The Lonely Island: The Refuge of the Mutineers

“Ship ahoy!” shouted Thursday, in the true nautical style which he had learned from Adams.

If the eyes of the men who looked over the side of the ship were wide open with surprise before, they seemed to blaze with amazement at the next remark by Thursday.

“Where d’ye hail from, an’ what’s your name?” he asked, as Charlie made fast to the rope which was thrown to them.

“The Topaz, from America, Captain Folger,” answered the captain, with a smile.

With an agility worthy of monkeys, and that might have justified Jack and Bill looking for tails, the brothers immediately stood on the deck, and holding out their hands, offered with affable smiles to shake hands. We need scarcely say the offer was heartily accepted by every one of the crew.

“And who may you be, my good fellows?” asked Captain Folger, with an amused expression.

“I am Thursday October Christian,” answered the youth, drawing himself up as if he were announcing himself the king of the Cannibal Islands. “I’m the oldest son of Fletcher Christian, one of the mutineers of the Bounty, an’ this is my brother Charlie.”

The sailors glanced at each other and then at the stalwart youths, as if they doubted the truth of the assertion.

“I’ve heard of that mutiny,” said Captain Folger. “It was celebrated enough to make a noise even on our side of the Atlantic. If I remember rightly, most of the mutineers were caught on Otaheite and taken to England, being wrecked and some drowned on the way; the rest were tried, and some acquitted, some pardoned, and some hanged.”

“I know nothin’ about all that,” said Thursday, with an interested but perplexed look.

“But I do, sir,” said the man whom we have styled Jack, touching his hat to the captain. “I’m an Englishman, as you knows, an’ chanced to be in England at the very time when the mutineers was tried. There was nine o’ the mutineers, sir, as went off wi’ the Bounty from Otaheite, an’ they’ve never bin heard on from that day to this.”

“Yes, yes!” exclaimed Thursday, with sudden animation, “that’s us. The nine mutineers came to our island here, Pitcairn, an’ remained here ever since, an’ we’ve all bin born here; there’s lots more of us,—boys and girls.”

“You don’t say so!” exclaimed the captain, whose interest was now thoroughly aroused. “Are the nine mutineers all on Pitcairn still?”

Thursday’s mobile countenance at once became profoundly sad, and he shook his head slowly.

“No,” said he, “they’re all dead but one. John Adams is his name.”

“Don’t remember that name among the nine said to be lost,” remarked the Englishman.

“I’ve heard father say he was sometimes called John Smith,” said Thursday.

“Ah, yes! I remember the name of Smith,” said Jack. “He was one of ’em.”

“And is he the only man left on the island?” asked the captain.

“Yes, the only man,” replied Thursday, who had never yet thought of himself in any other light than a boy; “an’ if you’ll come ashore in our canoe, father’ll take you to his house an’ treat you to the best he’s got. He’ll be right glad to see you too, for he’s not seen a soul except ourselves for nigh twenty years.”

“Not seen a soul! D’ye mean to say no ship has touched here for that length of time?” asked the captain in surprise.

“No, except one that only touched an’ went off without discovering that we were here, an’ none of us found out she had bin here till we chanced to see her sailin’ away far out to sea. That was five years ago.”

“That’s very strange and interestin’. I’d like well to visit old Adams, lad, an’ I thank ’ee for the invitation; but I won’t run my ship through such a surf as that, an’ don’t like to risk leavin’ her to go ashore in your canoe.”

“If you please, sir, I’d be very glad to go, an’ bring off what news there is,” said Jack, the English sailor, whose surname was Brace.

At first Captain Folger refused this offer, but on consideration he allowed Jack to go, promising at the same time to keep as near to the shore as possible, so that if there was anything like treachery he might have a chance of swimming off.

“So your father is dead?” asked the captain, as he walked with Thursday to the side.

“Yes, long, long ago.”

“But you called Adams ‘father’ just now. How’s that?”

“Oh, we all calls ’im that. It’s only a way we’ve got into.”

“What made your father call you Thursday?”

“’Cause I was born on a Thursday.”

“H’m I an’ I suppose if you’d bin born on a Tuesday or Saturday, he’d have called you by one or other of these days?”

“S’pose so,” said Thursday, with much simplicity.

“Are you married, Thursday?”

“Yes, I’m married to Susannah,” said Thursday, with a pleased smile; “she’s a dear girl, though she’s a deal older than me—old enough to be my mother. And I’ve got a babby too—a splendid babby!”

Thursday passed ever the side as he said this, and fortunately did not see the merriment which him remarks created.

Jack Brace followed him into the canoe, and in less than half-an-hour he found himself among the wondering, admiring, almost awestruck, islanders of Pitcairn.

“It’s a man!” whispered poor Mainmast to Susannah, with the memory of Fletcher Christian strong upon her.

“What a lovely beard he has!” murmured Sally to Bessy Mills.

Charlie Christian and Matt Quintal chancing, curiously enough, to be near Sally and Bessy, overheard the whisper, and for the first time each received a painful stab from the green-eyed demon, jealousy.

But the children did not whisper their comments. They crowded round the seaman eagerly.

“You’ve come to live with us?” asked Dolly Young, looking up in his face with an innocent smile, and taking his rough hand.

“To tell us stories?” said little Arthur Quintal, with an equally innocent smile.

“Well, no, my dears, not exactly,” answered the seaman, looking in a dazed manner at the pretty faces and graceful forms around him; “but if I only had the chance to remain here, it’s my belief that I would.”

Further remark was stopped by the appearance of John Adams coming towards the group. He walked slowly, and kept his eyes steadily, yet wistfully, fastened on the seaman. Holding out his hand, he said in a low tone, as if he were soliloquising, “At last! It’s like a dream!” Then, as the sailor grasped his hand and shook it warmly, he added aloud a hearty “Welcome, welcome to Pitcairn.”

“Thank ’ee, thank ’ee,” said Jack Brace, not less heartily; “an’ may I ax if you are one o’ the Bounty mutineers, an’ no mistake?”

“The old tone,” murmured Adams, “and the old lingo, an’ the old cut o’ the jib, an’—an’—the old toggery.”

He took hold of a flap of Jack’s pea-jacket, and almost fondled it.

“Oh, man, but it does my heart good to see you! Come, come away up to my house an’ have some grub. Yes, yes—axin’ your pardon for not answerin’ right off—I am one o’ the Bounty mutineers; the last one—John Smith once, better known now as John Adams. But where do you hail from, friend?”

Jack at once gave him the desired information, told him on the way up all he knew about the fate of the mutineers who had remained at Otaheite, and received in exchange a brief outline of the history of the nine mutineers who had landed on Pitcairn.