I was not a hundred yards from her when the wind came again in a clap;
she filled on the port tack and was off again, stooping and skimming
like a swallow.

My first impulse was one of despair, but my second was towards joy.
Round she came, till she was broadside on to me--round still till she
had covered a half, and then two-thirds, and then three-quarters of the
distance that separated us. I could see the waves boiling white under
her forefoot. Immensely tall she looked to me from my low station in the
coracle.

And then, of a sudden, I began to comprehend. I had scarce time to
think--scarce time to act and save myself. I was on the summit of one
swell when the schooner came stooping over the next. The bowsprit was
over my head. I sprang to my feet and leaped, stamping the coracle under
water. With one hand I caught the jib-boom, while my foot was lodged
between the stay and the brace, and as I still clung there panting, a
dull blow told me that the schooner had charged down upon and struck the
coracle and that I was left without retreat on the _Hispaniola_.




CHAPTER XXV

I STRIKE THE JOLLY ROGER


I had scarce gained a position on the bowsprit when the flying jib
flapped and filled upon the other tack with a report like a gun. The
schooner trembled to her keel under the reverse, but next moment, the
other sails still drawing, the jib flapped back again and hung idle.

This had nearly tossed me off into the sea, and now I lost no time,
crawled back along the bowsprit and tumbled headforemost on the deck.

I was on the lee side of the forecastle, and the mainsail, which was
still drawing, concealed from me a certain portion of the after-deck.
Not a soul was to be seen. The planks, which had not been swabbed since
the mutiny, bore the print of many feet; and an empty bottle, broken by
the neck, tumbled to and fro like a live thing in the scuppers.

Suddenly the _Hispaniola_ came right into the wind. The jibs behind me
cracked aloud; the rudder slammed to; the whole ship gave a sickening
heave and shudder; and at the same moment the main-boom swung inboard,
the sheet groaning in the blocks, and showed me the lee after-deck.

There were the two watchmen, sure enough; Red-cap on his back, as stiff
as a handspike, with his arms stretched out like those of a crucifix,
and his teeth showing through his open lips; Israel Hands propped
against the bulwarks, his chin on his chest, his hands lying open before
him on the deck, his face as white, under its tan, as a tallow candle.

For a while the ship kept bucking and sidling like a vicious horse, the
sails filling, now on one tack, now on another, and the boom swinging to
and fro till the mast groaned aloud under the strain. Now and again,
too, there would come a cloud of light sprays over the bulwark, and a
heavy blow of the ship's bows against the swell--so much heavier weather
was made of it by this great rigged ship than by my homemade, lopsided
coracle, now gone to the bottom of the sea.

At every jump of the schooner, Red-cap slipped to and fro; but--what was
ghastly to behold--neither his attitude nor his fixed teeth-disclosing
grin was any way disturbed by this rough usage. At every jump, too,
Hands appeared still more to sink into himself and settle down upon the
deck, his feet sliding ever the farther out, and the whole body canting
toward the stern, so that his face became, little by little, hid from
me; and at last I could see nothing beyond his ear and the frayed
ringlet of one whisker.

At the same time I observed, around both of them, splashes of dark blood
upon the planks, and began to feel sure that they had killed each other
in their drunken wrath.

While I was thus looking and wondering, in a calm moment when the ship
was still, Israel Hands turned partly round, and with a low moan,
writhed himself back to the position in which I had seen him first. The
moan, which told of pain and deadly weakness, and the way in which his
jaw hung open, went right to my heart. But when I remembered the talk I
had overheard from the apple barrel, all pity left me.

I walked aft until I reached the mainmast.

"Come aboard, Mr. Hands," I said, ironically.

He rolled his eyes round heavily, but he was too far gone to express
surprise. All he could do was to utter one word, "Brandy."

It occurred to me there was no time to lose, and dodging the boom as it
once more lurched across the deck, I slipped aft and down the
companion-stairs into the cabin.

It was such a scene of confusion as you can hardly fancy. All the
lock-fast places had been broken open in quest of the chart. The floor
was thick with mud, where the ruffians had sat down to drink or consult
after wading in the marshes round their camp. The bulkheads, all painted
in clear white, and beaded round with gilt, bore a pattern of dirty
hands. Dozens of empty bottles clinked together in corners to the
rolling of the ship. One of the doctor's medical books lay open on the
table, half of the leaves gutted out, I suppose, for pipe-lights. In the
midst of all this the lamp still cast a smoky glow, obscure and brown as
umber.

I went into the cellar; all the barrels were gone, and of the bottles a
most surprising number had been drunk out and thrown away. Certainly,
since the mutiny began, not a man of them could ever have been sober.

Foraging about I found a bottle with some brandy left, for Hands; and
for myself I routed out some biscuit, some pickled fruits, a great bunch
of raisins, and a piece of cheese. With these I came on deck, put down
my own stock behind the rudder-head, and well out of the coxswain's
reach, went forward to the water-breaker, and had a good, deep drink of
water, and then, and not until then, gave Hands the brandy.

He must have drunk a gill before he took the bottle from his mouth.

"Ay," said he, "by thunder, but I wanted some o' that!"

I had sat down already in my own corner and begun to eat.

"Much hurt?" I asked him.

He grunted, or, rather, I might say, he barked.

"If that doctor was aboard," he said, "I'd be right enough in a couple
of turns; but I don't have no manner of luck, you see, and that's what's
the matter with me. As for that swab, he's good and dead, he is," he
added, indicating the man with the red cap. "He warn't no seaman,
anyhow. And where mought you have come from?"

