Lord of the Flies | Page 9

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Quit“Heave!”
The great rock loitered, poised on one toe, decided not to return,
moved through the air, fell, struck, turned over, leapt droning through
the air and smashed a deep hole in the canopy of the forest. Echoes and
birds ew, white and pink dust oated, the forest further down shook as
with the passage of an enraged monster: and then the island was still.
“Wacco!”
“Like a bomb!”
“Whee-aa-oo!”
Not for ve minutes could they drag themselves away from this tri-
umph. But they left at last.
The way to the top was easy after that. As they reached the last stretch
Ralph stopped.
“Golly!”
They were on the lip of a circular hollow in the side of the mountain.
This was lled with a blue ower, a rock plant of some sort, and the
overow hung down the vent and spilled lavishly among the canopy of
the forest. The air was thick with butteries, lifting, uttering, settling.
Beyond the hollow was the square top of the mountain and soon they
were standing on it.
They had guessed before that this was an island: clambering among
the pink rocks, with the sea on either side, and the crystal heights of air,
they had known by some instinct that the sea lay on every side. But there

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Quitseemed something more tting in leaving the last word till they stood on
the top, and could see a circular horizon of water.
Ralph turned to the others.
“This belongs to us.”
It was roughly boat-shaped: humped near this end with behind them
the jumbled descent to the shore. On either side rocks, cliffs, treetops
and a steep slope: forward there, the length of the boat, a tamer descent,
tree-clad, with hints of pink: and then the jungly at of the island, dense
green, but drawn at the end to a pink tail. There, where the island pe-
tered out in water, was another island; a rock, almost detached, standing
like a fort, facing them across the green with one bold, pink bastion.
The boys surveyed all this, then looked out to sea. They were high up
and the afternoon had advanced; the view was not robbed of sharpness
by mirage.
“That's a reef. A coral reef. I've seen pictures like that.”
The reef enclosed more than one side of the island, lying perhaps a mile
out and parallel to what they now thought of as their beach. The coral
was scribbled in the sea as though a giant had bent down to reproduce
the shape of the island in a owing chalk line but tired before he had
nished. Inside was peacock water, rocks and weeds showing as in an
aquarium; outside was the dark blue of the sea. The tide was running
so that long streaks of foam tailed away from the reef and for a moment
they felt that the boat was moving steadily astern.

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QuitJack pointed down.
“That's where we landed.”
Beyond falls and cliffs there was a gash visible in the trees; there were
the splintered trunks and then the drag, leaving only a fringe of palm
between the scar and the sea. There, too, jutting into the lagoon, was the
platform, with insect-like gures moving near it.
Ralph sketched a twining line from the bald spot on which they stood
down a slope, a gully, through owers, round and down to the rock where
the scar started.
“That's the quickest way back.”
Eyes shining, mouths open, triumphant, they savored the right of dom-
ination. They were lifted up: were friends.
“There's no village smoke, and no boats,” said Ralph wisely. “We'll
make sure later; but I think it's uninhabited.”
“We'll get food,” cried Jack. “Hunt. Catch things until they fetch us.”
Simon looked at them both, saying nothing but nodding till his black
hair opped backwards and forwards: his face was glowing.
Ralph looked down the other way where there was no reef.
“Steeper,” said Jack.
Ralph made a cupping gesture.
“That bit of forest down there. . . the mountain holds it up.”
Every point of the mountain held up trees—owers and trees. Now the
forest stirred, roared, ailed. The nearer acres of rock owers uttered

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Quitand for half a minute the breeze blew cool on their faces.
Ralph spread his arms.
“All ours.”
They laughed and tumbled and shouted on the mountain.
“I'm hungry.”
When Simon mentioned his hunger the others became aware of theirs.
“Come on,” said Ralph. “We've found out what we wanted to know.”
They scrambled down a rock slope, dropped among owers and made
their way under the trees. Here they paused and examined the bushes
round them curiously.
Simon spoke rst.
“Like candles. Candle bushes. Candle buds.”
The bushes were dark evergreen and aromatic and the many buds were
waxen green and folded up against the light. Jack slashed at one with his
knife and the scent spilled over them.
“Candle buds.”
“You couldn't light them,” said Ralph. “They just look like candles.”
“Green candles,” said Jack contemptuously. “We can't eat them. Come
on.”
They were in the beginnings of