the thick­ness of their fo­liage, the ob­scu­ri­ty ren­dered any ob­ject in­vis­ible be­yond a ra­dius of from thir­ty to forty feet. The re­porter and Pen­croft, halt­ing at any sus­pi­cious sound, ad­vanced with great cau­tion.

They walked a lit­tle dis­tance apart from each oth­er so as to of­fer a less mark for a shot. And, to tell the truth, they ex­pect­ed ev­ery mo­ment to hear a re­port. Five min­utes af­ter leav­ing the cart, Gideon Spilett and Pen­croft ar­rived at the edge of the wood be­fore the clear­ing be­yond which rose the pal­isade.

They stopped. A few strag­gling beams still fell on the field clear of trees. Thir­ty feet dis­tant was the gate of the cor­ral, which ap­peared to be closed. This thir­ty feet, which it was nec­es­sary to cross from the wood to the pal­isade, con­sti­tut­ed the dan­ger­ous zone, to bor­row a bal­lis­tic term: in fact, one or more bul­lets fired from be­hind the pal­isade might knock over any one who ven­tured on to this zone. Gideon Spilett and the sailor were not men to draw back, but they knew that any im­pru­dence on their part, of which they would be the first vic­tims, would fall af­ter­wards on their com­pan­ions. If they them­selves were killed, what would be­come of Hard­ing, Neb, and Her­bert?

But Pen­croft, ex­cit­ed at feel­ing him­self so near the cor­ral where he sup­posed the con­victs had tak­en refuge, was about to press for­ward, when the re­porter held him back with a grasp of iron.

“In a few min­utes it will be quite dark,” whis­pered Spilett in the sailor’s ear, “then will be the time to act.”

Pen­croft, con­vul­sive­ly clasp­ing the butt-​end of his gun, re­strained his en­er­gies, and wait­ed, swear­ing to him­self.

Soon the last of the twi­light fad­ed away. Dark­ness, which seemed as if it is­sued from the dense for­est, cov­ered the clear­ing. Mount Franklin rose like an enor­mous screen be­fore the west­ern hori­zon, and night spread rapid­ly over all, as it does in re­gions of low lat­itudes. Now was the time.

The re­porter and Pen­croft, since post­ing them­selves on the edge of the wood, had not once lost sight of the pal­isade. The cor­ral ap­peared to be ab­so­lute­ly de­sert­ed. The top of the pal­isade formed a line, a lit­tle dark­er than the sur­round­ing shad­ow, and noth­ing dis­turbed its dis­tinct­ness. Nev­er­the­less, if the con­victs were there, they must have post­ed one of their num­ber to guard against any sur­prise.

Spilett grasped his com­pan­ion’s hand, and both crept to­wards the cor­ral, their guns ready to fire.

They reached the gate with­out the dark­ness be­ing il­lu­mi­nat­ed by a sin­gle ray of light.

Pen­croft tried to push open the gate, which, as the re­porter and he had sup­posed, was closed. How­ev­er, the sailor was able to as­cer­tain that the out­er bars had not been put up. It might, then, be con­clud­ed that the con­victs were there in the cor­ral, and that very prob­ably they had fas­tened the gate in such a way that it could not be forced open.

Gideon Spilett and Pen­croft lis­tened.

Not a sound could be heard in­side the pal­isade. The mus­mons and the goats, sleep­ing no doubt in their huts, in no way dis­turbed the calm of night.

The re­porter and the sailor hear­ing noth­ing, asked them­selves whether they had not bet­ter scale the pal­isades and pen­etrate in­to the cor­ral. This would have been con­trary to Cyrus Hard­ing’s in­struc­tions.

It is true that the en­ter­prise might suc­ceed, but it might al­so fail. Now, if the con­victs were sus­pect­ing noth­ing, if they knew noth­ing of the ex­pe­di­tion against them, if, last­ly, there now ex­ist­ed a chance of sur­pris­ing them, ought this chance to be lost by in­con­sid­er­ate­ly at­tempt­ing to cross the pal­isades?

This was not the re­porter’s opin­ion. He thought it bet­ter to wait un­til all the set­tlers were col­lect­ed to­geth­er be­fore at­tempt­ing to pen­etrate in­to the cor­ral. One thing was cer­tain, that it was pos­si­ble to reach the pal­isade with­out be­ing seen, and al­so that it did not ap­pear to be guard­ed. This point set­tled, there was noth­ing to be done but to re­turn to the cart, where they would con­sult.

Pen­croft prob­ably agreed with this de­ci­sion, for he fol­lowed the re­porter with­out mak­ing any ob­jec­tion when the lat­ter turned back to the wood.

In a few min­utes the en­gi­neer was made ac­quaint­ed with the state of af­fairs.

“Well,” said he, af­ter a lit­tle thought, “I now have rea­son to be­lieve that the con­victs are not in the cor­ral.”

“We shall soon know,” said Pen­croft, “when we have scaled the pal­isade.”

“To the cor­ral, my friends!” said Cyrus Hard­ing.

“Shall we leave the cart in the wood?” asked Neb.

“No,” replied the en­gi­neer, “it is our wag­on of am­mu­ni­tion and pro­vi­sions, and, if nec­es­sary, it would serve as an en­trench­ment.”

“For­ward, then!” said Gideon Spilett.

The cart emerged from the wood and be­gan to roll noise­less­ly to­wards the pal­isade. The dark­ness was now pro­found, the si­lence as com­plete as when Pen­croft and the re­porter crept over the ground. The thick grass com­plete­ly muf­fled their foot­steps. The colonists held them­selves ready to fire. Jup, at Pen­croft’s or­ders, kept be­hind. Neb led Top in a leash, to pre­vent him from bound­ing for­ward.

