Île mystérieuse. English

Chapter 8

Neb did not move. Pen­croft on­ly ut­tered one word.

“Liv­ing?” he cried.

Neb did not re­ply. Spilett and the sailor turned pale. Her­bert clasped his hands, and re­mained mo­tion­less. The poor Ne­gro, ab­sorbed in his grief, ev­ident­ly had nei­ther seen his com­pan­ions nor heard the sailor speak.

The re­porter knelt down be­side the mo­tion­less body, and placed his ear to the en­gi­neer’s chest, hav­ing first torn open his clothes.

A minute–an age!–passed, dur­ing which he en­deav­ored to catch the faintest throb of the heart.

Neb had raised him­self a lit­tle and gazed with­out see­ing. De­spair had com­plete­ly changed his coun­te­nance. He could scarce­ly be rec­og­nized, ex­haust­ed with fa­tigue, bro­ken with grief. He be­lieved his mas­ter was dead.

Gideon Spilett at last rose, af­ter a long and at­ten­tive ex­am­ina­tion.

“He lives!” said he.

Pen­croft knelt in his turn be­side the en­gi­neer, he al­so heard a throb­bing, and even felt a slight breath on his cheek.

Her­bert at a word from the re­porter ran out to look for wa­ter. He found, a hun­dred feet off, a limpid stream, which seemed to have been great­ly in­creased by the rains, and which fil­tered through the sand; but noth­ing in which to put the wa­ter, not even a shell among the downs. The lad was obliged to con­tent him­self with dip­ping his hand­ker­chief in the stream, and with it has­tened back to the grot­to.

Hap­pi­ly the wet hand­ker­chief was enough for Gideon Spilett, who on­ly wished to wet the en­gi­neer’s lips. The cold wa­ter pro­duced an al­most im­me­di­ate ef­fect. His chest heaved and he seemed to try to speak.

“We will save him!” ex­claimed the re­porter.

At these words hope re­vived in Neb’s heart. He un­dressed his mas­ter to see if he was wound­ed, but not so much as a bruise was to be found, ei­ther on the head, body, or limbs, which was sur­pris­ing, as he must have been dashed against the rocks; even the hands were un­in­jured, and it was dif­fi­cult to ex­plain how the en­gi­neer showed no traces of the ef­forts which he must have made to get out of reach of the break­ers.

But the ex­pla­na­tion would come lat­er. When Cyrus was able to speak he would say what had hap­pened. For the present the ques­tion was, how to re­call him to life, and it ap­peared like­ly that rub­bing would bring this about; so they set to work with the sailor’s jer­sey.

The en­gi­neer, re­vived by this rude sham­poo­ing, moved his arm slight­ly and be­gan to breathe more reg­ular­ly. He was sink­ing from ex­haus­tion, and cer­tain­ly, had not the re­porter and his com­pan­ions ar­rived, it would have been all over with Cyrus Hard­ing.

“You thought your mas­ter was dead, didn’t you?” said the sea­man to Neb.

“Yes! quite dead!” replied Neb, “and if Top had not found you, and brought you here, I should have buried my mas­ter, and then have lain down on his grave to die!”

It had in­deed been a nar­row es­cape for Cyrus Hard­ing!

Neb then re­count­ed what had hap­pened. The day be­fore, af­ter hav­ing left the Chim­neys at day­break, he had as­cend­ed the coast in a norther­ly di­rec­tion, and had reached that part of the shore which he had al­ready vis­it­ed.

There, with­out any hope he ac­knowl­edged, Neb had searched the beach, among the rocks, on the sand, for the small­est trace to guide him. He ex­am­ined par­tic­ular­ly that part of the beach which was not cov­ered by the high tide, for near the sea the wa­ter would have oblit­er­at­ed all marks. Neb did not ex­pect to find his mas­ter liv­ing. It was for a corpse that he searched, a corpse which he wished to bury with his own hands!

He sought long in vain. This desert coast ap­peared nev­er to have been vis­it­ed by a hu­man crea­ture. The shells, those which the sea had not reached, and which might be met with by mil­lions above high-​wa­ter mark, were un­touched. Not a shell was bro­ken.

Neb then re­solved to walk along the beach for some miles. It was pos­si­ble that the waves had car­ried the body to quite a dis­tant point. When a corpse floats a lit­tle dis­tance from a low shore, it rarely hap­pens that the tide does not throw it up, soon­er or lat­er. This Neb knew, and he wished to see his mas­ter again for the last time.

“I went along the coast for an­oth­er two miles, care­ful­ly ex­am­in­ing the beach, both at high and low wa­ter, and I had de­spaired of find­ing any­thing, when yes­ter­day, above five in the evening, I saw foot­prints on the sand.”

