No Man's Island, Page 2

  CHAPTER I

  NO MAN'S ISLAND

  One hot August afternoon, a motor-boat, with a little dinghy in tow, wasthrashing its way up a narrow, winding river in Southern Wessex. Thestream, swollen by the drainage of overnight rain from the high moorsthat loomed in the hazy blue distance, was running riotously, castingbuffets of spray across the bows of the little craft, and tossing like acork the dinghy astern. On either side a dense entanglement of shrubs,bushes, and saplings overhung the water's edge, forming a sort oframpart or outwork for the taller trees behind.

  The occupants of the boat were three. Amidships, its owner, PhilWarrender, was dividing his attention between the engine and the tiller.Warrender was tall, lithe, swarthy, with crisp black hair which seemedto lift his cap as an irksome incubus. A little abaft of him sat JackArmstrong, bent forward over an Ordnance map: he had the lean,tight-skinned features, spare frame, and hard muscles of the athlete,and his hay-coloured hair was cropped as close as a prize-fighter's. Inthe bows, on the scrap of deck, Percy Pratt, facing the others, squattedcross-legged like an Oriental cobbler, and dreamily twanged a banjo. Hewas shorter and of stouter build than his companions, with a round,chubby face and brown curly hair clustering close to his poll, andcaressing the edge of his cap like the tendrils of a creeper. All threeboys were in their eighteenth year, and wore the flannels, caps, andblazers of their school Eleven.

  "We ought to be nearing this island," remarked Armstrong, looking upfrom his map. "I say, Pratt, you've been here before: can't youremember something about it?"

  Pratt thrummed his strings, smiled sweetly, and sang, in the head notesof a light tenor--

  "The roses have made me remember All that I tried to forget; The past with its pain comes back again, Filling my heart with----

  Sorry, old man, I've pitched it a bit too high. Lend me your ears whileI modulate from G to E flat."

  "Keep your Percy's Reliques for serenading the moon. You were here as akid; aren't we nearly there?"

  "'The past with its pain'--fact! It _was_ pain. My old uncle could beatany beak at licking. He made a very pretty criss-cross pattern on methat day--all for pinching a peach! Frightful temper he had. My peoplesaid it was due to sunstroke on his travels. Jolly lot of good being afamous traveller, if it makes you a beast. He was more ratty every timehe came home. I don't wonder my pater had a royal row with him, andhasn't been near the place since. Rough luck, to have to desert yourancestral dust-heap.

  "I try, try to forget you, But I only love you more."

  "Isn't that the island? Away there to starboard?" Warrender interposed."But I thought you said we might camp there, my Percy?"

  "True, sober Philip. We picnicked there in the days of yore."

  "Well, we'd have to do a week's clearing before we camped there now.Look at it!"

  Pratt swung lazily round on his elbow, and gazed over the starboardquarter towards the left bank. The river was parted by what wasevidently an island. The channel between it and the left bank was verynarrow, and almost impassable by reason of the low, overhangingbranches, which formed a tunnel of foliage. Warrender steered across thebroader channel towards the right bank, all three scanning the islandintently as they coasted along.

  "Shows how old Tempus fugit," said Pratt. "In the dim and distant ageswhen I was a kid that island was a lawn; now it's a wilderness. Thinkwhat your beardless cheeks will be like in ten years' time, Armstrong.See what Nature will do unless you use the razor. The place seems quitechanged somehow. But I'd never have believed trees could grow so fast.As we're not dicky birds, we certainly can't pitch our camp there.Drive on, old shover."

  The island was, indeed, to all appearances, more densely wooded than theriver banks. By the map scale it was about a third of a mile long, andat its widest part fully half as broad. Nowhere along its whole extentdid they see a spot suitable for camping.

  They ran past the island. The stream narrowed; the wooded character ofthe mainland banks was unchanged.

  "We might as well be on the Congo," growled Armstrong. "Are you sureyour uncle didn't bring back a bit of Africa in his carpet bag, Pratt,and plank it down here?"

  "Let the great big world keep turning, Never mind, if I've got you,"

  hummed Pratt. "Turn your eyes three points a-starboard, Armstrong, andyou'll see, peeping at you through the sylvan groves, the gables of myancestors' eligible and beautifully situated riverside residence. It'spretty nearly a quarter-mile from the river, but that's a detail."

  Warrender slowed down so that they might get a better view of thestately old house of which they caught glimpses through gaps in thewoodland.

  "You behold that ruined ivy-clad tower about a cable's length away fromit," Pratt went on. "Tradition saith that one of my ancestorsincarcerated there a foeman unworthy of his steel, and forgot to feedhim."

  "Well, I want my tea," said Armstrong. "We had next to no lunch, and Ican't live on memories."

  A sharp crack cut the air.

  "Some one's shooting in the woods ahead," said Warrender. "Perhapswe'll catch sight of them, and get a direction."

  "Why not make a polite inquiry of that woodland faun or satyr smoking aclay pipe yonder?" suggested Pratt, pointing with his banjo to the leftbank.

