Island by Aldous Huxley

Author:Aldous Huxley
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3, pdf
ISBN: 9780061959646
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 1962-01-04T10:00:00+00:00

Missing People

On my hands and knees, I watched Kimberly until she vanished around the point. Then I stood up, brushed the sand off my body, and started trudging back to Billie and Connie. Billie was a couple of hundred yards away from me, Connie another hundred yards or so behind her mother.

The way we were separated, any one of us could've gotten picked off. Keeping an eye on the edge of the jungle, I quickened my pace.

Connie made no attempt to join us. She just stood where she'd stopped, and watched.

When I got within speaking range of Billie, I started shaking my head.

"You almost had her," Billie said.

"It only looked that way. She slowed down to let me get close."

"I can't believe she just ran off and left us."

"She wants to go on by herself."

Billie handed the ax to me. "We can't let her."

"We can't stop her," I pointed out.

"But we can join her."

"I guess so. If we can find her."

"She's on her way to the lagoon," Billie said. "We'll just go there."

We started walking toward Connie.

"What route should we take?" I asked.

"What do you think?" She wasn't being sarcastic; she was asking my advice.

"Well, we could circle around through the jungle, but that's what Kimberly's probably doing. I don't think we'd have any luck intercepting her, either. It'd be too easy for her to sneak past us. So maybe we oughta just go ahead and make a direct approach to the lagoon."

"Go straight up the stream?"

"Yeah. That'd be the quickest way to get there. We might even reach the lagoon ahead of her."

Billie made a rueful smile. "Ahead of her? Think we wanta do that?"

"If we're careful."

"I'd hate for us to get attacked without Kimberly around to help."

I shrugged. "We can probably handle it. I mean, we're talking about Wesley and Thelma. Unless they take us completely by surprise . . ."

"What gives?" Connie called to us.

"Kimberly doesn't want us in her way," I explained.

"Is she still going to the lagoon?"

"Guess so."

"Good. We can go back to camp now, right?"

"Sort of," I said.

"What do you mean, sort of?"

"We'll go back," Billie said, "but then we're heading straight up the stream."

"Oh, really?"

"That's the idea," Billie told her.

"I've got a better idea," Connie said. "Let's not, and say we did."

We reached Connie. Then the three of us started walking back toward camp.

"I mean," Connie said, "Kimberly obviously doesn't want us with her. Shouldn't we do what she wants, and stay out of it?"

"She'd be outnumbered two to one," I pointed out.

"That's just assuming Wesley hasn't already bought the farm."

"Even if he has, what's to stop Thelma from jumping her?"

Connie smirked at me. "You think Kimberly can't take Thelma?"

"Sure, in a fair fight. But maybe she gets jumped from behind. Thelma almost nailed me. She isn't that easy."

"Well, she knew which buttons to push on you, didn't she?"

"There's no point arguing," Billie broke in. "We're going up to the lagoon, and that's final."

"Is it?"

"Yeah, it is."

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