Blown to Bits or The Lonely Man of Rakata Part 7

"Good-bye, Ma.s.sa Nadgel, till to-morrer."

The negro waved his hand and, sauntering slowly back to his boat, remarked in an undertone, "I lub dat young feller!" Saying which, he resumed his greasing operations.

Of course Captain Roy made no objection to his son's proposal, though he freely gave his opinion that it was a wild-goose chase.

"However, lad, please yourself and you'll please me," he added; "and now, be particular to bear in mind that you've got to write to me every time you get within hail of a post-office or a pa.s.sing s.h.i.+p or steamer that may chance to be comin' this way, and in each letter be sure to tell me where you're goin' to next, so as I may send a letter there to you in case I want you to return sudden or otherwise. We mustn't lose touch, you see. You needn't write long screeds. I only want to know your whereabouts from time to time. For the rest--you can spin it out in yarns when you come back."

CHAPTER VI.

THE HERMIT OF RAKATA INTRODUCED.

Nothing worthy of particular note occurred during the boat-voyage along the northern sh.o.r.e of Java to Sunda Straits. A fair, steady breeze wafted them westward, and, on the morning of the third day, they came in sight of the comparatively small uninhabited island of Krakatoa.

The boat in which they voyaged, although a little one, had a small portion of the bow decked over, so that our hero and his sable friend could find shelter from the night air when disposed to sleep and from the fierce rays of the sun at noon.

By the advice of his father, Nigel had changed his sailor costume for the "sh.o.r.e-goin' toggery" in which he had landed on the Keeling Islands, as being more suitable to his new character as a traveller, namely, a white cloth cap with a peak in front and a curtain behind to protect his neck, a light-grey tunic belted at the waist, and a pair of strong canvas trousers. He had also purchased an old-fas.h.i.+oned double-barrelled fowling-piece, muzzle-loading and with percussion locks.

"For you see, Nigel," the captain had said, "it's all very well to use breech-loaders when you've got towns and railways and suchlike to supply you wi' cartridges, but when you've got to cruise in out-o'-the-way waters, there's nothin' like the old style. It's not difficult to carry a few thousand percussion-caps an' a bullet-mould about wi' you wherever you go. As to powder, why, you'll come across that 'most everywhere, an'

lead too; and, for the matter o' that, if your life depended on it you could shove a handful of gravel or a pen-knife or tooth-pick into your gun an' blaze away, but with a breech-loader, if you run out o'

cartridges, where are you?"

So, as Nigel could not say where he was, the percussion-gun had been purchased.

The peak of Rakata--the highest in the island--a little over 2600 feet, came in sight first; gradually the rest of the island rose out of the horizon, and ere long the rich tropical verdure became distinguishable.

Krakatoa--destined so soon to play a thrilling part in the world's history; to change the aspect of the heavens everywhere; to attract the wondering gaze of nearly all nations, and to devastate its immediate neighbourhood--is of volcanic origin, and, at the time we write of (1883) was beginning to awaken from a long, deep slumber of two hundred years. Its last explosion occurred in the year 1680. Since that date it had remained quiet. But now the tremendous subterranean forces which had originally called it into being were beginning to rea.s.sert their existence and their power. Vulcan was rousing himself again and beginning once more to blow his bellows. So said some of the sailors who were constantly going close past the island and through Sunda Straits, which may be styled the narrows of the world's highway to the China seas.

Subterranean forces, however, are so constantly at work more or less violently in those regions that people took little notice of these indications in the comparatively small island of Krakatoa, which was between five and six miles long by four broad.

As we have said, it was uninhabited, and lying as it does between Sumatra and Java, about sixteen miles from the former and over twenty miles from the latter, it was occasionally visited by fishermen. The hermit whom Nigel was about to visit might, in some sort, be counted an inhabitant, for he had dwelt there many years, but he lived in a cave which was difficult of access, and held communication with no one. How he spent his time was a mystery, for although his negro servant went to the neighbouring town of Anjer in Java for supplies, and sometimes to Batavia, as we have seen, no piece of inanimate ebony from the forest could have been less communicative than he. Indeed, our hero was the first to unlock the door of his lips, with that key of mysterious sympathy to which reference has already been made. Some of the bolder of the young fishermen of the neighbouring coasts had several times made futile efforts to find out where and how the hermit lived, but the few who got a glimpse of him at a distance brought back such a report that a kind of superst.i.tious fear of him was generated which kept them at a respectful distance.

