Chapter 20 Chapter 19 Montgomery's "Public Holiday"

When we had done this, washed, and dined, Montgomery and I went into my cabin to discuss our situation seriously for the first time.It was nearly midnight, and he was almost awake, but very disturbed.He had been strangely influenced by Moreau's personality, and I guess it never occurred to him that Moreau would die.These habits, which had become part of his temperament during the ten years of monotony he had spent on the island, suddenly collapsed with this catastrophe.He was talking vaguely and absently, answering my questions irrelevantly, wandering in some general questions at a loss.

"This ghost world," he said. "What a mess! I haven't enjoyed life at all. I don't know when the real life will start. Sixteen years bullied at will by nannies and teachers and five years studying medicine hard in London — poor food, shabby lodgings, ragged clothes, vile behavior — what a blunder — little did I know there was a better thing, and then I hurried to this Orc Island. Been here for ten years What is all this for, Prendick? Are we nothing but soap bubbles blown by children? It is difficult to deal with such crazy nonsense. "Now what we have to consider," I said, "is how to escape from this island."

"What's the good of running away? I'm an outcast. Where can I join? Of course you're all right, Planck. Poor old Moreau! We can't leave him here, let Those guys went to gnaw his bones. But in fact?? Besides, who knows what will happen to the more decent part of these orcs?" "Well," I said. "Tomorrow will be just right. I've been thinking, we might as well make a funeral pyre with the firewood and cremate his body—and some other things?? But what will happen to the Orcs?" "I don't know. I guess those orcs made of carnivorous beasts will do stupid things sooner or later. We can't kill them all. Can you say that? I think that's what your humanity is willing to suggest Did it??? But they'll change. They'll definitely change." He babbled like that until I couldn't help but lose my temper.

"Damn it!" He looked at me a little irritable and shouted loudly. "Can't you see that I'm in a much worse predicament than you are?" With that, he got up and went to get his brandy. "Drink," he said, and turned back. "You strong-tongued, pale, godless saint, drink." "I won't drink," I said, and in the yellow dim light of the flickering candle, I saw him drank to the point of babbling, I just sat there and stared into his face coldly.To this day I can recall the infinitely dreary atmosphere of that time.Dazedly, with a sort of drunken sentimentality, he began to defend the Orcs and Mling.

He said that the only one who really loved him in the past was Murling.As he spoke, he suddenly had an idea. "I'm so darn stupid!" he said, rising staggeringly to his feet and picking up the brandy bottle.With some momentary intuition, I already figured out what he was going to do. "Aren't you going to let that beast drink too much!" I said, standing up and facing him. "Beast!" he said. "You're the beast. He drinks like a civilized man. Go away, Prendick." "For God's sake," I said. "Go away," he growled, and jerked his pistol out.

"Very well," I said, stepping aside, and when he put his hand on the lock, I really wanted to jump on him, but hesitated at the thought of my shattered arm. "You've turned yourself into wild beasts and beasts. You go to the beasts." He flung the door open, and between the yellow light and the bluish-white shadow of the moon, he stood looking sideways at me; his eye sockets looked like blobs of ink under stubby brows. "You're a pompous prudish fellow, Prendick, a fool! You're always frightened and always delusional. We're on the brink. Tomorrow I'm doomed. Tonight." , I'm going to spend a happy public holiday for him."

He turned away and went out into the moonlight. "Mling," he cried, "Mring, old friend!" Under the silver-white moonlight, along the shore of the dark beach, three indistinct guys came, one wrapped in a white cloth, and the other two black ones followed behind. They stopped and stared.Then I saw Mling coming around the corner, shoulders hunched. "Drink," cried Montgomery, "drink, you brutes. Drink like a man. Damn it, I'm the smartest and capable! Forget it, Moreau. This is the last touch. Let me tell you, drink." He shook the green wine bottle in his hand and trotted westward, with Mulling between him and the three indistinct fellows following behind.

I go to the door.Before Montgomery stopped, their figures were already indistinct in the hazy moonlight.I saw Montgomery pour Mring a glass of brandy straight, and saw five figures merge indistinguishably into one. "Sing it," I heard Montgomery yell, "everybody sing 'Old Prendik'?? Yes. Well, here we go again: 'Old Prendique.'" The black mass dispersed into five separate figures, and slowly walked away along the ribbon-shaped beach shimmering with moonlight.As we walked, each of us howled, yelled, and insulted me as we wished.Or, under the new encouragement of the brandy smell, the wild drunken madness will be released at will.

