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On shore, he trudged through clawing willow branches to find a sunny spot where he could dry himself. “Hello, is anyone else here?” He raised his voice again, but already he knew this would be a deserted island, a small refuge in the middle of the wide estuary.

No one lived here. He was alone . . . on an uninhabited island.

Verne sat down on a fallen tree, wondering what he should do, indignant that the rented sailboat had fallen into pieces on him. He certainly didn’t intend to pay the old man for the damages. His father was a lawyer, after all -- in fact, the potbellied owner’s blatant disregard for a young man’s safety would look very bad in a court of law.

But Verne didn’t want to think what his father would say about the whole misadventure. How would he get rescued? Would he ever see his home again? His loving mother, his sisters, his young brother Paul?

Around him, he found an unexplored world of trees and grass. This was the closest he’d ever been to reenacting his beloved “Robinson” stories. He allowed himself a wan smile . . . and then his imagination took over.

In clothes still wet and uncomfortable, Verne pushed his way through the clumps of willows, knocking aside gnarled branches that scratched his face. As his soggy shoes sank into the river grass that covered the ground, he thought that perhaps he might be the first person ever to walk here. These footprints -- like the footprints the man Friday had left on Crusoe’s beach -- might be the first mark a human soul had ever made on this untamed land.

He studied the loose rocks piled by spring floodwaters and imagined firepits with blackened bones from cannibal feasts. But he found nothing more than a rat’s nest and a worm-eaten plank washed up from some old ship.

His heart thumped, and a foolish grin crossed his face. This might be similar to some of the ordeals Nemo was enduring on his world-wide explorations. He couldn’t wait to tell his friend about it.

Before long, Verne was sweaty, sunburned, and miserable. As any true castaway would have done, he salvaged the sail from his sunken boat where it had caught on shore weeds. Then he raised a lean-to shelter of weathered sticks to protect him from wind and storms, hurricanes or snow. Curled on the prickly ground, he imagined he could live here for a while, isolated from the world. Perhaps he’d even keep a journal of his daily struggles, scratch words on smooth bark. There was no telling how long he might remain lost on his little island. . . .

Exhausted in the afternoon and at a loss for what else to do, he tried to nap, troubled by thoughts of tropical storms or pirate ships on the prowl. The ground was uncomfortable, and his shelter let in the biting flies so prevalent during summer along the sluggish river.

Within an hour, Verne began to consider how he might signal for help. He thought of piling dry branches and lighting a bonfire so that passing ships could see the smoke and send rowboats to investigate. But as Verne gathered sticks from the shore, he realized he had no matches and no other way of lighting the blaze. Glum, he sat with his chin in his hands.

He had absorbed the wilderness adventures of James Fenimore Cooper, tales of wild Indians, Hawkeye and Chinganook, The Last of the Mohicans, The Deerslayer, Drums Along the Mohawk. He had learned about survival in an untamed new world.

But though he furiously rubbed sticks together, he got no smoke or sparks -- only blisters.

Frustrated, Verne knocked apart his pile of firewood and scanned the islet again. His stomach knotted with the first pangs of hunger, and he wondered what he might eat, since he had packed no lunch. Could he perhaps fashion a stone knife or maybe a throwing ax to kill some wild animal? He would skin it and roast its haunch over a crackling fire.

But again, he had no fire, no weapons, and he’d never killed anything in his life. He couldn’t recall seeing any animals other than a few sparrows on this whole islet. He doubted he could even catch fish in the river without