The Castaways Read Online Free Page A

think your father would be happy with how we turned out.”
    I shook my head. “He wouldn’t.”
    “We never should have drawn them lots,” said Boggis.
    “But we did,” said Weedle. “So kill him, Tom. It’s time!”
    “I won’t. I can’t.” I stared at them all, each in turn. “Look, I’ll take Midgely’s place,” I said. “I’ll take his lot as mine.”
    Midge shouted, “No!” He groped out and took hold of my arm, as though he believed I was already trying to throw myself into the sea. “Please, Tom. We did it fair and proper, didn’t we?”
    I picked up the five lots and placed them in his hand, sothat he might know it all had been done properly, if not fairly. He bunched them together, not even feeling for the knot. “Let’s do it now,” he said. “Just give me a moment first.”
    The axe was passed from Penny to Weedle to me. I led Midgely to the bow. He laid himself down, on his side, with not so much as a whimper. I rubbed his arm, then ran my fingers through his hair as he spoke to me softly.
    “It was supposed to be Penny,” he said. “But I was too eager, weren’t I? It’s justice, Tom.”
    “Justice? Why, there’s no justice here.” I felt as though my heart had been torn away. “It’s the curse, Midge. It’s that dreadful diamond.”
    “No, it ain’t that, Tom. Luck was never with me, that’s all.” He put his hand in mine. “I was never meant to inherit no earth.”
    Benjamin Penny came creeping forward. “You’re wasting time,” he said. “Bash his head or I’ll do it myself.”
    “Get back!” I shouted. “He can take as long as he wants.”
    But Midgely squeezed my hand and said, “I’m ready now.” He closed his eyes. “Quick, Tom. One clean blow so’s I don’t have to drown, and put me quick into the sea.”
    Midgely covered his eyes with his fingers. Underneath, he was squinting, waiting for the blow that would be his end. But I couldn’t do it. For the first time in my life I cared more for another than I did for myself. I dropped the axe and crouched there, weeping.
    “Do it!” screamed Benjamin Penny.
    He lurched along the boat and took up the axe. His webbed fingers wrapped round the handle.
    Gaskin Boggis came lumbering after him, shouting atPenny to stop. He made the boat rock and plunge. “Give me the axe!” he shouted.
    I threw myself down to shield poor Midge, willing to take the blow in his place.
    But it never came. Boggis snatched the axe from Benjamin Penny and hurled it into the sea. “There’s a ship!” he said. “There’s a ship out there.”
    It was a long moment before I could raise myself to the shattered planks and look out where Boggis showed me. I saw masts and sun-bleached canvas, and the dark hull of a ship.
    “You see?” said Boggis. “I told you.”
    The ship came slowly on a breeze that barely rippled the water. It was old and weather-beaten, the sails all akimbo, the rigging in shreds. If the weather hadn’t been so fine and steady, I would have sworn the ship had only just emerged from a raging storm.
    Benjamin Penny gazed out at the ship with a look that chilled my blood. In his eyes was bitterness and disappointment! He had known the ship was coming—I could see it plainly—and he’d clamored for Midgely’s execution even as rescue was on the way.
    But as far as Midgely knew, it was a miracle that had saved him. He clasped his hands and said a prayer before he asked me, “What does she look like, Tom?”
    “Strange,” I said.
    Long ropes streamed from the masts and the yards. A great bowsprit held sail after sail, and not one of them properly set. The enormous square courses were drawn up at theircorners, giving the ship the look of a haggard old woman holding her skirts clear from the water.
    The ship veered to left and right with a rippling of canvas. The sails collapsed as it rounded up to the wind, and all the loose ropes—the sheets and braces—flogged the sails like the whips of a lion tamer.