“Foot­prints?” ex­claimed Pen­croft.

“Yes!” replied Neb.

“Did these foot­prints be­gin at the wa­ter’s edge?” asked the re­porter.

“No,” replied Neb, “on­ly above high-​wa­ter mark, for the oth­ers must have been washed out by the tide.”

“Go on, Neb,” said Spilett.

“I went half crazy when I saw these foot­prints. They were very clear and went to­wards the downs. I fol­lowed them for a quar­ter of a mile, run­ning, but tak­ing care not to de­stroy them. Five min­utes af­ter, as it was get­ting dark, I heard the bark­ing of a dog. It was Top, and Top brought me here, to my mas­ter!”

Neb end­ed his ac­count by say­ing what had been his grief at find­ing the inan­imate body, in which he vain­ly sought for the least sign of life. Now that he had found him dead he longed for him to be alive. All his ef­forts were use­less! Noth­ing re­mained to be done but to ren­der the last du­ties to the one whom he had loved so much! Neb then thought of his com­pan­ions. They, no doubt, would wish to see the un­for­tu­nate man again. Top was there. Could he not re­ly on the sagac­ity of the faith­ful an­imal? Neb sev­er­al times pro­nounced the name of the re­porter, the one among his com­pan­ions whom Top knew best.

Then he point­ed to the south, and the dog bound­ed off in the di­rec­tion in­di­cat­ed to him.

We have heard how, guid­ed by an in­stinct which might be looked up­on al­most as su­per­nat­ural, Top had found them.

Neb’s com­pan­ions had lis­tened with great at­ten­tion to this ac­count.

It was un­ac­count­able to them how Cyrus Hard­ing, af­ter the ef­forts which he must have made to es­cape from the waves by cross­ing the rocks, had not re­ceived even a scratch. And what could not be ex­plained ei­ther was how the en­gi­neer had man­aged to get to this cave in the downs, more than a mile from the shore.

“So, Neb,” said the re­porter, “it was not you who brought your mas­ter to this place.”

“No, it was not I,” replied the Ne­gro.

“It’s very clear that the cap­tain came here by him­self,” said Pen­croft.

“It is clear in re­al­ity,” ob­served Spilett, “but it is not cred­ible!”

The ex­pla­na­tion of this fact could on­ly be pro­duced from the en­gi­neer’s own lips, and they must wait for that till speech re­turned. Rub­bing had re-​es­tab­lished the cir­cu­la­tion of the blood. Cyrus Hard­ing moved his arm again, then his head, and a few in­com­pre­hen­si­ble words es­caped him.

Neb, who was bend­ing over him, spoke, but the en­gi­neer did not ap­pear to hear, and his eyes re­mained closed. Life was on­ly ex­hib­it­ed in him by move­ment, his sens­es had not as yet been re­stored.

Pen­croft much re­gret­ted not hav­ing ei­ther fire, or the means of procur­ing it, for he had, un­for­tu­nate­ly, for­got­ten to bring the burnt linen, which would eas­ily have ig­nit­ed from the sparks pro­duced by strik­ing to­geth­er two flints. As to the en­gi­neer’s pock­ets, they were en­tire­ly emp­ty, ex­cept that of his waist­coat, which con­tained his watch. It was nec­es­sary to car­ry Hard­ing to the Chim­neys, and that as soon as pos­si­ble. This was the opin­ion of all.

Mean­while, the care which was lav­ished on the en­gi­neer brought him back to con­scious­ness soon­er than they could have ex­pect­ed. The wa­ter with which they wet­ted his lips re­vived him grad­ual­ly. Pen­croft al­so thought of mix­ing with the wa­ter some mois­ture from the titra’s flesh which he had brought. Her­bert ran to the beach and re­turned with two large bi­valve shells. The sailor con­coct­ed some­thing which he in­tro­duced be­tween the lips of the en­gi­neer, who ea­ger­ly drink­ing it opened his eyes.

Neb and the re­porter were lean­ing over him.

“My mas­ter! my mas­ter!” cried Neb.

The en­gi­neer heard him. He rec­og­nized Neb and Spilett, then his oth­er two com­pan­ions, and his hand slight­ly pressed theirs.

A few words again es­caped him, which showed what thoughts were, even then, trou­bling his brain. This time he was un­der­stood. Un­doubt­ed­ly they were the same words he had be­fore at­tempt­ed to ut­ter.

“Is­land or con­ti­nent?” he mur­mured.

“Both­er the con­ti­nent,” cried Pen­croft hasti­ly; “there is time enough to see about that, cap­tain! we don’t care for any­thing, pro­vid­ed you are liv­ing.”

The en­gi­neer nod­ded faint­ly, and then ap­peased to sleep.

