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Bunyip Land: A Story of Adventure in New Guinea, a novel by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 6. How Jimmy Was Frightened By The Bunyip |
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_ CHAPTER SIX. HOW JIMMY WAS FRIGHTENED BY THE BUNYIP "Oh, I don't know that I've got any more to say about it," said Jack Penny to me as we sat next day in the bows of the schooner, with our legs dangling over the side. "I heard all about your going, and there was nothing to do at home now, so I said to myself that I'd go, and here I am." "Yes, here you are," I said; "but you don't mean to tell me that you intended to go up the country with us?" "Yes, I do," he said. "Nonsense, Jack! it is impossible!" I said warmly. "I say!" "Well?" "New Guinea don't belong to you, does it?" "Why, of course not." "Oh, I thought p'r'aps you'd bought it." "Don't talk nonsense, Jack." "Don't you talk nonsense then, and don't you be so crusty. If I like to land in New Guinea, and take a walk through the country, it's as free for me as it is for you, isn't it?" "Of course it is." "Then just you hold your tongue, Mister Joe Carstairs; and if you don't like to walk along with me, why you can walk by yourself." "And what provisions have you made for the journey?" I said. "Oh, I'm all right, my lad!" he drawled. "Father lent me his revolver, and I've got my double gun, and two pound o' powder and a lot o' shot." "Anything else?" "Oh, I've got my knife, and a bit o' string, and two fishing-lines and a lot of hooks, and I brought my pipe and my Jew's-harp, and I think that's all." "I'm glad you brought your Jew's-harp," I said ironically. "So am I," he said drily. "Yah! I know: you're grinning at me, but a Jew's-harp ain't a bad thing when you're lonely like, all by yourself, keeping sheep and nobody to speak to for a week together but Gyp. I say, Joe, I brought Gyp," he added with a smile that made his face look quite pleasant. "What! your dog?" I cried. "Yes; he's all snug down below, and he hasn't made a sound. He don't like it, but if I tell him to do a thing he knows he's obliged to do it." "I say, I wonder what the captain will say if he knows you've got a dog on board?" "I sha'n't tell him, and if he don't find it out I shall pay him for Gyp's passage just the same as I shall pay him for mine. I've got lots of money, and I hid on board to save trouble. I ain't a cheat." "No, I never thought you were, Jack," I said, for I had known him for some years, and once or twice I had been fishing with him, though we were never companions. "But it's all nonsense about your going with us. The doctor said this morning that the notion was absurd." "Let him mind his salts-and-senna and jollop," said Jack sharply. "Who's he, I should like to know? I knowed your father as much as he did. He's given me many a sixpence for birds' eggs and beetles and snakes I've got for him. Soon as I heard you were going to find him, I says to father, 'I'm going too.'" "And what did your father say?" "Said I was a fool." "Ah! of course," I exclaimed. "No, it ain't 'ah, of course,' Mr Clever," he cried. "Father always says that to me whatever I do, but he's very fond of me all the same." Just then the captain came forward with his glass under his arm, and his hands deep down in his pockets. He walked with his legs very wide apart, and stopped short before us, his straw hat tilted right over his nose, and see-sawing himself backwards and forwards on his toes and heels. "You're a nice young man, arn't you now?" he said to Jack. "No, I'm only a boy yet," said Jack quietly. "Well, you're tall enough to be a man, anyhow. What's your height?" "Five foot 'leven," said Jack. "And how old are you?" "Seventeen next 'vember," said Jack. "Humph!" said the captain. "Here, how much is it?" said Jack, thrusting his hand in his pocket. "I'll pay now and ha' done with it." "Pay what?" "My passage-money." "Oh!" said the captain quietly, "I see. Well, I think we'd better settle that by-and-by when you bring in claim for salvage." The captain pronounced it "sarvidge," and Jack stared. "What savage?" he said. "Do you mean Joe Carstairs' black fellow?" "Do I mean Joe Carstairs' grandmother, boy? I didn't say savage; I said salvage--saving of the ship from pirates." "Oh, I see what you mean," replied Jack. "I sha'n't bring in any claim. I knew that Malay chap wasn't doing right, and stopped him, that's all." "Well, we won't say any more about stowing away, then," said the captain. "Had plenty to eat this morning?" "Oh yes, I'm better now," drawled Jack. "I was real bad yesterday, and never felt so hollow before." The captain nodded and went back, while Jack turned to me, and nodding his head said slowly: "I like the captain. Now let's go and see how your black fellow's head is." Jimmy was lying under a bit of awning rigged up with a scrap of the storm-torn sail; and as soon as he saw us his white teeth flashed out in the light. "Well, Jimmy, how are you?" I said, as Jack Penny stood bending down over him, and swaying gently to and fro as if he had hinges in his back. "Jimmy better--much better. Got big fly in um head--big bunyip fly. All buzz--buzz--round and round--buzz in um head. Fedge doctor take um out." "Here, doctor," I shouted; and he came up. "Jimmy has got a fly in his head." "A bee in his bonnet, you mean," he said, bending down and laying his hand on the black's temples. "Take um out," said Jimmy excitedly. "Buzz--buzz--bunyip fly." "Yes, I'll take it out, Jimmy," said the doctor quietly; "but not to-day." "When take um out?" cried the black eagerly; "buzz--buzz. Keep buzz." "To-morrow or next day. Here, lie still, and I'll get your head ready for the operation." The preparation consisted in applying a thick cloth soaked in spirits and water to the feverish head, the evaporation in the hot climate producing a delicious sense of coolness, which made Jimmy say softly: "Fly gone--sleep now," and he closed his eyes, seeming to be asleep till the doctor had gone back to his seat on the deck, where he was studying a