  On a tree-stump near the water's edge sat a thick-set man, square-faced,beetle-browed, blear-eyed, a cloth cap pushed back on his close-croppedbullet head, a red cloth tie knotted about his neck. He wore a rusty,much-rubbed velveteen jacket, corduroy breeches, and a pair of shabbyleggings. Warrender slowed down until the boat just held its ownagainst the current, and called--"Hi! can you tell us of a clear spacewhere we can camp?"

  The man looked suspiciously from one to another, chewing the stem of hispipe.

  "Can't," said he, surlily.

  "Surely there's a stretch of turf somewhere?" Warrender persisted.

  "Bain't. Not hereabouts. Woods, from here to village up along."

  "Nothing back on the island?"

  The man half closed his eyes, and again suspicion lurked in the glancehe gave the speaker.

  "No. No Man's Island be nought but furze and thicket. Nothinghereabouts. Better go on and doss at the Ferry Inn."

  Then, however, he leered, barely recovering his pipe as it slipped frombetween his discoloured teeth. "Ay, I were forgetting," he said with achuckle. "There be a patch farther up. Ay, that might suit 'ee. Aparty camped there last week. Ay, try en."

  He chuckled again. Warrender opened the throttle, and when the boat hadrun a few yards up a guffaw, quickly stifled, sounded astern.

  "Pleasant fellow," remarked Armstrong.

  "When you are near, the dullest day seems bright; Doubts disappear, my load of care grows light,"

  warbled Pratt. "But he didn't say which bank it's on."

  "We can't miss it," said Warrender,--"unless he was pulling our leg."

  Within three minutes, however, they found that the man had not misledthem. There was disclosed, on the right bank, a considerable stretch ofsmooth green sward, affording ample space for their bell-tent and thesimple impedimenta of their camp. Warrender ran the boat in, andhitched it to a sapling; then the three began to transfer theirequipment to the shore. Besides their tent, they had a Primus stove, akettle, a couple of saucepans, pots, cups and plates of enamel, pewterforks and, stainless knives, cases of provisions, three sleeping-bags,three folding stools, and other oddments.

  While Warrender and Armstrong were stretching and pegging out the tent,Pratt started the stove, filled the kettle from the river, and assembledsuch utensils as they needed for their tea. These operations werepunctuated by renewed sounds of shooting, which were drawing nearerthrough the woods that skirted the clearing.

  "I say, you chaps," cried Pratt, "I wonder if I talked nicely, if Icould coax out of them something gamey for supper to-night?"

  "Wouldn't you like to sing for your supper,
like little Tommy Tucker?"said Armstrong.

  "Excellent idea! As you know, I've got a select and extensiverepertoire, and--hallo! Here's my little dog Bingo."

  A retriever came trotting out of the wood, stopped in the middle of theclearing, and gazed for a moment inquiringly at the tent, just erected;then turned tail and trotted back.

  "A very gentlemanly dog," said Pratt. "No loud discordant bark, noinquisitive snuffling; evidence of good breeding and a kind master."

  "Hi, there!" called a loud voice. "What are you doing on my land? Whothe deuce gave you permission to camp?"

  A stout, florid, white-whiskered gentleman of some sixty years, wearinga loose shooting costume, and carrying a shot-gun under his arm, hurriedacross the clearing, the retriever at his heels.

  "I'm sorry, sir," said Warrender, politely. "We've come up the river,and this is the first suitable place we've found. If we had known----"

  "Known!" interrupted the stranger. "You knew it wasn't commonland--public property. If you didn't know, any one about here would havetold you."

  "Just so, sir. But we understood that a party had camped here a shortwhile ago, and----"

  "You understood, boy? And where did you get your information?"

  "From a gamekeeper sort of man a little below on the other bank.He----"

  "That'll do," snapped the sportsman. "Take down that tent. Clear upall this disgusting litter, and be off. The place reeks with paraffin.Look alive, now."

  "'CLEAR UP ALL THIS DISGUSTING LITTER.'"]

  In silence Warrender and Armstrong began to loosen the tent guys, whilePratt put out the stove and started to carry the properties down to theboat. He alone of the three showed no sign of feeling; his friendssometimes said that he was perennially happy because he was fat, not, ashe himself explained, because he had music in his soul. Warrender'smouth had hardened, his face grown pale--sure indications of wrath.Armstrong, on the contrary, had flushed over the cheek-bones, andexpended his anger in muscular energy, heaving unaided the tent to hisback, and carrying it, the pole, guys, and pegs, with the ease of acoal-porter. The landowner stood sternly on guard until the place wascleared.

  The boat moved off.

  "Dashed old curmudgeon!" growled Armstrong.

  "He and my uncle Ambrose would make a pretty pair," remarked Pratt."I'd give anything to hear a slanging match between 'em. Anything butthis," he added, taking up his banjo.

  "I had a little dog, And his name was Bingo.

  His master's name ought to be 'Stingo!' Eh, what?"

  "It happens to be Crawshay," said Warrender, pointing to a tree. Uponit was nailed a board, facing upstream, and bearing the half-obliteratedlegend, "Trespassers will be Prosecuted." Below this, however, in freshpaint, were the words, "Camping Prohibited.--D. CRAWSHAY."

  "Precisely; D. Crawshay," said Armstrong.