"Well," said I, "I've come aboard to take possession of this ship, Mr.
Hands, and you'll please regard me as your captain until further
notice."

He looked at me sourly enough, but said nothing. Some of the color had
come back into his cheeks, though he still looked very sick and still
continued to slip out and settle down as the ship banged about.

"By the by," I continued, "I can't have these colors, Mr. Hands; and by
your leave I'll strike 'em. Better none than these."

And, again dodging the boom, I ran to the color lines, hauled down their
cursed black flag, and chucked it overboard.

"God save the king!" said I, waving my cap; "and there's an end to
Captain Silver."

He watched me keenly and slyly, his chin all the while on his breast.

"I reckon," he said at last--"I reckon, Cap'n Hawkins, you'll kind o'
want to get ashore, now. S'pose we talks."

"Why, yes," says I, "with all my heart, Mr. Hands. Say on." And I went
back to my meal with a good appetite.

"This man," he began, nodding feebly at the corpse--"O'Brien were his
name--a rank Irelander--this man and me got the canvas on her, meaning
for to sail her back. Well, _he's_ dead now, he is--as dead as bilge;
and who's to sail this ship, I don't see. Without I give you a hint, you
ain't that man, as far's I can tell. Now, look here, you gives me food
and drink, and a old scarf or ankercher to tie my wound up, you do; and
I'll tell you how to sail her; and that's about square all round, I take
it."

"I'll tell you one thing," says I; "I'm not going back to Captain Kidd's
anchorage. I mean to get into North Inlet, and beach her quietly there."

"To be sure you did," he cried. "Why, I ain't sich an infernal lubber,
after all. I can see, can't I? I've tried my fling, I have, and I've
lost, and it's you has the wind of me. North Inlet? Why, I haven't no
ch'ice, not I. I'd help you sail her up to Execution Dock, by thunder!
so I would."

Well, as it seemed to me, there was some sense in this. We struck our
bargain on the spot. In three minutes I had the _Hispaniola_ sailing
easily before the wind along the coast of Treasure Island, with good
hopes of turning the northern point ere noon, and beating down again as
far as North Inlet before high water, when we might beach her safely,
and wait till the subsiding tide permitted us to land.

Then I lashed the tiller and went below to my own chest, where I got a
soft silk handkerchief of my mother's. With this, and with my aid, Hands
bound up the great bleeding stab he had received in the thigh, and after
he had eaten a little and had a swallow or two more of the brandy, he
began to pick up visibly, sat straighter up, spoke louder and clearer,
and looked in every way another man.

The breeze served us admirably. We skimmed before it like a bird, the
coast of the island flashing by, and the view changing every minute.
Soon we were past the high lands and bowling beside low, sandy country,
sparsely dotted with dwarf pines, and soon we were beyond that again,
and had turned the corner of the rocky hill that ends the island on the
north.

I was greatly elated with my new command, and pleased with the bright,
sunshiny weather and these different prospects of the coast. I had now
plenty of water and good things to eat, and my conscience, which had
smitten me hard for my desertion, was quieted by the great conquest I
had made. I should, I think, have had nothing left me to desire but for
the eyes of the coxswain as they followed me derisively about the deck,
and the odd smile that appeared continually on his face. It was a smile
that had in it something both of pain and weakness--a haggard, old man's
smile; but there was, besides that, a grain of derision, a shadow of
treachery, in his expression as he craftily watched, and watched, and
watched me at my work.




CHAPTER XXVI

ISRAEL HANDS


The wind, serving us to a desire, now hauled into the west. We could run
so much easier from the northeast corner of the island to the mouth of
the North Inlet. Only, as we had no power to anchor, and dared not beach
her until the tide had flowed a good deal farther, time hung on our
hands. The coxswain told me how to lay the ship to; after a good many
trials I succeeded, and we both sat in silence over another meal.

"Cap'n," said he, at length, with that same uncomfortable smile, "here's
my old shipmate, O'Brien; s'pose you was to heave him overboard. I ain't
partic'lar, as a rule, and I don't take no blame for settling his hash;
but I don't reckon him ornamental, now, do you?"

"I'm not strong enough, and I don't like the job; and there he lies, for
me," said I.

"This here's an unlucky ship--the _Hispaniola_, Jim," he went on,
blinking. "There's a power of men been killed in this _Hispaniola_--a
sight o' poor seamen dead and gone since you and me took ship to
Bristol. I never seen such dirty luck, not I. There was this here
O'Brien, now--he's dead, ain't he? Well, now, I'm no scholar, and you're
a lad as can read and figure; and, to put it straight, do you take it as
a dead man is dead for good, or do he come alive again?"

"You can kill the body, Mr. Hands, but not the spirit; you must know
that already," I replied. "O'Brien, there, is in another world, and may
be watching us."

"Ah!" says he. "Well, that's unfort'nate--appears as if killing parties
was a waste of time. Howsomever, sperrits don't reckon for much, by what
I've seen. I'll chance it with the sperrits, Jim. And now you've spoke
up free, and I'll take it kind if you'd step down into that there cabin
and get me a--well, a--shiver my timbers! I can't hit the name on't.
Well, you get me a bottle of wine, Jim--this here brandy's too strong
for my head."

