Robinson Crusoe and Man Friday
She looked round the camp, and felt at once that there was something wrong. There were two tents, and a shipwrecked mariner on a desert island ought only to have one. For a moment she thought of taking down the captain’s tent, but then she remembered that for part of the time she would not be a shipwrecked mariner, but would be in charge of an explorers’ camp, while the main body had sailed away on a desperate expedition. During that part of the time the more tents there were the better. So she decided not to take down the captain’s tent. “It’s Man Friday’s tent,” she said to herself. “Of course I haven’t discovered him yet. But it’s ready for him when the time comes.”
Then she went into the tent that belonged to her and to the mate. It was still a very Susanish tent. Susan had taken her blankets, but she had left her haybag. It was quite clear that it was a tent belonging to two people and not a tent belonging to a lonely, shipwrecked sailor. So the able-seaman took Susan’s haybag, and put it on the top of her own, and spread her blankets over the two of them. At once the tent became hers and hers alone, and it would be easy enough to put the mate’s haybag back in its place when it was time to be on guard over a whole camp.
She lay down on the two haybags. The sun glowed through the white canvas of the tent, and through the doorway she could see smoke rising from the smouldering fire. She began to feel that she was really alone. Even the buzzing of the bees in the heather just behind the tent helped to make her feel that there was no one else on the island. She listened for other noises. Birds were not singing much, but a sandpiper was whistling somewhere near. There was the lapping of water against the western