Island of the Blue Dolphins

20

I gathered two more canoe-loads of abalones soon after that, mostly the sweet red ones, which I cleaned and carried to the house. Along the south part of the fence where the sun shone most of the day, I built long shelves out of branches and put the meat up to dry. Abalones are larger than your hand and twice as thick when fresh, but they shrink small in the sun so you have to dry many.

In the old days on the island there were children to keep away the gulls, which would rather feast on abalones than anything else. In one morning, if the meat was left unguarded, they could fly off with a month's harvest.

At first, whenever I went to the spring or to the beach, I left Rontu behind to chase them off, but he did not like this and howled all the time I was gone. Finally I tied strings to some of the abalone shells and hung them from poles. The insides of the shells are bright and catch the sun and they turn one way and another in the wind. After that I had little trouble with the gulls.

I also caught small fish in a net I had made and hung them up to dry for winter light. With meat drying on the shelves and the shells flashing and turning in the wind and the strings of fish hanging on the fence, the yard looked as if a whole village were living there on the headland instead of just Rontu and me.

Every morning after I had gathered food for winter, we went out on the sea. At the end of summer I would gather roots and seeds to store, but now there was nothing that needed to be done. We went many places those first days of summer — to the beach where the sea elephants lived, to Black Cave which was even larger than the first cave we found, and to Tall Rock where the cormorants roosted.

Tall Rock was more than a league from the island and was black and shimmering because it was covered with cormorants. I killed ten of the birds the first time we went there and I skinned and fleshed them and put them out to dry, for someday I wanted to make myself a skirt of cormorant feathers.

Black Cave was on the south coast of the island, near the place where the canoes were stored. In front of the cave was a high ledge of rocks surrounded by deep kelp beds, and I would have paddled by it if I had not seen a sea-hawk fly out. The sun was in the west and I had a long way to go to reach home, but I was curious about the hawk and the place he lived in.

The opening of the cave was small, like the one in the cave under the headland, and Rontu and I had to crouch low to get through. Weak light came from outside and I saw that we were in a room with black, shining walls that curved high overhead. At the far end of the room was another small opening. It was long and very dark, but when we reached the end of it we were in another room which was larger than the first and lit with a shaft of light. The light came from the sun, which shone down through a jagged crack in the ceiling.

Seeing the sun shining down and the black shadows drifting over the walls, Rontu barked, then began to howl. The sound echoed through the cave like the howling of a whole pack of dogs. It sent a cold feeling down my back.

‘Be quiet!’ I shouted, putting my hand over his jaws. My words echoed and echoed in the room.

I turned the canoe around and started back towards the opening. Above it, on a deep ledge that ran from one side of the room to the other, my gaze fell upon a row of strange figures. There must have been two dozen of them standing against the black wall. They were as tall as I, with long arms and legs and short bodies made of reeds and clothed in gull feathers. Each one had eyes fashioned of round or oblong disks of abalone shell, but the rest of their faces were blank. The eyes glittered down at me, moved as the light on the water moved and was reflected upon them. They were more alive than the eyes of those who live.

In the middle of the group was a seated figure, a skeleton. It sat leaning against the wall with its knees drawn up and in its fingers, which were raised to its mouth, a flute of pelican bone.

There were other things there on the ledge, in the shadows among the standing figures, but having drifted far back in the room, I again paddled towards the opening. I had forgotten that the tide was coming in. To my great surprise the opening had narrowed. It was too small now for me to get through. We would have to stay there in the room until the tide went out, until dawn came.

I paddled to the far end of the cave. I did not look back at the glittering eyes of the figures on the ledge. I crouched in the bottom of the canoe and watched the shaft of light grow weak. The opening out to the sea grew smaller and finally disappeared. Night came and a star showed through the crevice overhead.

This star passed out of sight and another took its place. The tide lifted the canoe higher in the room, and as the water lapped against the walls it sounded like the soft music of a flute. It played many tunes through the long night and I slept little, watching the stars change. I knew that the skeleton who sat on the ledge playing his flute was one of my ancestors, and the others with the glittering eyes, though only images, were too, but still I was sleepless and afraid.

With the first light, another high tide almost setting, we left the cave. I did not look up at those standing quietly on the ledge or at the flute player playing for them, but paddled fast out into the morning sea. Nor did I look back.

‘I suppose this cave once had a name,’ I said to Rontu, who was as glad to be free as I was, ‘but I have never heard of it or heard it spoken about. We will call it Black Cave and never in all our days go there again.’

When we came back from our voyage to Tall Rock, I hid the canoe in the cave below the headland. It was hard work, but each time I would lift the canoe from the water and on to the ledge, even though I planned to go out the next morning.

Two summers had come and gone and the Aleut hunters had not returned, yet during these days I always looked for them. At dawn, as Rontu and I went down the cliff, I would watch the ocean for their sails. The summer air was clear and I could see many leagues. Wherever we went in the canoe I would never be gone longer than half a day. On the way home, I always paddled close to shore and looked for them.

It was the last time that we went to Tall Rock that the Aleuts came.

I had hidden the canoe and climbed the cliff with the ten cormorant skins slung over my back. At the top of the cliff I stood for a while gazing at the sea. There were some small clouds on the water. One of them, the smallest, did not look like the others, and as I watched, I saw that it was a ship.

The sun made bright scales on the water, but I could see clearly. There were two sails and it was a ship coming towards the island. For a long time I could not tell the colour of the sails. I wondered if it could be the white men, though now I thought about them little and seldom looked for them.

I left the cormorants hanging on the fence and went to the rock on the headland. I could see no better from the rock because the sun was low and the whole ocean was covered with light. Then as I stood there I remembered that the white men's ship would come from the east. This one had come from a different direction — from the north.

I still was not sure that it belonged to the Aleuts, but I decided to pack the things that I would take to the cave in the ravine. There was much to take — my two birds, the skirt I had made, the stone utensils, my beads and ear-rings, the cormorant feathers, and all of my baskets and weapons. The abalones were not yet dry so I would have to leave them.

When I had packed everything and put it beside the hole under the fence, I went back to the headland. I lay on the rock so I would not be seen and peered over its rim towards the north. For a moment I did not find the ship, and then I saw that it had travelled faster than I thought it would. It was already rounding the kelp bed, close to the rocks of Coral Cove. The last of the sun shone on the ship, on the bow, which was made like the beak of a bird, and on the two red sails.

I knew that the Aleuts would not come on shore in the dark, and that I had until morning to carry my things to the cave, but I did not wait. Most of the night I worked, making two trips to the cave. At dawn, when everything had been moved, I went back to the house for the last time. There I buried the ashes of my fires and threw sand over the shelves and the floor. I took down the shells I had put up to scare the gulls and tossed them and the abalones over the cliff. At last, with a pelican wing, I brushed away the marks of my feet. When I had finished, it looked as though no one had lived there for a long time.

By now the sun was up and I climbed on to the rock. The ship lay at anchor in the cove. Canoes were bringing goods to the shore and some were out in the kelp beds, beginning to hunt for otter. There was a fire on the shore and beside it, a girl. She was cooking something and I could see the fire shining on her hair.

I did not stay long on the headland. Always in the past I had gone to the ravine by a different way so as not to wear a trail. This time I went off towards the west, along the cliff, and then doubled back through the brush, being careful to leave no tracks. Rontu's prints did not matter because the Aleuts knew that there were dogs on the island.

The cave was very dark and I had trouble getting Rontu to go through the small opening. Only after I had crawled in and out several times would he follow me. I closed the opening with stones, and since I was tired, lay down and slept all that day. I slept until I could see the stars shining between the cracks in the rocks.