Now the coxswain's hesitation seemed to be unnatural; and as for the
notion of his preferring wine to brandy, I entirely disbelieved it. The
whole story was a pretext. He wanted me to leave the deck--so much was
plain, but with what purpose I could in no way imagine. His eyes never
met mine; they kept wandering to and fro, up and down, now with a look
to the sky, now with a flitting glance upon the dead O'Brien. All the
time he kept smiling and putting his tongue out in the most guilty,
embarrassed manner, so that a child could have told that he was bent on
some deception. I was prompt with my answer, however, for I saw where my
advantage lay, and that with a fellow so densely stupid I could easily
conceal my suspicions to the end.

"Some wine?" I said. "Far better. Will you have white or red?"

"Well, I reckon it's about the blessed same to me, shipmate," he
replied; "so it's strong, and plenty of it, what's the odds?"

"All right," I answered. "I'll bring you port, Mr. Hands. But I'll have
to dig for it."

With that I scuttled down the companion with all the noise I could,
slipped off my shoes, ran quietly along the sparred gallery, mounted the
forecastle ladder and popped my head out of the fore companion. I knew
he would not expect to see me there, yet I took every precaution
possible, and certainly the worst of my suspicions proved too true.

He had risen from his position to his hands and knees, and though his
leg obviously hurt him pretty sharply when he moved--for I could hear
him stifle a groan--yet it was at a good, rattling rate that he trailed
himself across the deck. In half a minute he had reached the port
scuppers, and picked out of a coil of rope a long knife, or rather a
short dirk, discolored to the hilt with blood. He looked upon it for a
moment, thrusting forth his under jaw, tried the point upon his hand,
and then hastily concealing it in the bosom of his jacket, trundled back
again into his old place against the bulwark.

This was all that I required to know. Israel could move about; he was
now armed, and if he had been at so much trouble to get rid of me, it
was plain that I was meant to be the victim. What he would do
afterward--whether he would try to crawl right across the island from
North Inlet to the camp among the swamps, or whether he would fire Long
Tom, trusting that his own comrades might come first to help him, was,
of course, more than I could say.

Yet I felt sure that I could trust him in one point, since in that our
interests jumped together, and that was in the disposition of the
schooner. We both desired to have her stranded safe enough, in a
sheltered place, and so that when the time came, she could be got off
again with as little labor and danger as might be; and until that was
done I considered that my life would certainly be spared.

While I was thus turning the business over in my mind I had not been
idle with my body. I had stolen back to the cabin, slipped once more
into my shoes and laid my hand at random on a bottle of wine, and now
with this for an excuse, I made my reappearance on the deck.

Hands lay as I had left him, all fallen together in a bundle, and with
his eyelids lowered as though he were too weak to bear the light. He
looked up, however, at my coming, knocked the neck off the bottle like a
man who had done the same thing often, and took a good swig, with his
favorite toast of "Here's luck!" Then he lay quiet for a little, and
then, pulling out a stick of tobacco, begged me to cut him a quid.

"Cut me a junk o' that," says he, "for I haven't no knife, and hardly
strength enough, so be as I had. Ah, Jim, Jim, I reckon I've missed
stays! Cut me a quid as'll likely be the last, lad; for I'm for my long
home, and no mistake."

"Well," said I, "I'll cut you some tobacco, but if I was you and thought
myself so badly, I would go to my prayers, like a Christian man."

"Why?" said he. "Now you tell me why."

"Why?" I cried. "You were asking me just now about the dead. You've
broken your trust; you've lived in sin and lies and blood; there's a man
you killed lying at your feet this moment; and you ask me why! For God's
mercy, Mr. Hands, that's why."

I spoke with a little heat, thinking of the bloody dirk he had hidden in
his pocket, and designed, in his ill thoughts, to end me with. He, for
his part, took a great draught of the wine and spoke with the most
unusual solemnity.

"For thirty year," he said, "I've sailed the seas and seen good and bad,
better and worse, fair weather and foul, provisions running out, knives
going, and what not. Well, now I tell you, I never seen good come o'
goodness yet. Him as strikes first is my fancy; dead men don't bite;
them's my views--amen, so be it. And now, you look here," he added,
suddenly changing his tone, "we've had about enough of this foolery. The
tide's made good enough by now. You just take my orders, Cap'n Hawkins,
and we'll sail slap in and be done with it."

All told, we had scarce two miles to run, but the navigation was
delicate, the entrance to this northern anchorage was not only narrow
and shoal, but lay east and west, so that the schooner must be nicely
handled to be got in. I think I was a good, prompt subaltern, and I am
very sure that Hands was an excellent pilot; for we went about and
about, and dodged in, shaving the banks, with a certainty and a neatness
that were a pleasure to behold.

Scarcely had we passed the head before the land closed around us. The
shores of North Inlet were as thickly wooded as those of the southern
anchorage, but the space was longer and narrower, and more like, what in
truth it was, the estuary of a river. Right before us, at the southern
end, we saw the wreck of a ship in the last stages of dilapidation. It
had been a great vessel of three masts, but had lain so long exposed to
the injuries of the weather that it was hung about with great webs of
dripping seaweed, and on the deck of it shore bushes had taken root,
and now flourished thick with flowers. It was a sad sight, but it showed
us that the anchorage was calm.

"Now," said Hands, "look there; there's a pet bit for to beach a ship
in. Fine flat sand, never a catspaw, trees all around of it, and flowers
a-blowing like a garding on that old ship."

"And, once beached," I inquired, "how shall we get her off again?"

"Why, so," he replied; "you take a line ashore there on the other side
at low water; take a turn about one o' them big pines; bring it back,
take a turn around the capstan and lie-to for the tide. Come high water,
all hands take a pull upon the line, and off she comes as sweet as
natur'. And now, boy, you stand by. We're near the bit now, and she's
too much way on her. Starboard a little--so--steady--starboard--larboard
a little--steady--steady!"

