CHAPTER 20 – CAVE

I was hiding my activity on the island as much as possible. I was very careful. I tried not to be loud. I was worried when I made a fire. But I needed fire because I needed to cook. So when I made a fire, I tried to make as little smoke as possible. Smoke could go very high and it could be seen from a distance.

Once I discovered a small cave in the forest near the beach. I went inside, but when my eyes were OK with the dark, I saw two eyes which were looking at me. I jumped outside. I was scared to death. I waited but nothing happened. I went slowly to the beginning of the cave and I listened. I heard something. It sounded as if there was somebody injured inside. I took my gun and I entered the cave slowly. When my eyes could see again, I discovered an old goat. It was dying in the cave.

I returned to the cave the next day. I found that the goat was dead. I looked around the place and I saw that it was very safe. I thought, “It will be a good place near the beach where I could hide.” So I brought some of my guns and some gunpowder there.

It was twenty-three years since my first moment on this island. I was living comfortably now and I had many animals around me. Poll was repeating my name and some other words very nicely. I had two more parrots and I taught the parrots to say my name. I had more than thirty goats.

It was the last month of my twenty-third year on the island. I was walking to my fields early one morning when I saw fire on the beach.

I immediately returned to my house and I prepared all my guns. I took my telescope and I went close to the beach. I hid myself and I watched what was happening on the beach.

I saw nine naked people. They had two canoes. It looked like that they were waiting for the high tide.

When they left, I went to the beach. The beach was full of blood and bones again. This made me angry. “I will kill as many of the cannibals as possible next time when I see them,” I thought. But they didn’t return for a long time.

One day in the evening after a big storm,something happened which disturbed me. I heard the sound of a gun at sea. I got out of my house and I saw a light which was coming from the sea. A second shot followed. I thought that it was coming from a ship in danger which was asking for help. I took a lot of dry wood and I ran to the beach where I made a big fire. They probably saw the fire because they fired again. I thought, “I will speak to somebody tonight. This is great.”

I kept the fire until midnight but nobody came to my beach. It was strange. It was something what I couldn’t understand. “Maybe in the morning I will know more,” I thought.

WORDS FROM CHAPTER 20