***
By the end of his second year on Juan Fernández, Selkirk was living comfortably. Still, there was an annoying problem he hadn't solved: the island's rats.
Hidden during the day, they came out at night. Firelight and the scent of food lured them. He could hear their scurryings in the underbrush around the hut. Sometimes he could see their red eyes watching him. After he fell asleep, they crept into the hut, sniffed and nibbled his fingers and toes, and chewed his clothes.
There were also cats on the island; like the rats, they came from ships wrecked in the past. He tried to capture a few, but they eluded him, dashing into the underbrush as he approached.
Then, in an unexpected way, his problem with rats was solved.
While walking through the forest one day, he came upon a litter of newborn kittens between the roots of a large tree. Gathering them into his arms, he returned to his hut and placed them in the pen with the young goats.
Day after day he fed the kittens goat milk and scraps of goat meat. As they grew, they slept in the hut at night. The fearsome rats still eyed him from the darkness beyond the hut, but they stayed away.
In time a dozen cats roamed the hut. He enjoyed their company, talked to them, even selected his favorites. But secretly he was afraid of them. If he died in the hut, he believed, the cats would eat his body. The thought troubled him.
***
One day while on a high slope, Selkirk was startled to see the sails of two ships in the bay.
His heart leaped. Rescue! Dashing through the woods, leaping rocks and bushes, he ran down the slope calling and waving his goatskin cap.
On the beach men stepped from a boat, muskets in hand. They wore shiny metal helmets with narrow brims. Spanish soldiers!
For a long moment soldiers and marooned mariner stared at each other. Then Selkirk turned and fled. A musket ball breezed past his ear.
He ran into the forest, the Spanish soldiers chasing close behind. A gully lay in his path. Frantic with fear, he slid down and climbed the far side.
Running, stumbling, tripping through underbrush, he came to a tall cabbage palm. He scrambled up and hid among the broad leaves just as the soldiers appeared. There were six of them.
The soldiers took off their helmets and wiped their sweaty brows. Which way to go? Each pointed in a different direction. Then, no decision forthcoming, they decided to give up the chase. They undid their breeches and peed against the tree. From among the leaves Selkirk watched, terrified.
Then the soldiers picked up their muskets and moved off. A few sharp reports and a painful bleating told Selkirk they had shot a goat. Then a few more shots. Meat for their ships.
The next day, hidden behind boulders on his high lookout, he watched the scene in the bay through his spyglass. Spanish seamen floated water casks out to the anchored warships. Soon anchors raised, sails unfurled, and the ships moved out of the bay.
Years later, seated in a warm coffeehouse in London, Selkirk was able to joke about his near capture and fortunate escape. "Their prize being so inconsiderable," he said of the Spanish soldiers, "it is unlikely they thought it worth while to be at great trouble to find it."
***
Dusk falls quickly in the tropics. But Selkirk no longer feared the night, nor did it still hold the phantoms of his imagination.
By the light of his pimento-wood fire, he held the forepaws of his favorite cat, dancing and singing sea songs and Scottish folk tunes. The other cats silently watched.
In a warm glow of contentment, he may have thought of his former shipmates aboard the Cinque Ports. What would they say about their sailing master dancing in the firelight with a cat! But he knew his answer. "I never danced with a lighter heart or greater spirit any where to the best of music than I did to the sound of my own voice with my dumb animals."
His life on Juan Fernández had become a daily joy, his days aboard ship and his home in Largo increasingly remote. The hut was warm, food plentiful. He was never bored. Knowledge of the island had replaced fear and ignorance. He had a sense of complete freedom, of fulfillment, of safe harbor. There was the solitude to endure, of course, and the lack of a mate or two to enjoy a pint of flip and a chat. But in this he had no choice.
He came to a decision. If fate decreed, he would be content to spend the rest of his days on his island kingdom, master of his own life and destiny.
***
On the night of January 31, 1709, another day ended, he lay down on his fur-seal bedding. His favorite cats came to curl at his feet. Others lay on a mat of sweet-smelling grass. Perhaps there was a moon that night and the bay was visible, flat as a black mirror, reflecting the moon's path.
The pimento-wood fire burned down to comforting embers. A swath of stars became visible through the trees. Far out on the darkling sea two ships sailed a course for Juan Fernández.