So he issued his commands, which I breathlessly obeyed; till, all of a
sudden, he cried: "Now, my hearty, luff!" And I put the helm hard up,
and the _Hispaniola_ swung round rapidly and ran stem on for the low
wooded shore.

The excitement of these last maneuvers had somewhat interfered with the
watch I had kept hitherto, sharply enough, upon the coxswain. Even then
I was still so much interested, waiting for the ship to touch, that I
had quite forgot the peril that hung over my head, and stood craning
over the starboard bulwarks and watching the ripples spreading wide
before the bows. I might have fallen without a struggle for my life, had
not a sudden disquietude seized upon me and made me turn my head.
Perhaps I had heard a creak or seen his shadow moving with the tail of
my eye; perhaps it was an instinct like a cat's; but, sure enough, when
I looked round, there was Hands, already halfway toward me, with the
dirk in his right hand.

We must both have cried out aloud when our eyes met, but while mine was
the shrill cry of terror, his was a roar of fury like a charging bull's.
At the same instant he threw himself forward and I leaped sideways
toward the bows. As I did so I let go of the tiller, which sprung sharp
to leeward; and I think this saved my life, for it struck Hands across
the chest, and stopped him, for the moment, dead.

Before he could recover I was safe out of the corner where he had me
trapped, with all the deck to dodge about. Just forward of the mainmast
I stopped, drew a pistol from my pocket, took a cool aim, though he had
already turned and was once more coming directly after me, and drew the
trigger. The hammer fell, but there followed neither flash nor sound;
the priming was useless with sea water. I cursed myself for my neglect.
Why had not I, long before, reprimed and reloaded my only weapons? Then
I should not have been as now, a mere fleeing sheep before this butcher.

Wounded as he was, it was wonderful how fast he could move, his grizzled
hair tumbling over his face and his face itself as red as a red ensign
with his haste and fury. I had no time to try my other pistol, nor,
indeed, much inclination, for I was sure it would be useless. One thing
I saw plainly: I must not simply retreat before him, or he would
speedily hold me boxed into the bows, as a moment since he had so nearly
boxed me in the stern. Once so caught, and nine or ten inches of the
blood-stained dirk would be my last experience on this side of eternity.
I placed my palms against the mainmast, which was of a goodish bigness,
and waited, every nerve upon the stretch.

Seeing that I meant to dodge he also paused, and a moment or two passed
in feints on his part and corresponding movements upon mine. It was such
a game as I had often played at home about the rocks of Black Hill Cove;
but never before, you may be sure, with such a wildly beating heart as
now. Still, as I say it, it was a boy's game, and I thought I could hold
my own at it against an elderly seaman with a wounded thigh. Indeed, my
courage had begun to rise so high that I allowed myself a few darting
thoughts on what would be the end of the affair; and while I saw
certainly that I could spin it out for long, I saw no hope of any
ultimate escape.

Well, while things stood thus, suddenly the _Hispaniola_ struck,
staggered, ground for an instant in the sand, and then, swift as a blow,
canted over to the port side, till the deck stood at an angle of
forty-five degrees, and about a puncheon of water splashed into the
scupper holes, and lay in a pool between the deck and bulwark.

We were both of us capsized in a second, and both of us rolled, almost
together, into the scuppers, the dead Red-cap, with his arms still
spread out, tumbling stiffly after us. So near were we, indeed, that my
head came against the coxswain's foot with a crack that made my teeth
rattle. Blow and all, I was the first afoot again, for Hands had got
involved with the dead body. The sudden canting of the ship had made the
deck no place for running on; I had to find some new way of escape, and
that upon the instant, for my foe was almost touching me. Quick as
thought, I sprang into the mizzen shrouds, rattled up hand over hand,
and did not draw a breath till I was seated on the crosstrees.

[Illustration: _Quick as thought, I sprang into the mizzen shrouds_
(Page 193)]

I had been saved by being prompt; the dirk had struck not half a foot
below me as I pursued my upward flight; and there stood Israel Hands
with his mouth open and his face upturned to mine, a perfect statue of
surprise and disappointment.

Now that I had a moment to myself, I lost no time in changing the
priming of my pistol, and then, having one ready for service, and to
make assurance doubly sure, I proceeded to draw the load of the other,
and recharge it afresh from the beginning.

My new employment struck Hands all of a heap; he began to see the dice
going against him, and after an obvious hesitation, he also hauled
himself heavily into the shrouds, and, with the dirk in his teeth, began
slowly and painfully to mount. It cost him no end of time and groans to
haul his wounded leg behind him; and I had quietly finished my
arrangements before he was much more than a third of the way up. Then,
with a pistol in either hand, I addressed him:

"One more step, Mr. Hands," said I, "and I'll blow your brains out! Dead
men don't bite, you know," I added, with a chuckle.

He stopped instantly. I could see by the workings of his face that he
was trying to think, and the process was so slow and laborious that, in
my new-found security, I laughed aloud. At last, with a swallow or two,
he spoke, his face still wearing the same expression of extreme
perplexity. In order to speak he had to take the dagger from his mouth,
but, in all else, he remained unmoved.

"Jim," says he, "I reckon we're fouled, you and me, and we'll have to
sign articles. I'd have had you but for that there lurch; but I don't
have no luck, not I; and I reckon I'll have to strike, which comes hard,
you see, for a master mariner to a ship's younker like you, Jim."