In a moment I heard Montgomery's voices calling in the distance, "Turn right!" They shouted and howled as they drifted away into the darkness of the inland woods.Slowly, very slowly, their voices faded away. The calm of the moonlit night was restored.The moon has moved beyond the central meridian and is gradually sinking into the western sky.At that time, the moon was as bright as a disk, hanging in the vast blue night sky, shining with silver light.The shadow of the wall cast a jet-black shadow a yard wide at my feet.The sea in the east presents a featureless dim gray, which looks so dark and mysterious.Between the sea and the shadows, the sand of obsidian and volcanic rocks glowed gray, like a beach strewn with diamonds, shining brightly.Behind me, the flickering candlelight glowed hot and red.

Then I closed and locked the door and went inside the paddock, where Moreau lay next to the victims he had just tortured--several deerhounds, llamas, and others A beast with missing limbs——, although he died horribly, his broad face still looked so calm, and his cold and stern eyes were still open, staring at the pale moon in the sky.I sat down on the edge of the sink, looked at the terrible silvery moonlight and the ominous shadow, and began to think about my plan over and over in my mind. I intended next morning to gather some dry provisions into the longboat, and after lighting the pyre before me for the funeral pyre, I was to be again alone and desolate in the rough waters of the sea.I think there is no help for Montgomery. He is indeed almost the same species as these orcs, but he is a bit out of tune with the human relatives.