He was ten feet high, some romancers said, with shoulders four feet broad, a chest like a sugar-hogshead, and a countenance resembling a compound of orang-utan and tiger.

Of course our hero knew nothing of these rumours, and as Moses declined to give any information regarding his master beyond that already given, he was left to the full play of his imagination.

Moses was quite candid about it. He made no pretence to shroud things in mystery.

"You mus' know, Ma.s.sa Nadgel," he said, as they slowly drew near to the island, "I's 'fraid ob 'im dough I lub 'im."

"But why do you love him, Moses?"

"'Cause he sabe my life an' set me free."

"Indeed? well, that is good reason. And why do you fear him?"

"Da's what I don' know, ma.s.sa," replied the negro with a puzzled look.

"Is he harsh, then?"

"No."

"Pa.s.sionate?"

"No. Gentle as a lamb."

"Strong?"

"Yes--oh! mighty strong an' big."

"Surely you're not afraid of his giving you a licking, Moses?"

"Oh no," returned the negro, with a smile of expansive benignity; "I's not 'fraid ob dat. I's bin a slabe once, got used to lickin's. Don't care nuffin' at all for a lickin'!"

"Then it must be that you're afraid of hurting his feelings, Moses, for I know of no other kind of fear."

"Pr'aps da's it!" said the negro with a bright look, "now I wouldn't wonder if you's right, Ma.s.sa Nadgel. It neber come into my head in dat light before. I used to be t'ink, t'inkin' ob nights--when I's tired ob countin' my fingers an' toes--But I couldn't make nuffin' ob it. _Now_ I knows! It's 'fraid I am ob hurtin' his feelin's."

In the excess of his satisfaction at the solution of this long-standing puzzle, Moses threw back his head, shut his eyes, opened his enormous mouth and chuckled.

By the time he had reversed this process they were sufficiently near to Krakatoa to distinguish all its features clearly, and the negro began to point out to Nigel its various localities. There were three prominent peaks on it, he said, named respectively, Perboewatan about 400 feet high, at the northern end of the island; Danan, near the centre, 1500 feet; and Rakata, at the southern end, over 2600 feet. It was high up on the sides of the last cone that the residence of the hermit was situated.

"And you won't tell me your master's name?" said Nigel.

Moses shook his woolly head. "No, sar, no. I's 'fraid ob him--he! he!

'fraid ob hurtin' his feelin's!"

"Well, never mind; I'll find it out from himself soon. By the way, what were you telling me about explosions yesterday when that little white gull came to admire your pretty face, and took off our attention?"

"Well, I dun know. Not got much to tell, only dar's bin rumblin' an'

grumblin's an' heavin's lately in de mountains as didn't use to be, an'

cracks like somet'in' bustin' down blow, an' ma.s.sa he shook 'is head two or free times an' look solemn. He don't often do dat--shook 'is head, I mean--for he mostly always looks solemn."

A few minutes later the boat, running through a narrow opening among the rocks into a small circular harbour not more than fifty yards in diameter, rested its keel gently on a little bed of pure yellow sand.

The sh.o.r.e there was so densely covered with bushes that the harbour might easily have been pa.s.sed without being observed.

Jumping ash.o.r.e, Moses made the painter fast to a tree.

"What a quiet, cosy place!" said Nigel, as he sprang on the beach and looked admiringly round.

"Yes, an' not easy to find if you don't knows 'im. We will leabe de boat here,--no danger ob bein' tooked away--an' den go up to de cave."

"Is it far?" asked Nigel.

"A good bit--near de top ob de mountain,"--answered the negro, who looked at his companion somewhat uneasily.