Latest / Children’s Stories Library / Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson Part 2
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Hat was set on the back of his head. Here
- 0:04Speaker 1: you are, my man, said the captain, raising his head.
- 0:08Speaker 1: You had better sit down. You wait, go let me inside,
- 0:13Speaker 1: captain complained long John. It's a main cold morning. To
- 0:18Speaker 1: be sure, sir, to sit outside upon the sand, why, Silver,
- 0:24Speaker 1: said the captain. If you had pleased to be an
- 0:27Speaker 1: honest man, you might have been sitting in your galley.
- 0:30Speaker 1: It's your own doing. You're either my ship's cook, and
- 0:35Speaker 1: then you were treated handsome or cap'n Silver, a common
- 0:39Speaker 1: mutineer and pirate, and then you can go hang wow, well, Copton,
- 0:47Speaker 1: returned the sea cook, sitting down as he was bidden
- 0:49Speaker 1: on the sand. You're allowed to give me a hand
- 0:52Speaker 1: up again. That's all a sweet, pretty place you have
- 0:56Speaker 1: of it. Here, Ah, there's Jim of the morning to you,
- 1:01Speaker 1: Jim doctor. Here's my service. Why there you all are
- 1:07Speaker 1: together like a happy family in a manner of speaking.
- 1:11Speaker 1: If you have anything to say, my man, a better sight, it,
- 1:15Speaker 1: said the captain. Right you are, cap'n Smollett replied Silver.
- 1:21Speaker 1: Dooty's duty to be sure. Well, now you look here.
- 1:26Speaker 1: That was a good lay of yours last night. I
- 1:29Speaker 1: don't deny it was a good lay some of you
- 1:33Speaker 1: pretty handy with a handspike hand, And I'll not deny neither.
- 1:38Speaker 1: But what some of my people were shook? Maybe all
- 1:42Speaker 1: was shook. Maybe I was shook myself, and maybe that's
- 1:46Speaker 1: why I'm here for terms. But you mark me, cap'n.
- 1:51Speaker 1: It won't do twice by thunder. We'll have to do
- 1:55Speaker 1: century go and ease off a point or so on
- 1:58Speaker 1: the rum. Maybe you think we were all a sheep
- 2:02Speaker 1: in the wind's eye, but I'll tell you I was sober.
- 2:07Speaker 1: I was only dog tired. And if i'd awoke a
- 2:10Speaker 1: second sooner, i'd a caught you in the act. I would.
- 2:14Speaker 1: He wasn't dead when I got round to him. Not he, well,
- 2:20Speaker 1: said Captain Smollett, as cool as can be. All that
- 2:24Speaker 1: Silver said was a riddle to him, but you would
- 2:27Speaker 1: never have guessed it from his tone. As for me,
- 2:31Speaker 1: I began to have an inkling. Ben Gunn's last words
- 2:35Speaker 1: came back to my mind. I began to suppose that
- 2:39Speaker 1: he had paid the buccaneers a visit while they all
- 2:42Speaker 1: lay drunk together round their fire, and I reckoned up
- 2:46Speaker 1: with glee that we had only fourteen enemies to deal with. Well,
- 2:51Speaker 1: here it is said Silver, we want that treasure and
- 2:57Speaker 1: we'll have it. That's our pint. You would just as
- 3:01Speaker 1: soon save your lives, I reckon, and that's yours. You
- 3:05Speaker 1: have a chat, haven't you. That's as maybe, replied the captain. Ah,
- 3:12Speaker 1: well you have it. I know that, returned long John.
- 3:17Speaker 1: You needn't be so husky with a man. There ain't
- 3:20Speaker 1: a particle of service in that, and you may lay
- 3:23Speaker 1: to it. What I mean is we want your chat now.
- 3:28Speaker 1: I never meant you know, ah myself. That won't do
- 3:33Speaker 1: with me, my man, interrupted the captain. We know exactly
- 3:38Speaker 1: what you meant to do, and we don't care for now.
- 3:42Speaker 1: You see you can't do it, And the captain looked
- 3:46Speaker 1: at him calmly and proceeded to fill a pipe. If
- 3:50Speaker 1: abe Gray Silver broke out, I asked there, cried mister Smollett.
- 3:57Speaker 1: Gray told me nothing, and I asked him nothing. And
- 4:01Speaker 1: what's more, I would see you and him and this
- 4:04Speaker 1: whole island blown clear out of the water into blazes first.