I was drinking in his words and smiling away, as conceited as a cock
upon a walk, when, all in a breath, back went his right hand over his
shoulder. Something sang like an arrow through the air; I felt a blow
and then a sharp pang, and there I was pinned by the shoulder to the
mast. In the horrid pain and surprise of the moment--I scarce can say it
was by my own volition, and I am sure it was without a conscious
aim--both my pistols went off, and both escaped out of my hands. They
did not fall alone; with a choked cry the coxswain loosed his grasp upon
the shrouds, and plunged head first into the water.




CHAPTER XXVII

"PIECES OF EIGHT"


Owing to the cant of the vessel, the masts hung far out over the water,
and from my perch on the crosstrees I had nothing below me but the
surface of the bay. Hands, who was not so far up, was, in consequence,
nearer to the ship, and fell between me and the bulwarks. He rose once
to the surface in a lather of foam and blood, and then sank again for
good. As the water settled, I could see him lying huddled together on
the clean, bright sand in the shadow of the vessel's sides. A fish or
two whipped past his body. Sometimes, by the quivering of the water, he
appeared to move a little, as if he were trying to rise. But he was dead
enough, for all that, being both shot and drowned, and was food for fish
in the very place where he had designed my slaughter.

I was no sooner certain of this than I began to feel sick, faint, and
terrified. The hot blood was running over my back and chest. The dirk,
where it had pinned my shoulder to the mast, seemed to burn like a hot
iron; yet it was not so much these real sufferings that distressed me,
for these, it seemed to me, I could bear without a murmur; it was the
horror I had upon my mind of falling from the crosstree into that still,
green water beside the body of the coxswain.

I clung with both hands till my nails ached, and I shut my eyes as if to
cover up the peril. Gradually my mind came back again, my pulses
quieted down to a more natural time, and I was once more in possession
of myself.

It was my first thought to pluck forth the dirk; but either it stuck too
hard or my nerve failed me, and I desisted with a violent shudder. Oddly
enough, that very shudder did the business. The knife, in fact, had come
the nearest in the world to missing me altogether; it held me by a mere
pinch of skin, and this the shudder tore away. The blood ran down the
faster, to be sure, but I was my own master again, and only tacked to
the mast by my coat and shirt.

These last I broke through with a sudden jerk, and then regained the
deck by the starboard shrouds. For nothing in the world would I have
again ventured, shaken as I was, upon the overhanging port shrouds, from
which Israel had so lately fallen.

I went below and did what I could for my wound; it pained me a good
deal, and still bled freely, but it was neither deep nor dangerous, nor
did it greatly gall me when I used my arm. Then I looked around me, and
as the ship was now, in a sense, my own, I began to think of clearing it
from its last passenger--the dead man, O'Brien.

He had pitched, as I have said, against the bulwarks, where he lay like
some horrid, ungainly sort of puppet; life-size, indeed, but how
different from life's color or life's comeliness! In that position, I
could easily have my way with him, and as the habit of tragical
adventures had worn off almost all my terror for the dead, I took him by
the waist as if he had been a sack of bran, and, with one good heave,
tumbled him overboard. He went in with a sounding plunge; the red cap
came off, and remained floating on the surface; and as soon as the
splash subsided, I could see him and Israel lying side by side, both
wavering with the tremulous movement of the water. O'Brien, though still
quite a young man, was very bald. There he lay with that bald head
across the knees of the man who killed him, and the quick fishes
steering to and fro over both.

I was now alone upon the ship; the tide had just turned. The sun was
within so few degrees of setting that already the shadow of the pines
upon the western shore began to reach right across the anchorage and
fall in patterns on the deck. The evening breeze had sprung up, and
though it was well warded off by the hill with the two peaks upon the
east, the cordage had begun to sing a little softly to itself and the
idle sails to rattle to and fro.

I began to see a danger to the ship. The jibs I speedily doused and
brought tumbling to the deck, but the mainsail was a harder matter. Of
course, when the schooner canted over, the boom had swung outboard, and
the cap of it and a foot or two of sail hung even under water. I thought
this made it still more dangerous, yet the strain was so heavy that I
half feared to meddle. At last I got my knife and cut the halyards. The
peak dropped instantly, a great belly of loose canvas floated broad upon
the water; and since, pull as I liked, I could not budge the downhaul,
that was the extent of what I could accomplish. For the rest, the
_Hispaniola_ must trust to luck, like myself.

By this time the whole anchorage had fallen into shadow--the last rays,
I remember, falling through a glade of the wood, and shining bright as
jewels on the flowery mantle of the wreck. It began to be chill, the
tide was rapidly fleeting seaward, the schooner settling more and more
on her beam-ends.

I scrambled forward and looked over. It seemed shallow enough, and
holding the cut hawser in both hands for a last security, I let myself
drop softly overboard. The water scarcely reached my waist; the sand was
firm and covered with ripple-marks, and I waded ashore in great spirits,
leaving the _Hispaniola_ on her side, with her mainsail trailing wide
upon the surface of the bay. About the same time the sun went fairly
down, and the breeze whistled low in the dusk among the tossing pines.

At least, and at last, I was off the sea, nor had I returned thence
empty-handed. There lay the schooner, clear at last from buccaneers and
ready for our own men to board and get to sea again. I had nothing
nearer my fancy than to get home to the stockade and boast of my
achievements. Possibly I might be blamed a bit for my truantry, but the
recapture of the _Hispaniola_ was a clinching answer, and I hoped that
even Captain Smollett would confess I had not lost my time.

