Lord of the Flies | Page 7

hesitated. The dark boy, Roger, stirred at last and spoke up.
“Let's have a vote.”
“Yes!”
“Vote for chief!”
“Let's vote—”
This toy of voting was almost as pleasing as the conch. Jack started to
protest but the clamor changed from the general wish for a chief to an
election by acclaim of Ralph himself. None of the boys could have found
good reason for this; what intelligence had been shown was traceable to
Piggy while the most obvious leader was Jack. But there was a stillness

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Quitabout Ralph as he sat that marked him out: there was his size, and at-
tractive appearance; and most obscurely, yet most powerfully, there was
the conch. The being that had blown that, had sat waiting for them on
the platform with the delicate thing balanced on his knees, was set apart.
“Him with the shell.”
“Ralph! Ralph!”
“Let him be chief with the trumpet-thing.”
Ralph raised a hand for silence.
“All right. Who wants Jack for chief?”
With dreary obedience the choir raised their hands.
“Who wants me?”
Every hand outside the choir except Piggy's was raised immediately.
Then Piggy, too, raised his hand grudgingly into the air.
Ralph counted.
“I'm chief then.”
The circle of boys broke into applause. Even the choir applauded; and
the freckles on Jack's face disappeared under a blush of mortication. He
started up, then changed his mind and sat down again while the air rang.
Ralph looked at him, eager to offer something.
“The choir belongs to you, of course.”
“They could be the army—”
“Or hunters—”
“They could be—”

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QuitThe suffusion drained away from Jack's face. Ralph waved again for
silence.
“Jack's in charge of the choir. They can be—what do you want them to
be?”
“Hunters.”
Jack and Ralph smiled at each other with shy liking. The rest began to
talk eagerly.
Jack stood up.
“All right, choir. Take off your togs.”
As if released from class, the choir boys stood up, chattered, piled their
black cloaks on the grass. Jack laid his on the trunk by Ralph. His grey
shorts were sticking to him with sweat. Ralph glanced at them admir-
ingly, and when Jack saw his glance he explained.
“I tried to get over that hill to see if there was water all round. But
your shell called us.”
Ralph smiled and held up the conch for silence.
“Listen, everybody. I've got to have time to think things out. I can't
decide what to do straight off. If this isn't an island we might be rescued
straight away. So we've got to decide if this is an island. Everybody
must stay round here and wait and not go away. Three of us—if we take
more we'd get all mixed, and lose each other—three of us will go on an
expedition and nd out. I'll go, and Jack, and, and. . . ”
He looked round the circle of eager faces. There was no lack of boys to

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Quitchoose from.
“And Simon.”
The boys round Simon giggled, and he stood up, laughing a little. Now
that the pallor of his faint was over, he was a skinny, vivid little boy, with
a glance coming up from under a hut of straight hair that hung down,
black and coarse.
He nodded at Ralph.
“I'll come.”
“And I—”
Jack snatched from behind him a sizable sheath-knife and clouted it
into a trunk. The buzz rose and died away.
Piggy stirred.
“I'll come.”
Ralph turned to him.
“You're no good on a job like this.”
“All the same—”
“We don't want you,” said Jack, atly. “Three's enough.”
Piggy's glasses ashed.
“I was with him when he found the conch. I was with him before
anyone else was.”
Jack and the others paid no attention. There was a general dispersal.
Ralph, Jack and Simon jumped off the platform and walked along the
sand past the bathing pool. Piggy hung bumbling behind them.

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Quit“If Simon walks in the middle of us,” said Ralph, “then we could talk
over his head.”
The three of them fell into step. This meant that every now and then
Simon had to do a double shufe to catch up with the others. Presently
Ralph stopped and turned back to Piggy.
“Look.”
Jack and Simon pretended to notice nothing. They walked on.
“You can't come.”
Piggy's glasses were misted again—this time with humiliation.
“You told 'em. After what I said.”
His face ushed, his mouth trembled.
“After I said I didn't want—”
“What on earth are you talking about?”
“About being called Piggy. I said I didn't care as long as they didn't call
me Piggy; an' I said not to tell and then you went an' said straight out—”
Stillness descended on them. Ralph, looking with more understanding
at Piggy, saw that he was hurt and crushed. He hovered between the two
courses of apology or further insult.
“Better Piggy than Fatty,” he said at last, with the directness of genuine
leadership, “and anyway, I'm sorry if you feel like that. Now go back,
Piggy, and take names. That's your job. So long.”
He turned and raced after the other two. Piggy stood and the rose of
indignation