- 4:09Speaker 1: So there's my mind for you, my man. On that,
- 4:14Speaker 1: this little whiff of temper seemed to cool Silver down.
- 4:17Speaker 1: He had been growing nettled before, but now he pulled
- 4:20Speaker 1: himself together like enough, said he, I would set no
- 4:26Speaker 1: limits to what gentlemen might consider shipshape or might not,
- 4:30Speaker 1: as a case were, And seeing as hell you are
- 4:33Speaker 1: about to take a pipe, capt'n, I'll make so free
- 4:36Speaker 1: as to do likewise. And he filled a pipe and
- 4:40Speaker 1: lighted it. And the two men sat silently smoking for
- 4:43Speaker 1: quite a while, now looking each other in the face,
- 4:47Speaker 1: now stopping their tobacco, now leaning forward to spit. It
- 4:52Speaker 1: was as good as the plate to see them now
- 4:56Speaker 1: resumed silver. Here it is, give us the chap to
- 5:01Speaker 1: get the treasure, boy, and drop shooting purse, seamen and
- 5:05Speaker 1: stoven of their heads in boil asleep. You do that,
- 5:09Speaker 1: and we'll offer you a choice. Either you come aboorn
- 5:13Speaker 1: along of us once the treasure shipped, and then i'll
- 5:16Speaker 1: give you a affy davy upon my word honor, to
- 5:20Speaker 1: clap you somewhere safe ashore, or if that ain't to
- 5:24Speaker 1: your fancy, some of my hands being rough and having
- 5:27Speaker 1: old scores on account of hazing, then you can stay here.
- 5:32Speaker 1: You can. We'll devoid stores with you man from man,
- 5:38Speaker 1: and I'll give my affy davy as before to speak,
- 5:41Speaker 1: the first ship by sight and send de mere to
- 5:45Speaker 1: pick you up. Now youllone that's talking answomer, you could
- 5:51Speaker 1: look to get nut you. And I hope, raising his voice,
- 5:56Speaker 1: that all hands in this ear blockhouse will over ah
- 6:00Speaker 1: my words, for what is spoke to one is spoke
- 6:03Speaker 1: to all. Captain Smollett rose from his seat and knocked
- 6:08Speaker 1: out the ashes of his pipe in the palm of
- 6:10Speaker 1: his left hand. Is that all? He asked, every last
- 6:16Speaker 1: word by thunder, answered John. Refuse that. And you've seen
- 6:21Speaker 1: the last of me. But musket balls very good, said
- 6:27Speaker 1: the Captain. Now you'll hear me. If you'll come up
- 6:32Speaker 1: one by one unarmed, I'll engage to clap you all
- 6:36Speaker 1: in irons and to take you home to a fair
- 6:40Speaker 1: trial in England. If you won't. My name is Alexander Smollett.
- 6:46Speaker 1: I've flown my Sovereign's colors, and I'll see you all
- 6:50Speaker 1: to Davy Jones. You can't find the treasure. You can't
- 6:55Speaker 1: sail the ship. There's not a man among you fit
- 6:58Speaker 1: to sail the ship. You can't fight us Gray there
- 7:01Speaker 1: got away from five of you. Your ship's in irons,
- 7:05Speaker 1: Master Silver, you're on a lee shore, and so you'll
- 7:10Speaker 1: find I stand here and tell you so, and they're
- 7:14Speaker 1: the last good words you'll get from me, For in
- 7:17Speaker 1: the name of Heaven, I'll put a bullet in your
- 7:20Speaker 1: back where next I meet you. Tramp, my lad, bundle
- 7:25Speaker 1: out of this place. Please hand over hand and double quick.
- 7:31Speaker 1: Silver's face was a picture. His eyes started in his
- 7:35Speaker 1: head with wrath. He shook the fire out of his pipe.