So thinking, and in famous spirits, I began to set my face homeward for
the blockhouse and my companions. I remembered that the most easterly of
the rivers which drain into Captain Kidd's anchorage ran from the
two-peaked hill upon my left; and I bent my course in that direction
that I might pass the stream while it was small. The wood was pretty
open, and keeping along the lower spurs, I had soon turned the corner of
that hill, and not long after waded to the mid-calf across the
watercourse.

This brought me near to where I had encountered Ben Gunn, the maroon,
and I walked more circumspectly, keeping an eye on every side. The dusk
had come nigh hand completely, and, as I opened out the cleft between
the two peaks, I became aware of a wavering glow against the sky, where,
as I judged, the man of the island was cooking his supper before a
roaring fire. And yet I wondered, in my heart, that he should show
himself so careless. For if I could see this radiance, might it not
reach the eye of Silver himself where he camped upon the shore among the
marshes?

Gradually the night fell blacker; it was all I could do to guide myself
even roughly toward my destination; the double hill behind me and the
Spy-glass on my right hand loomed faint and fainter, the stars were few
and pale, and in the low ground where I wandered I kept tripping among
bushes and rolling into sandy pits.

Suddenly a kind of brightness fell about me. I looked up; a pale glimmer
of moonbeams had alighted on the summit of the Spy-glass, and soon after
I saw something broad and silvery moving low down behind the trees, and
knew the moon had risen.

With this to help me, I passed rapidly over what remained to me of my
journey; and, sometimes walking, sometimes running, impatiently drew
near to the stockade. Yet, as I began to thread the grove that lies
before it, I was not so thoughtless but that I slacked my pace and went
a trifle warily. It would have been a poor end of my adventures to get
shot down by my own party in mistake.

The moon was climbing higher and higher; its light began to fall here
and there in masses through the more open districts of the wood, and
right in front of me a glow of a different color appeared among the
trees. It was red and hot, and now and again it was a little
darkened--as it were the embers of a bonfire smoldering.

For the life of me I could not think what it might be.

At last I came right down upon the borders of the clearing. The western
end was already steeped in moon-shine; the rest, and the blockhouse
itself, still lay in a black shadow, chequered with long, silvery
streaks of light. On the other side of the house an immense fire had
burned itself into clear embers and shed a steady, red reverberation,
contrasting strongly with the mellow paleness of the moon. There was not
a soul stirring, nor a sound beside the noises of the breeze.

I stopped, with much wonder in my heart, and perhaps a little terror
also. It had not been our way to build great fires; we were, indeed, by
the captain's orders, somewhat niggardly of firewood, and I began to
fear that something had gone wrong while I was absent.

I stole round by the eastern end, keeping close in shadow, and at a
convenient place, where the darkness was thickest, crossed the palisade.

To make assurance surer, I got upon my hands and knees, and crawled,
without a sound, toward the corner of the house. As I drew nearer, my
heart was suddenly and greatly lightened. It was not a pleasant noise in
itself, and I have often complained of it at other times, but just then
it was like music to hear my friends snoring together so loud and
peaceful in their sleep. The sea-cry of the watch, that beautiful "All's
well," never fell more reassuringly on my ear.

In the meantime there was no doubt of one thing; they kept an infamous
bad watch. If it had been Silver and his lads that were now creeping in
on them, not a soul would have seen daybreak. That was what it was,
thought I, to have the captain wounded; and again I blamed myself
sharply for leaving them in that danger with so few to mount guard.

By this time I had got to the door and stood up. All was dark within, so
that I could distinguish nothing by the eye. As for sounds, there was
the steady drone of the snorers, and a small occasional noise, a
flickering or pecking that I could in no way account for.

With my arms before me I walked steadily in. I should lie down in my own
place (I thought, with a silent chuckle) and enjoy their faces when they
found me in the morning. My foot struck something yielding--it was a
sleeper's leg, and he turned and groaned, but without awaking.

And then, all of a sudden, a shrill voice broke forth out of the
darkness:

"Pieces of eight! pieces of eight! pieces of eight! pieces of eight!
pieces of eight!" and so forth, without pause or change, like the
clacking of a tiny mill.

Silver's green parrot, Captain Flint! It was she whom I had heard
pecking at a piece of bark; it was she, keeping better watch than any
human being, who thus announced my arrival with her wearisome refrain.

I had no time left me to recover. At the sharp clipping tone of the
parrot, the sleepers awoke and sprang up, and with a mighty oath the
voice of Silver cried:

"Who goes?"

I turned to run, struck violently against one person, recoiled, and ran
full into the arms of a second, who, for his part, closed upon and held
me tight.

"Bring a torch, Dick," said Silver, when my capture was thus assured.

And one of the men left the log-house, and presently returned with a
lighted brand.

[Illustration]




PART VI

CAPTAIN SILVER




CHAPTER XXVIII

IN THE ENEMY'S CAMP


The red glare of the torch lighting up the interior of the blockhouse
showed me the worst of my apprehensions realized. The pirates were in
possession of the house and stores; there was the cask of cognac, there
were the pork and bread, as before; and, what tenfold increased my
horror, not a sign of any prisoner. I could only judge that all had
perished, and my heart smote me sorely that I had not been there to
perish with them.

There were six of the buccaneers, all told; not another man was left
alive. Five of them were on their feet, flushed and swollen, suddenly
called out of the first sleep of drunkenness. The sixth had only risen
upon his elbow; he was deadly pale, and the blood-stained bandage round
his head told that he had recently been wounded, and still more recently
dressed. I remembered the man who had been shot and run back among the
woods in the great attack, and doubted not that this was he.

