Rainsford Dialectical Journal

Waking after such terrifying events, Rainsford was astonished to find Zaroff gone, upon looking through the window he saw that the dogs had dragged him off, that’s when he knew he had to get off of that terrible island. Quickly, he thought over all that had happened over the past few days on the island with General Zaroff. He even puzzled with the idea of how he survived the extraordinary trials he went through. “How will I ever find Whitney?” thought Rainsford as he stumbled around the chateau in a daze. “Perhaps I can swim to Haiti, I should be close enough and Johnson lives around there.” Johnson was Rainsford’s old childhood friend who had lived two blocks away, he moved to Haiti when he turned thirty, so that he would always be by the sea. Johnson had always loved the sea, but was an especially ignorant person, he liked not to think things through before he did them. Putting the facts aside, Rainsford decided it was a good plan to go to Haiti, but instead of swimming he went down by the shore and forged a raft out of bamboo. The raft was very crude, but it took a long time to build and it gave Rainsford confidence. He eventually left after continuous inspections, deserting the island left Rainsford with many different feelings, mainly sadness, but for some reason he felt like he would be back one day. He put these feelings aside and pushed his raft out to sea with the help of an unusually long palm frond. The waters that day were especially rough, making it very hard for Rainsford’s raft to get to it’s destination. While in a patch of water that was unnaturally calm, he began to see the tops of fins in the water. Rainsford knew about the dangers of bull sharks, but hadn’t thought about it when he was rushing to get off the island. “This is it, this is when I perish, how will I get out of this one,” thought Rainsford rightly, seeing as he was still about five miles from the nearest shore. Suddenly, one of the sharks turned towards the raft and started swimming as fast as a missile. A monstrous bite was taken out of the side of the raft, but Rainsford got a lucky hit on it with the extra wood pole he brought. The shark did not slow down, but instead got angry and made a second charge, this one caused the raft to tip and Rainsford was plunged into the rough sea. If not for his pole, he would not have been able to fend off the vicious shark, but was still left in the ocean with a half eaten raft. Rainsford thought quickly, “Perhaps I can use the knife Zaroff gave me and this pole to make a temporary fix.” The temporary fix was almost as scary as the boat itself, barely staying afloat. This idea worked, but by the time he got to shore, three hours later, he was in his shorts, swimming the rest of the way. Exhausted, Rainsford attempted to find his bearings on a deserted Haitian island and find his way to Petionville, the rich town in which Johnson lived. He walked a while down an exquisite jungle trail until he began to see lights and hear the violent splitting sounds of wood. It was all coming from a quaint little shanty …show more content…
Whitney was most interested in Rainsford’s health, but also wanted to know certain, odd details of the story that Rainsford hadn’t thought of. One of which, included something about the well-being of the animals on the island. After pondering this idea, Rainsford moved past it and went on to ask the crew how they were getting home. During this discussion, Whitney decided that they should pass by the island, to see it’s natural beauty in the sunlight. Obviously, Rainsford was hesitant to do this, but he agreed, thinking he deserved a final look at the island. While in the same waters where Rainsford had fallen last time, they saw the ghostly outline of a ship, not just any ship, but Johnson’s ship, docked on the island. The chateau’s lights were on and Rainsford could hear the enraged howling of General Zaroff’s