The Pirate Story Megapack. R.M. Ballantyne

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СКАЧАТЬ know what you’re after,” said Bart, impatiently. “What do you mean?”

      “Sure an we can tear up our coats an shirts, an make a rope that way; ony,” he added, thoughtfully, “it mightn’t be long enough, so it mightn’t.”

      “Nonsense,” said Bart; “you’re crazy. What do we want of a rope?”

      “Sure, to climb with.

      “How? Where would you fasten it?”

      “Fasten it, is it?” said Pat, in a dubious tone; “sure that same I niver thought of at all at all. I forgot all about it, so I did.”

      “Well, we’ll have to do something,” said Bart. “We can’t stand still here and die.”

      “There’s the bit of a pick here,” said Pat. “Sure an we ought to be able to do somethin with the pick, so we ought.”

      And with these words he stooped and lifted up the pickaxe which he had thrown in before they went down, and which, in the anguish and excitement which they had thus far felt, had been altogether forgotten.

      “We ought to do something with that,” said Bart.

      “It won’t do any good to more thin one of us,” said Pat, sadly, “for only one of us can use it at a time.”

      “Nonsense,” said Bart; “if one of us can only climb up, can’t he help the other?”

      “Sure an so he can,” said Pat; “an I niver thought of that, so I didn’t.”

      “I wonder if we can climb with that?” said Bart.

      “Sure an we can try,” said Pat; “an we ought to do somethin, so we ought.”

      With these words, he thrust the pick between two timbers, a few feet above his head, and then clutching it, he raised himself up to a level with the pick, in the easiest way possible. Hanging there for a moment, with his hands grasping the pick, and his feet stuck tight between the logs, he tried to raise himself higher. To do this, it was necessary to hold himself there, while removing the pick, and raising it to the logs farther up. But here was the fatal and insuperable difficulty; and this brought them exactly back to where they were before. Do what he would, his hands could not grasp the round logs with sufficient firmness to maintain a hold. After a few efforts he gave it up, and jumped down.

      Bart then tried, making his attempt at the corner of the pit, where the angle of the two sides favored him more. Striking the pick in between two logs, as high up as he could reach, he raised himself up as Pat had done, and then tried to lift himself higher. He found a place which he could grasp, and clinging to this with a convulsive effort, he raised the pick to the logs farther up, and succeeded in thrusting it into a new place. Then he drew himself up higher, and once more searched about for a place to grasp. But now no place could be found. In vain he tried to thrust his fingers between the logs; in vain he sought to grasp the round surface. It was a thing that could not be done. After a long but fruitless effort, Bart was compelled to give up. Yet he was not satisfied. He tried the other three corners of the pit in succession. In all of them his efforts met with the same result—failure, utter and hopeless.

      At length he flung down the pick, and stood panting.

      “Deed, thin, an I’m glad to see you back, so I am,” said Pat.

      “Glad!” said Bart.

      “Yis, glad I am; that same’s what I mane. I’d rather have you fail down here, than half way up. You niver cud go all the way; an if you had to turrun back when half way up, it’s a sore head I’d have watchin you; an you cud niver expict to git back here again without broken bones.”

      “If we only had one other pickaxe,” said Bart, “I could do it.”

      “Of coorse you cud; an if we had dizens of other thing, you cud do it, so you cud, an so cud I; but there’s the throuble, an that’s what we’ve got to contind against, so it is.”

      “We’ll have to do something,” said Bart, gloomily and desperately.

      “Sure an that’s thrue for you, so it is, an you niver spoke a thruer word in yer life, so you didn’t,” said Pat; “an be the same token, it’s with this pick, so it is, that we’ve got to work,—for it’s the only thing we’ve got at all at all.”

      “What can we do,” said Bart, in the same gloomy tone, “if we can’t climb?”

      “Sure an there’s lots more, so there is,” said Pat, who on this occasion showed a wonderful fertility of invention. “I’ve ben a thinkin,” he added, “that we might dig away these logs with the pick.”

      “What good would that do?” asked Bart.

      “Sure an we might dig thim out one by one, an pile thim up as we dug thim, an so we might make a pile of logs high enough to reach to the top.”

      Bart was silent for a few moments. The suggestion was certainly of some value.

      “I wonder whether we mightn’t shake that log down on us, by pounding away down here?”

      “Sure an it’s the only thing,” said Pat. “We’ve got to run some risk, of coorse; an I don’t think that our blows would be felt so high up. Besides, we needn’t sthrike very hard.”

      “Well,” said Bart, “it’s the only thing we can do.”

      Upon this, Pat inserted the point of the pick between the logs near him, and tried to pry the lower one out at one end. But the stubborn log resisted his efforts. It had been too firmly fixed in its place to yield to such a slight force as that which he could bring. Bart lent his efforts, and the two exerted themselves with their utmost strength, but altogether in vain.

      “If we cud ony git out one log,” said Pat, “it wud be aisy workin out the others, so it wud; but this one seems a tough customer, so it does.”

      “There ought to be some log about here,” said Bart, “weaker than others.”

      “Sure an that’s thrue for you,” said Pat, “an so we’ll jist thry thim all one afther another, ivery one of them. We’ve got lots of time, so we have.”

      “See, here’s a smaller one,” said Bart.

      Pat struck the point of the pick where Bart pointed, and once more the two boys exerted themselves to pry out the log. But though this one was somewhat smaller than the other, it was quite as firmly fixed, and the utmost efforts of both of them failed to move it, even in the slightest degree, from its bed.

      “Sure an there’s no danger of this pit iver cavin in,” said Pat, as he desisted from his efforts. “They made this pit strong enough to howld a iliphant, so they did—the worse for us.”

      “Well,” said Bart, “we’ll have to try every log that’s within reach.”

      “Sure an we ought to find some weak spot if we do, so we ought,” said Pat.

      Bart now inserted the pick between the logs just above the last one.

      “This is jist what we intinded to do whin we come down,” СКАЧАТЬ