- 7:40Speaker 1: Give me a hand up, he cried, Not I returned
- 7:44Speaker 1: the captain. Give me a hand up, he roared. Not
- 7:50Speaker 1: a man among us moved, growling the foulest imprecations. He
- 7:54Speaker 1: crawled along the sand till he got hold of the
- 7:57Speaker 1: porch and could hoist himself again upon his crutch. Then
- 8:01Speaker 1: he spat into the spring. There he cried, that's what
- 8:06Speaker 1: I think of ye before the ah, stoving your old
- 8:11Speaker 1: blockhouse like a rum puncheon, Laugh, boy, thunder, laugh before
- 8:16Speaker 1: an hour isel year. Laugh upon the other side them
- 8:20Speaker 1: that dial'll be the lucky ones. And with a dreadful oath,
- 8:25Speaker 1: he stumbled off, plowed down the sand, and was helped
- 8:28Speaker 1: across the stockade after four or five failures by the
- 8:32Speaker 1: man with the flag of truce, and disappeared in an
- 8:35Speaker 1: instant afterward among the trees. End of Chapter twenty Chapter
- 8:41Speaker 1: twenty one the attack. As soon as Silver disappeared, the captain,
- 8:47Speaker 1: who had been closely watching him, turned toward the interior
- 8:50Speaker 1: of the house, and found not a man of us
- 8:53Speaker 1: at his post but Gray. It was the first time
- 8:57Speaker 1: we had ever seen him angry quarters, he roared, and
- 9:02Speaker 1: then as we slunk back to our places, Gray, he said,
- 9:06Speaker 1: I'll put your name in the log. You've stood by
- 9:09Speaker 1: your duty like a seaman, mister Trelawney. I'm surprised at you, sir, Doctor.
- 9:16Speaker 1: I thought you had worn the king's coat. If that
- 9:20Speaker 1: was how you served at Fonteneus, sir, you'd have been
- 9:23Speaker 1: better in your birth. The Doctor's watch were all back
- 9:27Speaker 1: at their loopholes. The rest were busy loading the spare muskets,
- 9:31Speaker 1: and everyone with a red face, you may be certain,
- 9:34Speaker 1: and a flea in his ear as the saying is.
- 9:37Speaker 1: The captain looked on for a while in silence. Then
- 9:41Speaker 1: he spoke, my lads, He said, I've given Silver a broadside.
- 9:47Speaker 1: I pitched it in red hot on the purpose, and
- 9:50Speaker 1: before the hour's out, as he said, we shall be boarded.
- 9:55Speaker 1: We're outnumbered. I needn't tell you that, but we fight
- 10:00Speaker 1: shelter and minutes ago I would have said, we fought
- 10:04Speaker 1: with discipline. I have no manner of doubt that we
- 10:08Speaker 1: can drub them if you choose. Then he went the
- 10:12Speaker 1: round and saw, as he said, that all was clear.
- 10:16Speaker 1: On the two short sides of the house east and west.
- 10:20Speaker 1: There were only two loopholes. On the south side, where
- 10:23Speaker 1: the porch was two again, and on the north side five.
- 10:29Speaker 1: There was a round score of muskets for the seven
- 10:32Speaker 1: of us. The firewood had been built into four piles tables,
- 10:36Speaker 1: you might say, one about the middle of each side.
- 10:39Speaker 1: And on each of these tables some ammunition and four
- 10:42Speaker 1: loaded muskets were laid ready to the hand of the defenders.
- 10:47Speaker 1: In the middle, the cutlasses lay ranged. Toss out the fire,
- 10:53Speaker 1: said the captain. The chin is past, and we mustn't
- 10:57Speaker 1: have smoke in our eyes. The fire basket was carried
- 11:01Speaker 1: bodily out by mister Trelawney, and the embers smothered among sand.
- 11:06Speaker 1: Hawkins hasn't had his breakfast. Hawkins, help yourself and back
- 11:11Speaker 1: to your post to eat it, continued Captain Smollett lively. Now,
- 11:16Speaker 1: my lad, you'll want it before you're done. Hunter, serve
- 11:21Speaker 1: out a round of brandy to all hands. And while
- 11:25Speaker 1: this was going on, the Captain completed in his own
- 11:28Speaker 1: mind the plan of defense. Doctor, you will take the door,
- 11:34Speaker 1: he resumed. See, don't expose yourself, keep within and fire
- 11:39Speaker 1: through the porch. Hunter take the east side there, Joyce,
- 11:44Speaker 1: you stand by the west, my man, mister Trelawney, you
- 11:48Speaker 1: are the best shot. You and Gray will take this
- 11:52Speaker 1: long north side with the five loopholes. It's there. The
- 11:57Speaker 1: danger is if they can get up to it and
- 12:01Speaker 1: fire upon us through our own ports, things would begin
- 12:05Speaker 1: to look dirty. Hawkins, neither you nor I are much
- 12:09Speaker 1: account at the shooting. We all stand by to load
- 12:13Speaker 1: and bear a hand. As the Captain had said, the
- 12:17Speaker 1: chill was pasted. As soon as the sun had climbed
- 12:20Speaker 1: above our girdle of trees. It fell with all its
- 12:23Speaker 1: force upon the clearing and drank up the vapors at
- 12:27Speaker 1: a draft. Soon the sand was baking and the resin
- 12:31Speaker 1: melting in the logs of the blockhouse. Jackets and coats
- 12:34Speaker 1: were flung aside. Shirts were thrown open at the neck
- 12:38Speaker 1: and rolled up to the shoulders. And we stood there,
- 12:41Speaker 1: each at his post, in a fever of heat and anxiety.