chart of the great island we were running for. But as soon as he was out of hearing Jimmy opened first one eye and then another. Then in a whisper, as he gently took up his waddy: "No tell doctor; no tell captain fellow. Jimmy go knock brown fellow head flap to-night." "What?" I cried. "He no good brown fellow. Knock head off. Overboard: fis eat up." "What does he say; he's going to knock that Malay chap's head off?" drawled Jack. "Yes, Jimmy knock um head flap." "You dare to touch him, Jimmy," I said, "and I'll send you back home." "Jimmy not knock um head flap?" he said staring. "No. You're not to touch him." "Mass Joe gone mad. Brown fellow kill all a man. Jimmy kill um." "You are not to touch him," I said. "And now go to sleep or I shall go and tell the captain." Jimmy lifted up his head and looked at me. Then he banged it down upon his pillow, which was one of those gooseberry-shaped rope nets, stuffed full of oakum, and called a fender, while we went forward once more to talk to the doctor about his chart, for Jack Penny was comporting himself exactly as if he had become one of the party, though I had made up my mind that he was to go back with the captain when we were set ashore. All the same, at Jack Penny's urgent request I joined him in the act of keeping the presence of the other passenger a secret--I mean Gyp the dog, to whom I was stealthily introduced by Jack, down in a very evil-smelling part of the hold, and for whom I saved scraps of meat and bits of fish from my dinner every day. The introduction was as follows on the part of Jack: "Gyp, old man, this is Joe Carstairs. Give him your paw." It was very dark, but I was just able to make out a pair of fiery eyes, and an exceedingly shaggy curly head--I found afterwards that Gyp's papa had been an Irish water spaniel, and his mamma some large kind of hound; and Jack informed me that Gyp was a much bigger dog than his mamma--then a rough scratchy paw was dabbed on my hand, and directly after my fingers were wiped by a hot moist tongue. At the same time there was a whimpering noise, and though I did not know it then, I had made one of the ugliest but most faithful friends I ever had. The days glided by, and we progressed very slowly, for the weather fell calm after the typhoon, and often for twenty-four hours together we did nothing but drift about with the current, the weather being so hot that we were glad to sit under the shade of a sail. The doctor quite took to Jack Penny, saying that he was an oddity, but not a bad fellow. I began to like him better myself, though he did nothing to try and win my liking, being very quiet and distant with us both, and watching us suspiciously, as if he thought we were always making plots to get rid of him, and thwart his plans. Gyp had remained undiscovered, the poor brute lying as quiet as a mouse, except when Jack Penny and I went down to feed him, when he expressed his emotion by rapping the planks hard with his tail. At last the captain, who had been taking observations, tapped me on the shoulder one hot mid-day, and said: "There, squire, we shall see the coast to-morrow before this time, and I hope the first thing you set eyes on will be your father, waving his old hat to us to take him off." Just then Jimmy, whose wound had healed rapidly, and who had forgotten all about the big bunyip fly buzzing in his head, suddenly popped his face above the hatchway with his eyes starting, his hair looking more shaggy than usual, and his teeth chattering with horror. He leaped up on the deck, and began striking it with the great knob at the end of his waddy, shouting out after every blow. "Debble, debble--big bunyip debble. Jimmy, Jimmy see big bunyip down slow!" "Here, youngster, fetch my revolver," shouted the captain to me. "Here, doctor, get out your gun, that Malay chap's loose again." "A no--a no--a no," yelled Jimmy, banging at the deck. "Big bunyip--no brown fellow--big black bunyip debble, debble!" "Get out, you black idiot; it's the Malay." "A no--a no--a no; big black bunyip. 'Gin eat black fellow down slow." To my astonishment, long quiet Jack Penny went up to Jimmy and gave him a tremendous kick, to which the black would have responded by a blow with his war-club had I not interposed. "What did you kick him for, Jack?" I cried. "A great scuffle-headed black fool! he'll let it out now about Gyp. Make him be quiet." It was too late, for the captain and the doctor were at the hatchway, descending in spite of Jimmy's shouts and cries that the big bunyip--the great typical demon of the Australian aborigine--would eat them. "Shoot um--shoot um--bing, bang!" _whop_ went Jimmy's waddy on the deck; and in dread lest they should fire at the unfortunate dog in the dark, I went up and told the captain, the result being that Gyp was called up on deck, and the great beast nearly went mad with delight, racing about, fawning on his master and on me, and ending by crouching down at my feet with his tongue lolling out, panting and blinking his eyes, unaccustomed to the glare of daylight. "You're in this game, then, eh, Master Carstairs?" said the captain. "Well, yes, sir; Penny here took me into his confidence about having brought the dog, and of course I could not say a word." "Humph! Nice game to have with me, 'pon my word. You're a pretty penny, you are, young man," he added, turning to Jack. "I ought to toss you--overboard." "I'll pay for Gyp's passage," said Jack coolly. "I wish you wouldn't make such a fuss." The captain muttered something about double-jointed yard measures, and went forward without another word, while Gyp selected a nice warm place on the deck, and lay down to bask on his side, but not until he had followed Jimmy up the port-side and back along the starboard, sniffing his black legs, while that worthy backed from him, holding his waddy ready to strike, coming to me afterwards with a look of contempt upon his noble savage brow, and with an extra twist to his broad nose, to say: "Jimmy know all a time only big ugly dog. Not bunyip 'tall." _ |
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