I don't know how long I sat there planning, there must have been an hour or so.Montgomery returned to the vicinity of the paddock, interrupting my thoughts of planning.I heard the howling of voices, the ecstatic uproar, heading for the beach.The shouts, howls, and excited screams seemed to have stopped as they approached the sea.The uproar ebbed and flowed.I heard heavy beating and splintering, but it didn't bother me at the time. There was an incoherent, noisy and chaotic singing. My thoughts went back to the measures to escape from the island.I arose, holding my lamp, and went into a shed to examine some of the kegs I had seen there.Later, I became interested in some of the cracker barrel stashes and opened one.Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something outside, a red figure, and then it ran away suddenly. The courtyard was behind me, black and white in the moonlight.On the piles and bundles of firewood, Moreau and the victims whose limbs were mutilated by him lay there one by one.They seemed to be clung to each other, twisted as if with a last-ditch desire for vengeance.Under the night light, Mo Luo's wound was black and open, and the blood that flowed out merged into black pools of blood on the sand.Then, I inexplicably saw the origin of the phantom of the monster, and saw a red light and shadow reflected, jumped, and shone on the opposite wall.I misunderstood and fancied this the reflection of a flickering lamp, and turned again to the piled-up stores in the shed. I rummaged through the store, as well as a one-armed man could, now and then finding this or that fitting thing, and laying it aside for the next day's voyage.My movements were very slow, but time passed quickly.In a blink of an eye, the morning light of dawn reflected on me unconsciously. Gradually the chanting died away, and in its place was a bustling noise, then another singing, and suddenly another disorderly uproar.I heard shouts of "Come again, come again!", what seemed to be an argument, and a sudden frenzied scream.The timbre and timbre of the loud sound changed so dramatically it grabbed my attention right away.I went out into the courtyard and listened.Then, like a sharp knife piercing through the mess, a gunshot rang out crisply. Immediately I crossed my house and rushed to the door of the little gate.That's when I heard some packing boxes behind me slide down and hit each other, glass shattering on the shed floor.But I didn't notice these, I opened the door and looked out. Above the beach next to the dock, a bonfire was burning, and the sparks of beeping flew into the hazy morning light.A group of dark shadows fought around the campfire.I heard Montgomery calling my name.I immediately ran towards the campfire with my pistol in hand.I saw a tongue of flame licking from the muzzle of Montgomery's gun against the ground.He fell down.Shouting as loud as I could, I fired my gun into the air. I heard someone shout "Master!" The fiercely battling black shadows that were churned together scattered into individual shadows one by one. The tongue of flame jumped up suddenly, then retracted again.The group of orcs suddenly panicked, fled in front of me, and ran onto the beach.They disappeared into the bushes, and in my agitation I shot at their retreating backs.Then I turned and walked towards the black heap on the sand.Montgomery was lying on his back, and the grey-haired grotesque was lying sprawled on top of him. The brute was dead, but it was still clutching Montgomery's throat with its bent claws. Mulling was lying face down beside him, already stiff and motionless, his neck was bloody from the bite, and he was still clutching the broken top half of the brandy bottle in his hand. There were two other corpses lying near the bonfire, one was unconscious, the other was still moaning, raising its head slowly from time to time, and then fell down again. I grabbed the grey-haired weirdo and dragged him away from Montgomery.When I dragged him away, his sharp claws tore Montgomery's torn coat unwillingly.Montgomery's face was dark and he was almost out of breath.I poured some sea water on his face and rolled up my coat and put it under his head.Mling is dead.I found the wounded fellow by the campfire, the bearded, livid-faced werewolf, lying on top of a red-hot log.The poor fellow was so badly wounded that, out of pity, I immediately shot him in the head.The other guy, a cowman wrapped in a white cloth, died too. The rest of the orcs all disappeared from the sand.I walked over to Montgomery again, knelt down beside him, and complained that I knew nothing about medicine. The campfire beside me was almost extinguished, and only the end of the charred log in the middle was still glowing with sparks amidst the ashes.Inadvertently, I wondered where Montgomery got all this wood.In a blink of an eye, I saw that the light of dawn was already bathing around us.The sky is getting brighter, and in the dazzling blue sky, the moon that is gradually setting in the west is getting paler and darker.The sky in the east is edged with red. Then I heard a bang and hiss behind me.I looked around, and couldn't help screaming in horror, and jumped up.Against the warm dawn, there was chaos and noise, and large groups of black smoke billowed from the paddock, and blood-red flames shot out from the billowing black smoke.Then the thatched roof of the paddock was also on fire, and the flames were seen bending and leaping through the sloping sheds and rushing forward.In the windows of my house, flames also suddenly spewed out. Immediately it dawned on me that I understood what had happened.I remembered hearing the shattering of glass.As I rushed out to rescue Montgomery, I knocked over the lamp. The stuff in the paddock is without any hope of being saved.I was devastated and transfixed.I remembered my escape plan again, turned around suddenly, and looked towards the beach where the two boats were stranded.The boats are gone!There were two axes lying on the sand beside him, and sawdust and firewood scattered around, and in the morning light, the ashes of the campfire gradually blackened and smoked.He burned both ships, as his revenge on me, and to prevent my return to the world. Suddenly, I felt violent convulsions all over me.I was so excited I almost wanted to punch Montgomery's stupid head as he lay helpless at my feet.After a while, his hand moved suddenly, so weak and so pitiful, that my irritation disappeared again.He groaned and opened his eyes for a moment.I knelt beside him and held his head up.He opened his eyes again, staring at the dawn silently, and then met my gaze again.His eyelids drooped. "I'm sorry," he said with difficulty after a short pause.It seemed he was still thinking hard. "The last one," he murmured under his breath, "the last one in this stupid world. What a mess—" I listen.His head drooped limply to one side.I thought of giving him something to drink, which might revive him, but I had neither drink nor a bowl to hold it.He suddenly looked desperate.My heart suddenly became cold. I leaned over his face and put my hand in the slit of his jacket.he died.Just as he was dying, beyond the bulge of the bay, a line of white heat, representing the rim of the sun, rose from the east in a flash of radiance across the blue sky.The dark sea suddenly turned into dazzling and turbulent waves.The sun, like the glory of heaven, shone on Montgomery's shriveled face after death. I gently placed his head on the pillow I had rolled up with my clothes and stood up.There was the gleaming, lonely sea before me, and I had tasted so much of this dreadful solitude and solitude.The silent island in the morning light was right behind me, and all the orcs on the island had disappeared.The paddock, with all its stores and ammunition, was crackling and burning, with spouts of flame now and then, intermittent ping-pong explosions and rumbling collapses.Billows of smoke floated over the beach far away from me, and drifted low over the tops of the distant woods toward the orc caves in the canyon.All that remained beside me were the charred remains of the two ships and the five dead bodies. After a while, three orcs came out from the bushes. They shrugged their shoulders, stretched their heads, and held their deformed hands in an ugly way. Follow me and come over.