- 12:46Speaker 1: An hour passed away. Hang them, said the captain. This
- 12:51Speaker 1: is as dull as the doldrums gray whistle for a wind.
- 12:56Speaker 1: And just at that moment came the first news of
- 12:58Speaker 1: the attack. If you please, sir, said Joyce. If I
- 13:03Speaker 1: see any one, am I to fire? I told you so,
- 13:07Speaker 1: cried the captain. Thank you, sir, returned Joyce, with the
- 13:11Speaker 1: same quiet civility. Nothing followed for a time, but the
- 13:15Speaker 1: remark had set us all on the alert, straining ears
- 13:18Speaker 1: and eyes, the musketeers with their pieces balanced in their hands,
- 13:23Speaker 1: the captain out in the middle of the block house,
- 13:25Speaker 1: with his mouth very tight and a frown on his face.
- 13:29Speaker 1: So some seconds passed till suddenly Joyce whipped up his
- 13:33Speaker 1: musket and fired. The report had scarcely died away ere
- 13:38Speaker 1: it was repeated and repeated from without, in a scattering volley,
- 13:42Speaker 1: shot behind, shot, like a string of geese, from every
- 13:46Speaker 1: side of the enclosure. Several bullets struck the log house,
- 13:50Speaker 1: but not one entered, And as the smoke cleared away
- 13:54Speaker 1: and vanished, the stockade and the woods around it looked
- 13:57Speaker 1: as quiet and empty as before. Not a bough waved,
- 14:01Speaker 1: not a gleam of a musket barrel, betrayed the presence
- 14:04Speaker 1: of our foes. Did you hit your men, asked the captain, No, sir,
- 14:11Speaker 1: replied Joyce, I believe not, sir. Next best thing to
- 14:15Speaker 1: tell the truth, muttered Captain Smollett, load his gun, Hawkins.
- 14:20Speaker 1: How many should you say were on your side? A doctor?
- 14:23Speaker 1: I know precisely, said doctor Livesey. Three shots were fired
- 14:28Speaker 1: on this side. I saw three flashes, two close together,
- 14:32Speaker 1: one farther to the west, three, repeated the captain. And
- 14:37Speaker 1: how many on yours, mister Trelawney. But this was not
- 14:41Speaker 1: so easily answered. There had come many from the north,
- 14:45Speaker 1: seven by the squire's computation, eight or nine, according to Gray,
- 14:49Speaker 1: from the east and west only a single shot had
- 14:52Speaker 1: been fired. It was plain, therefore that the attack would
- 14:55Speaker 1: be developed from the north, and that on the other
- 14:58Speaker 1: three sides we were to be annoyed by a show
- 15:01Speaker 1: of hostilities. But Captain Smollett made no change in his arrangements.
- 15:06Speaker 1: If the mutineers succeeded in crossing the stockade, he argued,
- 15:10Speaker 1: they would take possession of any protected loophole and shoot
- 15:14Speaker 1: us down like rats in our stronghold. Nor had we
- 15:17Speaker 1: much time left to us for thought Suddenly, with a
- 15:20Speaker 1: loud huzzah, a little cloud of pirates leaped from the
- 15:24Speaker 1: woods on the north side and ran straight on the stockade.
- 15:28Speaker 1: At the same moment, the fire was once more opened
- 15:31Speaker 1: from the woods, and a rifle ball sang through the
- 15:34Speaker 1: doorway and knocked the doctor's musket into bits. The boarders
- 15:39Speaker 1: swarmed over the fence like monkeys. Squire and Gray fired again,
- 15:43Speaker 1: and yet again three men fell, one forward into the enclosure,
- 15:48Speaker 1: two back on the outside. But of these one was
- 15:51Speaker 1: evidently more frightened than hurt, for he was on his
- 15:54Speaker 1: feet again in a crack, and instantly disappeared among the trees.