The clear­ing soon came in sight. It was de­sert­ed. With­out hes­itat­ing, the lit­tle band moved to­wards the pal­isade. In a short space of time the dan­ger­ous zone was passed. Neb re­mained at the on­agers’ heads to hold them. The en­gi­neer, the re­porter, Her­bert, and Pen­croft, pro­ceed­ed to the door, in or­der to as­cer­tain if it was bar­ri­cad­ed in­side. It was open!

“What do you say now?” asked the en­gi­neer, turn­ing to the sailor and Spilett.

Both were stu­pe­fied.

“I can swear,” said Pen­croft, “that this gate was shut just now!”

The colonists now hes­itat­ed. Were the con­victs in the cor­ral when Pen­croft and the re­porter made their re­con­nais­sance? It could not be doubt­ed, as the gate then closed could on­ly have been opened by them. Were they still there, or had one of their num­ber just gone out?

All these ques­tions pre­sent­ed them­selves si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly to the minds of the colonists, but how could they be an­swered?

At that mo­ment, Her­bert, who had ad­vanced a few steps in­to the en­clo­sure, drew back hur­ried­ly, and seized Hard­ing’s hand.

“What’s the mat­ter?” asked the en­gi­neer.

“A light!”

“In the house?”

“Yes!”

All five ad­vanced and in­deed, through the win­dow fronting them, they saw glim­mer­ing a fee­ble light. Cyrus Hard­ing made up his mind rapid­ly. “It is our on­ly chance,” said he to his com­pan­ions, “of find­ing the con­victs col­lect­ed in this house, sus­pect­ing noth­ing! They are in our pow­er! For­ward!” The colonists crossed through the en­clo­sure, hold­ing their guns ready in their hands. The cart had been left out­side un­der the charge of Jup and Top, who had been pru­dent­ly tied to it.

Cyrus Hard­ing, Pen­croft, and Gideon Spilett on one side, Her­bert and Neb on the oth­er, go­ing along by the pal­isade, sur­veyed the ab­so­lute­ly dark and de­sert­ed cor­ral.

In a few mo­ments they were near the closed door of the house.

Hard­ing signed to his com­pan­ions not to stir, and ap­proached the win­dow, then fee­bly light­ed by the in­ner light.

He gazed in­to the apart­ment.

On the ta­ble burned a lantern. Near the ta­ble was the bed for­mer­ly used by Ayr­ton.

On the bed lay the body of a man.

Sud­den­ly Cyrus Hard­ing drew back, and in a hoarse voice,–“Ayr­ton!” he ex­claimed.

Im­me­di­ate­ly the door was forced rather than opened, and the colonists rushed in­to the room.

Ayr­ton ap­peared to be asleep. His coun­te­nance showed that he had long and cru­el­ly suf­fered. On his wrists and an­kles could be seen great bruis­es.

Hard­ing bent over him.

“Ayr­ton!” cried the en­gi­neer, seiz­ing the arm of the man whom he had just found again un­der such un­ex­pect­ed cir­cum­stances.

At this ex­cla­ma­tion Ayr­ton opened his eyes, and, gaz­ing at Hard­ing, then at the oth­ers,–

“You!” he cried, “you?”

“Ayr­ton! Ayr­ton!” re­peat­ed Hard­ing.

“Where am I?”

“In the house in the cor­ral!”

“Alone?”

“Yes!”

“But they will come back!” cried Ayr­ton. “De­fend your­selves! de­fend your­selves!”

And he fell back ex­haust­ed.

“Spilett,” ex­claimed the en­gi­neer, “we may be at­tacked at any mo­ment. Bring the cart in­to the cor­ral. Then, bar­ri­cade the door, and all come back here.”

Pen­croft, Neb, and the re­porter has­tened to ex­ecute the en­gi­neer’s or­ders. There was not a mo­ment to be lost. Per­haps even now the cart was in the hands of the con­victs!

In a mo­ment the re­porter and his two com­pan­ions had crossed the cor­ral and reached the gate of the pal­isade be­hind which Top was heard growl­ing sul­len­ly.

The en­gi­neer, leav­ing Ayr­ton for an in­stant, came out ready to fire. Her­bert was at his side. Both sur­veyed the crest of the spur over­look­ing the cor­ral. If the con­victs were ly­ing in am­bush there, they might knock the set­tlers over one af­ter the oth­er.

At that mo­ment the moon ap­peared in the east, above the black cur­tain of the for­est, and a white sheet of light spread over the in­te­ri­or of the en­clo­sure. The cor­ral, with its clumps of trees, the lit­tle stream which wa­tered it, its wide car­pet of grass, was sud­den­ly il­lu­mi­nat­ed. From the side of the moun­tain, the house and a part of the pal­isade stood out white in the moon­light. On the op­po­site side to­wards the door, the en­clo­sure re­mained dark. A black mass soon ap­peared. This was the cart en­ter­ing the cir­cle of light, and Cyrus Hard­ing could hear the noise made by the door, as his com­pan­ions shut it and fas­tened the in­te­ri­or bars.

But, at that mo­ment, Top, break­ing loose, be­gan to bark fu­ri­ous­ly and rush to the back of the cor­ral, to the right of the house.

“Be ready to fire, my friends!” cried Hard­ing.

The colonists raised their pieces and wait­ed the mo­ment to fire.

Top still barked, and Jup, run­ning to­wards the dog, ut­tered shrill cries.

The colonists fol­lowed him, and reached the bor­ders of the lit­tle stream, shad­ed by large trees. And there, in the bright moon­light, what did they see? Five corpses, stretched on the bank!

They were those of the con­victs who, four months pre­vi­ous­ly, had land­ed on Lin­coln Is­land!