I decided that Cookie’s pig was after all a pig, though still in the flesh.  I thought I remembered having seen quite fair pigs, which would pass for white with a frightened negro in the dim light of dawn.  So far only black pigs had been visible, but perhaps the light ones were shyer and kept to the remote parts of the island.  I consoled Cookie as best I could by promising to cross my fingers if I heard or saw anything suspicious, and struck out into the woods,

For all my brave words to Cookie, I had no intention of going very far afield.  From the shore of the cove I had observed that the ground behind the clearing rose to the summit of a low ridge, perhaps four hundred feet in height, which jutted from the base of the peak.  From this ridge I thought I might see something more of the island than the limited environment of Lantern Bay.

As the woods shut out the last glimpse of the white tents in the clearing, as even the familiar sound of the surf died down to a faint, half-imagined whisper mingling with the rustling of the palms overhead, I experienced a certain discomfort, which persons given to harsh and unqualified terms might have called fear.  It seemed to me as if a very strong cord at the rear of my belt were jerking me back toward the inglorious safety of camp.  Fortunately there came to me a vision of the three umbrellas and of Mr. Tubbs heroically exposing his devoted bosom to non-existent perils, and I resolved that the superior smiles with which I had greeted Aunt Jane’s recital should not rise up to shame me now.  I fingered my automatic and marched on up the hill, trying not to gasp when a leaf rustled or a cocoanut dropped in the woods.

There was little undergrowth between the crowding trunks of the cocoa-palms.  Far overhead their fronds mingled in a green thatch, through which a soft light filtered down.  Here and there the close ranks of the palms were broken by an outcropping of rock, glaring up hot and sunbeaten at a distant patch of the sky.  The air of the forest was still and languid, its heat tempered like that of a room with drawn blinds.

I gained the summit of the ridge, and stood upon a bare rock platform, scantily sheltered by a few trees, large shrubs rather, with a smooth waxy leaf of vivid green.  On the left rose the great mass of the peak.  From far above among its crags a beautiful foamy waterfall came hurtling down.  Before me the ground fell away to the level of the low plateau, or mesa, as we say in California, which made up the greater part of the island.  Cutting into the green of this was the gleaming curve of a little bay, which in Mr. Shaw’s chart of the island showed slightly larger than our cove.  Part of it was hidden by the shoulder of the peak, but enough was visible to give a beautiful variety to the picture, which was set in a silver frame of sea.

I had not dreamed of getting a view so glorious from the little eminence of the ridge.  Here was an item of news to take back to camp.  Having with great originality christened the place Lookout, I turned to go.  And as I turned I saw a shape vanish into the woods.