Lava was dripping through from the surface here too.

The flow had chased me both above- and belowground. I dodged around it, the rocks hot beneath my feet. This new stream of lava would join what was behind me, and it was only going to get faster. The eggs clanked and Farthing scuttled ahead.

What exactly happens to a person engulfed by molten rock?

Probably not the best moment to think about that.

There would be nothing left. Not even bones for even an intrepid scientist like Mr. Darwin to dig from the rock. No one was going to find my ashy remains and send me home to London for men to talk about over their fancy cigars.

I wasn’t going to let this hellhole be my tomb.

Light ahead. Not the eerie red of the lava but the pure light of sun. I raced through the buccaneer’s cave and ducked out, onto the earth’s surface where I belonged, and pulled down my neckerchief to heave in gulps of fresh air.

There was no time to rest. The volcano was in full furious eruption, spraying out its molten insides. Above me flew a flock of the huge pink birds. Great hunks of red lava flew into the air like a giant infant flinging sand, and more flooded from the summit, a river slowly engulfing the plain. The flows advanced toward me from two directions, merging with each other in a thick burning tide. Ahead of it skittered a retreating army of red Sally Lightfoot crabs.

Despite my exhaustion, my feet raced across the black mud to the boat. I threw the chest in, flung it open, stepped out of the makeshift sling, and tumbled the eggs inside, still bundled in my shirt. I would leave, as I was, shirtless and barefoot, with a broken oar, a copper pan, a knife, and my fiddle without a case.

The sea was calm … but the island was raging.

Farthing. Where was she?

“Farthing!” I screamed. I couldn’t remember when I’d last seen her. She was in front of me as I climbed from the cave, I was sure of it.

“Farthing!”

I grabbed the rope I had tied to the prow of the rowboat and pulled. On the second tug the boat slooped out of the mud, and on the third tug the hull started to slide. It gained momentum until I was almost running. The lava made its journey across the jagged rocks, empty of the iguanas I’d always seen draped there.

“Farthing!”

It wasn’t much farther to the sea, and I forced my trembling muscles on. The water lapped wonderfully cool around my ankles, then my thighs, stinging as it hit the burns from the spitting lava, and the boat lifted. I tipped myself in as three thick tongues of lava hit the wet mudflats, sizzling and sending up huge plumes of steam.

I searched the shoreline for a glimpse of green. I couldn’t be sure of the last time I’d seen her. Had she fallen behind, been engulfed by the lava, and I hadn’t even noticed?