- 15:59Speaker 1: Two had bit the dust, one had fled, four had
- 16:02Speaker 1: made good their footing inside our defenses, while from the
- 16:06Speaker 1: shelter of the woods, seven or eight men, each evidently
- 16:09Speaker 1: supplied with several muskets, kept up a hot, though useless
- 16:13Speaker 1: fire on the log house. The four who had boarded
- 16:17Speaker 1: made straight before them for the building, shouting as they ran,
- 16:20Speaker 1: and the men among the trees shouted back to encourage them.
- 16:24Speaker 1: Several shots were fired, but such was the hurry of
- 16:27Speaker 1: the marksmen that not one appeared to have taken effect.
- 16:31Speaker 1: In a moment, the four pirates had swarmed up the
- 16:34Speaker 1: mound and were upon us. The head of job Anderson
- 16:37Speaker 1: the Bozun, appeared at the middle loop hole them all hands,
- 16:42Speaker 1: All hands, he roared in a voice of thunder. At
- 16:45Speaker 1: the same moment, another pirate grasped Hunter's musket by the muzzle,
- 16:50Speaker 1: wrenched it from his hands, pillucked it through the loophole,
- 16:53Speaker 1: and with one stunning blow, laid the poor fellow senseless
- 16:57Speaker 1: on the floor. Meanwhile, a third running on armed all
- 17:00Speaker 1: round the house, appeared suddenly in the doorway and fell
- 17:04Speaker 1: with his cutlass on the doctor. Our position was utterly
- 17:08Speaker 1: reversed a moment, since we were firing under cover at
- 17:11Speaker 1: an exposed enemy. Now it was we who lay uncovered
- 17:15Speaker 1: and could not return a blow. The log house was
- 17:19Speaker 1: full of smoke, to which we owed our comparative safety.
- 17:23Speaker 1: Cries and confusion, the flashes and reports of pistol shots,
- 17:27Speaker 1: and one loud groan rang in my ears. Out lads,
- 17:31Speaker 1: out and fightum in the open cutlasses, cried the captain.
- 17:36Speaker 1: I snatched a cutlass from the pile, and someone at
- 17:39Speaker 1: the same time snatching another, gave me a cut across
- 17:42Speaker 1: the knuckles, which I hardly felt. I dashed out of
- 17:45Speaker 1: the door into the clear sunlight. Someone was close behind,
- 17:50Speaker 1: I knew, not whom. Right in front, the doctor was
- 17:52Speaker 1: pursuing his assailant down the hill, and just as my
- 17:55Speaker 1: eyes fell upon him, beat down his guard and sent
- 17:58Speaker 1: him sprawling on his back, with a great slash across
- 18:01Speaker 1: his face. Round to the house. Lads, Round to the house,
- 18:06Speaker 1: cried the captain, and even in the hurly burly, I
- 18:09Speaker 1: perceived a change in his voice. Mechanically I obeyed, turned eastward,
- 18:14Speaker 1: and with my cutlass raised, ran round the corner of
- 18:18Speaker 1: the house. Next moment I was face to face with Anderson.
- 18:22Speaker 1: He roared aloud, and his hanger went up above his head,
- 18:26Speaker 1: flashing in the sunlight. I had not time to be afraid,
- 18:30Speaker 1: but as the blow still hung impending, leapt dinner trice
- 18:34Speaker 1: upon one side, and, missing my footing in the soft sand,
- 18:38Speaker 1: rolled headlong down the slope. When I had first sallied
- 18:41Speaker 1: from the door, the other mutineers had been already swarming
- 18:45Speaker 1: up the palisade to make an end of us. One
- 18:47Speaker 1: man in a red night cap, with his cutlass in
- 18:50Speaker 1: his mouth, had even got upon the top and thrown
- 18:53Speaker 1: a leg across well. So short had been the interval
- 18:57Speaker 1: that when I found my feet again, all was in
- 18:59Speaker 1: the sad imposture, the fellow with the red nightcap still
- 19:03Speaker 1: half way over, another still showing his head above the
- 19:06Speaker 1: top of the stockade. And yet in this breath of
- 19:09Speaker 1: time the fight was over and the victory. Hours Gray,
- 19:14Speaker 1: following close behind me, had cut down the big bozen
- 19:18Speaker 1: ere he had time to recover from his lost blow.
- 19:21Speaker 1: Another had been shot at a loophole in the very
- 19:24Speaker 1: act of firing into the house, and now lay in agony,
- 19:27Speaker 1: the pistol still smoking in his hand. A third, as
- 19:31Speaker 1: I had seen the doctor, had disposed of at a blow.