They re­spect­ed this sleep, and the re­porter be­gan im­me­di­ate­ly to make ar­range­ments for trans­port­ing Hard­ing to a more com­fort­able place. Neb, Her­bert, and Pen­croft left the cave and di­rect­ed their steps to­wards a high mound crowned with a few dis­tort­ed trees. On the way the sailor could not help re­peat­ing,–

“Is­land or con­ti­nent! To think of that, when at one’s last gasp! What a man!”

Ar­rived at the sum­mit of the mound, Pen­croft and his two com­pan­ions set to work, with no oth­er tools than their hands, to de­spoil of its prin­ci­pal branch­es a rather sick­ly tree, a sort of ma­rine fir; with these branch­es they made a lit­ter, on which, cov­ered with grass and leaves, they could car­ry the en­gi­neer.

This oc­cu­pied them near­ly forty min­utes, and it was ten o’clock when they re­turned to Cyrus Hard­ing whom Spilett had not left.

The en­gi­neer was just awak­ing from the sleep, or rather from the drowsi­ness, in which they had found him. The col­or was re­turn­ing to his cheeks, which till now had been as pale as death. He raised him­self a lit­tle, looked around him, and ap­peared to ask where he was.

“Can you lis­ten to me with­out fa­tigue, Cyrus?” asked the re­porter.

“Yes,” replied the en­gi­neer.

“It’s my opin­ion,” said the sailor, “that Cap­tain Hard­ing will be able to lis­ten to you still bet­ter, if he will have some more grouse jel­ly,–for we have grouse, cap­tain,” added he, pre­sent­ing him with a lit­tle of this jel­ly, to which he this time added some of the flesh.

Cyrus Hard­ing ate a lit­tle of the grouse, and the rest was di­vid­ed among his com­pan­ions, who found it but a mea­ger break­fast, for they were suf­fer­ing ex­treme­ly from hunger.

“Well!” said the sailor, “there is plen­ty of food at the Chim­neys, for you must know, cap­tain, that down there, in the south, we have a house, with rooms, beds, and fire­place, and in the pantry, sev­er­al dozen of birds, which our Her­bert calls couroucous. Your lit­ter is ready, and as soon as you feel strong enough we will car­ry you home.”

“Thanks, my friend,” replied the en­gi­neer; “wait an­oth­er hour or two, and then we will set out. And now speak, Spilett.”

The re­porter then told him all that had oc­curred. He re­count­ed all the events with which Cyrus was un­ac­quaint­ed, the last fall of the bal­loon, the land­ing on this un­known land, which ap­peared a desert (what­ev­er it was, whether is­land or con­ti­nent), the dis­cov­ery of the Chim­neys, the search for him, not for­get­ting of course Neb’s de­vo­tion, the in­tel­li­gence ex­hib­it­ed by the faith­ful Top, as well as many oth­er mat­ters.

“But,” asked Hard­ing, in a still fee­ble voice, “you did not, then, pick me up on the beach?”

“No,” replied the re­porter.

“And did you not bring me to this cave?”

“No.”

“At what dis­tance is this cave from the sea?”

“About a mile,” replied Pen­croft; “and if you are as­ton­ished, cap­tain, we are not less sur­prised our­selves at see­ing you in this place!”

“In­deed,” said the en­gi­neer, who was re­cov­er­ing grad­ual­ly, and who took great in­ter­est in these de­tails, “in­deed it is very sin­gu­lar!”

“But,” re­sumed the sailor, “can you tell us what hap­pened af­ter you were car­ried off by the sea?”

Cyrus Hard­ing con­sid­ered. He knew very lit­tle. The wave had torn him from the bal­loon net. He sank at first sev­er­al fath­oms. On re­turn­ing to the sur­face, in the half light, he felt a liv­ing crea­ture strug­gling near him. It was Top, who had sprung to his help. He saw noth­ing of the bal­loon, which, light­ened both of his weight and that of the dog, had dart­ed away like an ar­row.

There he was, in the midst of the an­gry sea, at a dis­tance which could not be less than half a mile from the shore. He at­tempt­ed to strug­gle against the bil­lows by swim­ming vig­or­ous­ly. Top held him up by his clothes; but a strong cur­rent seized him and drove him to­wards the north, and af­ter half an hour of ex­er­tion, he sank, drag­ging Top with him in­to the depths. From that mo­ment to the mo­ment in which he re­cov­ered to find him­self in the arms of his friends he re­mem­bered noth­ing.

“How­ev­er,” re­marked Pen­croft, “you must have been thrown on to the beach, and you must have had strength to walk here, since Neb found your foot­marks!”

“Yes… of course replied the en­gi­neer, thought­ful­ly; “and you found no traces of hu­man be­ings on this coast?”