The parrot sat, preening her plumage, on Long John's shoulder. He
himself, I thought, looked somewhat paler and more stern than I was used
to. He still wore his fine broadcloth suit in which he had fulfilled his
mission, but it was bitterly the worse for wear, daubed with clay and
torn with sharp briers of the wood.

"So," said he, "here's Jim Hawkins, shiver my timbers! dropped in,
like, eh? Well, come, I take that friendly."

And thereupon he sat down across the brandy-cask, and began to fill a
pipe.

"Give me the loan of a link, Dick," said he; and then, when he had a
good light, "That'll do, my lad," he added, "stick the glim in the wood
heap; and you, gentlemen, bring yourselves to!--you needn't stand up for
Mr. Hawkins; _he'll_ excuse you, you may lay to that. And so,
Jim"--stopping the tobacco--"here you are, and quite a pleasant surprise
for poor old John. I see you were smart when first I set my eyes on you,
but this here gets away from me clean, it do."

To all this, as may be well supposed, I made no answer. They had set me
with my back against the wall, and I stood there, looking Silver in the
face, pluckily enough, I hope, to all outward appearance, but with black
despair in my heart.

Silver took a whiff or two of his pipe with great composure, and then
ran on again:

"Now, you see, Jim, so be as you _are_ here," says he, "I'll give you a
piece of my mind. I've always liked you, I have, for a lad of spirit,
and the picter of my own self when I was young and handsome. I always
wanted you to jine and take your share, and die a gentleman, and now, my
cock, you've got to. Cap'n Smollett's a fine seaman, as I'll own up to
any day, but stiff on discipline. 'Dooty is dooty,' says he, and right
he is. Just you keep clear of the cap'n. The doctor himself is gone dead
again you--'ungrateful scamp' was what he said; and the short and long
of the whole story is about here: You can't go back to your own lot, for
they won't have you; and, without you start a third ship's company all
by yourself, which might be lonely, you'll have to jine with Cap'n
Silver."

So far so good. My friends, then, were still alive, and though I partly
believed the truth of Silver's statement, that the cabin party were
incensed at me for my desertion, I was more relieved than distressed by
what I heard.

"I don't say nothing as to your being in our hands," continued Silver,
"though there you are, and you may lay to it. I'm all for argyment; I
never seen good come out o' threatening. If you like the service, well,
you'll jine; and if you don't, Jim, why, you're free to answer no--free
and welcome, shipmate; and if fairer can be said by mortal seaman,
shiver my sides!"

"Am I to answer, then?" I asked, with a very tremulous voice. Through
all this sneering talk I was made to feel the threat of death that
overhung me, and my cheeks burned and my heart beat painfully in my
breast.

"Lad," said Silver, "no one's a-pressing of you. Take your bearings.
None of us won't hurry you, mate; time goes so pleasant in your company,
you see."

"Well," says I, growing a bit bolder, "if I'm to choose, I declare I
have a right to know what's what, and why you're here, and where my
friends are."

"Wot's wot?" repeated one of the buccaneers, in a deep growl. "Ah, he'd
be a lucky one as knowed that!"

"You'll, perhaps, batten down your hatches till you're spoke to, my
friend," cried Silver, truculently, to this speaker. And then, in his
first gracious tones, he replied to me: "Yesterday morning, Mr.
Hawkins," said he, "in the dogwatch, down came Doctor Livesey with a
flag of truce. Says he: 'Cap'n Silver, you're sold out. Ship's gone!'
Well, maybe we'd been taking a glass, and a song to help it round. I
won't say no. Leastways, none of us had looked out. We looked out, and,
by thunder! the old ship was gone. I never seen a pack o' fools look
fishier; and you may lay to that, if I tells you that I looked the
fishiest. 'Well,' says the doctor, 'let's bargain.' We bargained, him
and I, and here we are; stores, brandy, blockhouse, the firewood you was
thoughtful enough to cut, and, in a manner of speaking, the whole
blessed boat, from crosstrees to keelson. As for them, they've tramped;
I don't know where's they are."

He drew again quietly at his pipe.

"And lest you should take it into that head of yours," he went on, "that
you was included in the treaty, here's the last word that was said: 'How
many are you,' says I, 'to leave?' 'Four,' says he--'four, and one of us
wounded. As for that boy, I don't know where he is, confound him,' says
he, 'nor I don't much care. We're about sick of him.' These was his
words."

"Is that all?" I asked.

"Well, it's all you're to hear, my son," returned Silver.

"And now I am to choose?"

"And now you are to choose, and you may lay to that," said Silver.

"Well," said I, "I am not such a fool but I know pretty well what I have
to look for. Let the worst come to the worst, it's little I care. I've
seen too many die since I fell in with you. But there's a thing or two I
have to tell you," I said, and by this time I was quite excited; "and
the first is this: Here you are, in a bad way; ship lost, treasure lost,
men lost; your whole business gone to wreck; and if you want to know who
did it--it was I! I was in the apple barrel the night we sighted land,
and I heard you, John, and you, Dick Johnson, and Hands, who is now at
the bottom of the sea, and told every word you said before the hour was
out. And as for the schooner, it was I who cut her cable, and it was I
who killed the men you had aboard of her, and it was I who brought her
where you'll never see her more, not one of you. The laugh's on my side;
I've had the top of this business from the first; I no more fear you
than I fear a fly. Kill me, if you please, or spare me. But one thing
I'll say, and no more; if you spare me, bygones are bygones, and when
you fellows are in court for piracy, I'll save you all I can. It is for
you to choose. Kill another and do yourselves no good, or spare me and
keep a witness to save you from the gallows."

