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The beggars won't find you, let them hunt as they like; they daren't come near this place, bless you, it's an 'Arnt;" by which he meant that it was haunted. "Well," said I, "but how should we be any better off to-morrow morning?" "That's just it, sir," said Bludger.
The crowd deserted us, and gathered about him. I threw myself on the sand, weary, hopeless, parched with thirst, and racked with pain. Bludger was already lying in a crumpled mass at my feet. I think he had fainted. I retained consciousness, but that was all. The fierceness of the sun beat upon me, the sky and sea and shore swam before me in a mist.
His shirt and trousers were torn and dripping; apparently he had been washed ashore, like myself, after the storm, and had been found and brought into the town by some of the fishing population. What a blow to all my hopes was the wholly unlooked-for arrival of this tipsy, irreclaimable seaman, this unawakened Bill Bludger!
I gave a hollow groan as these reflections passed through my mind, and this appeared to afford William Bludger some consolation. "You don't seem to like it yourself, Capt'n; what's your advice? We're both in the same boat; leastways I wish we were in a boat; anyhow we're both in the same hole." There was no denying this, and it was high time to mature some plan of escape.
Man after man spoke, and finally the chief rose, as I had little doubt, to sum up the discussion. He pointed to myself, and to William Bludger alternately, and the words which I had already noted, Thargeelyah, and farmakoi, frequently recurred in his speech. His ideas seemed to meet with general approval; even the old priest laid aside his sickle, and beat applause with his hands.
Nothing was left to me but my hat and spectacles, which, for some religious reason I presume, I was, fortunately, allowed to retain. Then I was driven with blows, which hurt a great deal, into the market-place, and up to the great altar, where William Bludger, also naked, was lying more dead than alive. "William," I said solemnly, "what cheer?" He did not answer me.
"Hi!" he said again, and when I exclaimed, naturally, "Hullo!" he put his finger on his lips, and beckoned to me to join him. This I did, and found that he was lurking in a cavern under the group of grey weather- worn stones. When I entered the cave, Bludger fell a-trembling so violently that he could not speak. He seemed in the utmost alarm, his face quite ashen with terror.
I had afterwards too good reason to estimate their dreadful lack of the ordinary feelings of humanity at its true value. They now began to return to their homes, and Bludger, crowned with flowers that became him but ill, was carried off, not, as it seemed to me, without even a reverential demeanour on the part of his escort.
Rocked on the smooth green swell of the sea, beneath the white rocks, I was brooding over these and many other matters, when I heard sudden and violent movements in the deep vegetation on the hillside. The laurel groves were stirred, and Bill Bludger, with a basket in his hand, bounded down the slope, and swam for dear life to the boat.
At last the east grew faintly grey, and we started, not keeping together, but Bludger marching cautiously in my rear, at a considerable distance. We only met one person, a dissipated young man, who, I greatly fear, had been paying his court to a shepherdess in the hills.
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