“Not a trace,” replied the re­porter; “be­sides, if by chance you had met with some de­liv­er­er there, just in the nick of time, why should he have aban­doned you af­ter hav­ing saved you from the waves?”

“You are right, my dear Spilett. Tell me, Neb,” added the en­gi­neer, turn­ing to his ser­vant, “it was not you who… you can’t have had a mo­ment of un­con­scious­ness… dur­ing which no, that’s ab­surd…. Do any of the foot­steps still re­main?” asked Hard­ing.

“Yes, mas­ter, replied Neb; “here, at the en­trance, at the back of the mound, in a place shel­tered from the rain and wind. The storm has de­stroyed the oth­ers.”

“Pen­croft,” said Cyrus Hard­ing, “will you take my shoe and see if it fits ex­act­ly to the foot­prints?”

The sailor did as the en­gi­neer re­quest­ed. While he and Her­bert, guid­ed by Neb, went to the place where the foot­prints were to be found, Cyrus re­marked to the re­porter,–

“It is a most ex­traor­di­nary thing!”

“Per­fect­ly in­ex­pli­ca­ble!” replied Gideon Spilett.

“But do not dwell up­on it just now, my dear Spilett, we will talk about it by-​and-​by.”

A mo­ment af­ter the oth­ers en­tered.

There was no doubt about it. The en­gi­neer’s shoe fit­ted ex­act­ly to the foot­marks. It was there­fore Cyrus Hard­ing who had left them on the sand.

“Come,” said he, “I must have ex­pe­ri­enced this un­con­scious­ness which I at­tribut­ed to Neb. I must have walked like a som­nam­bu­list, with­out any knowl­edge of my steps, and Top must have guid­ed me here, af­ter hav­ing dragged me from the waves… Come, Top! Come, old dog!”

The mag­nif­icent an­imal bound­ed bark­ing to his mas­ter, and ca­ress­es were lav­ished on him. It was agreed that there was no oth­er way of ac­count­ing for the res­cue of Cyrus Hard­ing, and that Top de­served all the hon­or of the af­fair.

To­wards twelve o’clock, Pen­croft hav­ing asked the en­gi­neer if they could now re­move him, Hard­ing, in­stead of re­ply­ing, and by an ef­fort which ex­hib­it­ed the most en­er­get­ic will, got up. But he was obliged to lean on the sailor, or he would have fall­en.

“Well done!” cried Pen­croft; “bring the cap­tain’s lit­ter.”

The lit­ter was brought; the trans­verse branch­es had been cov­ered with leaves and long grass. Hard­ing was laid on it, and Pen­croft, hav­ing tak­en his place at one end and Neb at the oth­er, they start­ed to­wards the coast. There was a dis­tance of eight miles to be ac­com­plished; but, as they could not go fast, and it would per­haps be nec­es­sary to stop fre­quent­ly, they reck­oned that it would take at least six hours to reach the Chim­neys. The wind was still strong, but for­tu­nate­ly it did not rain. Al­though ly­ing down, the en­gi­neer, lean­ing on his el­bow, ob­served the coast, par­tic­ular­ly in­land. He did not speak, but he gazed; and, no doubt, the ap­pear­ance of the coun­try, with its in­equal­ities of ground, its forests, its var­ious pro­duc­tions, were im­pressed on his mind. How­ev­er, af­ter trav­el­ing for two hours, fa­tigue over­came him, and he slept.

At half-​past five the lit­tle band ar­rived at the precipice, and a short time af­ter at the Chim­neys.

They stopped, and the lit­ter was placed on the sand; Cyrus Hard­ing was sleep­ing pro­found­ly, and did not awake.

Pen­croft, to his ex­treme sur­prise, found that the ter­ri­ble storm had quite al­tered the as­pect of the place. Im­por­tant changes had oc­curred; great blocks of stone lay on the beach, which was al­so cov­ered with a thick car­pet of sea-​weed, al­gae, and wrack. Ev­ident­ly the sea, pass­ing over the islet, had been car­ried right up to the foot of the enor­mous cur­tain of gran­ite. The soil in front of the cave had been torn away by the vi­olence of the waves. A hor­rid pre­sen­ti­ment flashed across Pen­croft’s mind. He rushed in­to the pas­sage, but re­turned al­most im­me­di­ate­ly, and stood mo­tion­less, star­ing at his com­pan­ions…. The fire was out; the drowned cin­ders were noth­ing but mud; the burnt linen, which was to have served as tin­der, had dis­ap­peared! The sea had pen­etrat­ed to the end of the pas­sages, and ev­ery­thing was over­thrown and de­stroyed in the in­te­ri­or of the Chim­neys!