I stopped, for, I tell you, I was out of breath, and, to my wonder, not
a man of them moved, but all sat staring at me like as many sheep. And
while they were still staring I broke out again:

"And now, Mr. Silver," I said, "I believe you're the best man here, and
if things go to the worst, I'll take it kind of you to let the doctor
know the way I took it."

"I'll bear it in mind," said Silver, with an accent so curious that I
could not, for the life of me, decide whether he were laughing at my
request or had been favorably affected by my courage.

"I'll put one to that," cried the old mahogany-faced seaman--Morgan by
name--whom I had seen in Long John's public-house upon the quays of
Bristol. "It was him that knowed Black Dog."

"Well, and see here," added the sea-cook, "I'll put another again to
that, by thunder! for it was this same boy that faked the chart from
Billy Bones. First and last we've split upon Jim Hawkins!"

"Then here goes!" said Morgan, with an oath.

And he sprang up, drawing his knife as if he had been twenty.

"Avast, there!" cried Silver. "Who are you, Tom Morgan? Maybe you
thought you were captain here, perhaps. By the powers, but I'll teach
you better! Cross me and you'll go where many a good man's gone before
you, first and last, these thirty year back--some to the yardarm, shiver
my sides! and some by the board, and all to feed the fishes. There's
never a man looked me between the eyes and seen a good day a'terward,
Tom Morgan, you may lay to that."

Morgan paused, but a hoarse murmur rose from the others.

"Tom's right," said one.

"I stood hazing long enough from one," added another. "I'll be hanged if
I'll be hazed by you, John Silver."

"Did any of you gentlemen want to have it out with _me_?" roared Silver,
bending far forward from his position on the keg, with his pipe still
glowing in his right hand. "Put a name on what you're at; you ain't
dumb, I reckon. Him that wants shall get it. Have I lived this many
years to have a son of a rum puncheon cock his hat athwart my hawser at
the latter end of it? You know the way; you're all gentlemen o' fortune,
by your account. Well, I'm ready. Take a cutlass, him that dares, and
I'll see the color of his inside, crutch and all, before that pipe's
empty."

Not a man stirred; not a man answered.

"That's your sort, is it?" he added, returning his pipe to his mouth.
"Well, you're a gay lot to look at, any way. Not worth much to fight,
you ain't. P'r'aps you can understand King George's English. I'm cap'n
here by 'lection. I'm cap'n here because I'm the best man by a long
sea-mile. You won't fight, as gentlemen o' fortune should; then, by
thunder, you'll obey, and you may lay to it! I like that boy, now; I
never seen a better boy than that. He's more a man than any pair of rats
of you in this here house, and what I say is this: Let me see him
that'll lay a hand on him--that's what I say, and you may lay to it."

There was a long pause after this. I stood straight up against the wall,
my heart still going like a sledgehammer, but with a ray of hope now
shining in my bosom. Silver leant back against the wall, his arms
crossed, his pipe in the corner of his mouth, as calm as though he had
been in church; yet his eye kept wandering furtively, and he kept the
tail of it on his unruly followers. They, on their part, drew gradually
together toward the far end of the blockhouse, and the low hiss of their
whispering sounded in my ears continuously, like a stream. One after
another they would look up, and the red light of the torch would fall
for a second on their nervous faces; but it was not toward me, it was
toward Silver that they turned their eyes.

"You seem to have a lot to say," remarked Silver, spitting far into the
air. "Pipe up and let me hear it, or lay to."

"Ax your pardon, sir," returned one of the men; "you're pretty free with
some of the rules, maybe you'll kindly keep an eye upon the rest. This
crew's dissatisfied; this crew don't vally bullying a marlinspike; this
crew has its rights like other crews, I'll make so free as that; and by
your own rules I take it we can talk together. I ax your pardon, sir,
acknowledging you for to be capting at this present, but I claim my
right and steps outside for a council."

And with an elaborate sea-salute this fellow, a long, ill-looking,
yellow-eyed man of five-and-thirty, stepped coolly toward the door and
disappeared out of the house. One after another the rest followed his
example, each making a salute as he passed, each adding some apology.
"According to rules," said one. "Foc's'le council," said Morgan. And so
with one remark or another, all marched out and left Silver and me alone
with the torch.

The sea-cook instantly removed his pipe.

"Now, look you here, Jim Hawkins," he said in a steady whisper that was
no more than audible, "you're within half a plank of death, and, what's
a long sight worse, of torture. They're going to throw me off. But you
mark, I stand by you through thick and thin. I didn't mean to; no, not
till you spoke up. I was about desperate to lose that much blunt, and be
hanged into the bargain. But I see you was the right sort. I says to
myself: You stand by Hawkins, John, and Hawkins'll stand by you. You're
his last card, and by the living thunder, John, he's yours! Back to
back, says I. You save your witness and he'll save your neck!"

I began dimly to understand.

"You mean all's lost?" I asked.

"Ay, by gum, I do!" he answered. "Ship gone, neck gone--that's the size
of it. Once I looked into that bay, Jim Hawkins, and seen no
schooner--well, I'm tough, but I gave out. As for that lot and their
council, mark me, they're outright fools and cowards. I'll save your
life--if so be as I can--from them. But see here, Jim--tit for tat--you
save Long John from swinging."

I was bewildered; it seemed a thing so hopeless he was asking--he, the
old buccaneer, the ringleader throughout.

"What I can do, that I'll do," I said.