Boon Island - Kenneth Roberts [116]
When I didn't answer, he said, "Go in yourself, Miles. I can't allow them to disobey orders like this."
I went to the tent and pulled aside the flap. Earlier, when I had crawled out, they were lying down, huddled together, as motionless as Chips Bullock.
Now only Chips lay there. The others, even Saver and Graystock, were sitting up. I sensed a feverish excitement.
"Why didn't you take Chips out?" I asked. "The captain said to put him on the ledge."
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"We haven't the strength," Langman said. "We're weak from lack of food."
I looked from one to another. Neal crawled out from among them and stood beside me. "They want to eat him," he said. "They're afraid to ask the captain. They want you to do it."
"I never said any such thing!" Langman said. "I'd never eat a fellow creature."
"We'll get mussels for you at low tide," I reminded them.
"Mussels!" Henry Dean exclaimed. I gag whenever I try to swallow one!"
"Look, Whitworth," Graystock said, "those mussels make every last one of us sick! The captain'll do whatever you ask him to do. Ask him to let us have Chips. There's no use wasting him, the way we wasted Cooky!"
Well, there was no use lying to myself. When the captain rolled Cooky into the sea, I'd almost protestedalmost, but I hadn't quite dared. I hadn't let myself formulate clearly in my mind that there was no good reason why we shouldn't have eaten him.
I stood looking from them to the body of Chips Bullock. I had no feeling at all except pity for Captain Dean.
When he came in among us I said, "Captain, these people want to eat Chips Bullock."
"Not me!" Langman said.
"Captain," I said, "we ate a seagull last week. Mr. Langman killed it, and Mr. Langman ate a mouthful of it, like the rest of us. He was glad to get it and so were we."
"What's that got to do with it?" Langman asked sharply.
"It's got this to do with it," I said. "Gulls are scaven-
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gers. They eat anything dead. The one we ate might have eaten part of Cooky Sipper."
"Everyone in England eats eels," Christopher Gray said. "Eels eat anything that's dead."
"You'll never catch me eating the body of a fellow human," Langman said. "My conscience would never let me rest."
"You've already got more on your conscience than any one man should be called on to endure," Captain Dean said.
"Eating a man would be a sin," Langman protested. "If I agreed to it, I'd be forever damned."
"It's a terrible thing," Captain Dean agreed, "but in my opinion it's not as much of a sin as swearing to a lie that robs a man of his good name. You've lied about the insurance my brother and I carried on the Nottingham. You lied when you said I purposely ran the Nottingham ashore. I think you're damned already."
Langman eyed the captain sourly.
"Captain," Christopher Gray said, "Hallion lived with Indians in Nova Scotia, and Hallion said that when one Indian killed another in battle, he ate the dead Indian's heart. Hallion said Indians thought it gave 'em courage."
"We could use a few Indians' hearts on Boon Island," Captain Dean said. "I think all of us could! We've lost the only one who didn't need to eat an Indian's heart ... Swede Butler."
"Are you accusing us of cowardice?" Langman asked.
"Mr. Langman," the captain said, "I ordered you and George White to drag Chips Bullock's body to the ledge nearest the sea. Why didn't you do it?"
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"I told Mr. Whitworth," Langman said. "We're too weak."
"If you're too weak to do that, you're weak from hunger. And if you're hungry enough, you'll eat anything. I know. Yesterday I tried, like a dog, to eat my own frozen excrement. I think you didn't move Chips because you secretly wanted to eat him but lacked the courage to say so."
"I'll never eat a fellow human," Langman repeated.
"We'll vote," Captain Dean said. "We'll vote whether or not we'll eat this body. Neal, you're youngest, but you won't vote until after all the others."
"I want to vote," Neal