- 19:35Speaker 1: Of the four who had scaled the palisade, only one
- 19:38Speaker 1: remained unaccounted for, and he, having left his cutlass on
- 19:42Speaker 1: the field, was now clambering out again, with the fear
- 19:45Speaker 1: of death upon him. Fire fire from the house, cried
- 19:50Speaker 1: the doctor, and you lads back into cover. But his
- 19:54Speaker 1: words were unheeded, no shot was fired, and the last
- 19:58Speaker 1: border made good his and disappeared with the rest into
- 20:02Speaker 1: the wood. In three seconds. Nothing remained of the attacking
- 20:06Speaker 1: party but the five who had fallen, four on the
- 20:09Speaker 1: inside and one on the outside of the palisade, The
- 20:13Speaker 1: Doctor and Gray and I ran full speed for shelter.
- 20:16Speaker 1: The survivors would soon be back where they had left
- 20:19Speaker 1: their muskets, and at any moment the fire might recommence.
- 20:25Speaker 1: The house was by this time somewhat cleared of smoke,
- 20:28Speaker 1: and we saw at a glance the price we had
- 20:30Speaker 1: paid for victory. Hunter lay beside his loophole, stunned Joyce
- 20:35Speaker 1: by his shot through the head, never to move again.
- 20:39Speaker 1: While riot in the center the squire was supporting the captain,
- 20:42Speaker 1: one as pale as the other. The captain's wounded, said
- 20:47Speaker 1: mister Trelawney. Have they run, asked mister Smollett. All that could,
- 20:53Speaker 1: you may be bound, returned the doctor. But there's five
- 20:57Speaker 1: of them. Will never run again, five, cried the captain. Come,
- 21:03Speaker 1: that's better. Five against three leaves us four to nine.
- 21:08Speaker 1: That's better odds than we had at starting. We were
- 21:12Speaker 1: seven to nineteen then, or thought we were, and that's
- 21:16Speaker 1: bad to bear footnote The mutineers were soon only eight
- 21:22Speaker 1: in number. For the man shot by mister Trelawney on
- 21:26Speaker 1: board the schooner died that same evening of his wound,
- 21:30Speaker 1: but this was of course not known till after by
- 21:33Speaker 1: the faithful party. End of Chapter twenty one, Part five,
- 21:40Speaker 1: My Sea Adventure. Chapter twenty two, How My Sea Adventure began.
- 21:48Speaker 1: There was no return of the mutineers, not so much
- 21:52Speaker 1: as another shot out of the woods. They had got
- 21:55Speaker 1: their rations for that day, as the Captain put it,
- 21:58Speaker 1: and we had the place to us elves and a
- 22:00Speaker 1: quiet time to overhaul the wounded and get dinner. Squire
- 22:05Speaker 1: and I cooked outside in spite of the danger, and
- 22:08Speaker 1: even outside we could hardly tell what we were at
- 22:11Speaker 1: for the horror of the loud groans that reached us
- 22:14Speaker 1: from the doctor's patients. Out of the eight men who
- 22:17Speaker 1: had fallen in the action, only three still breathed, that
- 22:21Speaker 1: one of the pirates who had been shot at the loophole,
- 22:24Speaker 1: Hunter and Captain Smollett, And of these the first two
- 22:28Speaker 1: were as good as dead. The mutineer, indeed, died under
- 22:32Speaker 1: the doctor's knife, and huntered do what we could. Never
- 22:35Speaker 1: regained consciousness in this world. He lingered all day, breathing loudly,
- 22:40Speaker 1: like the old buccaneer at home in his apileptic fit.
- 22:43Speaker 1: But the bones of his chest had been crushed by
- 22:46Speaker 1: the blow, and his skull fractured in falling, and some
- 22:50Speaker 1: time in the following night, without sign nor sound, he
- 22:53Speaker 1: went to his maker. As for the captain, his wounds
- 22:57Speaker 1: were grievous, indeed, but not dangerous. No organ was fatally injured.
- 23:02Speaker 1: Anderson's ball, for it was job that shot him first,
- 23:06Speaker 1: had broken his shoulder blade and touched the lung, not badly.
- 23:11Speaker 1: The second had only torn and displaced some muscles in
- 23:14Speaker 1: the calf. He was sure to recover, the doctor said,
- 23:18Speaker 1: but in the meantime, and for weeks to come, he
- 23:21Speaker 1: must not walk, nor move his arm, nor so much
- 23:24Speaker 1: as speak. When he could help it, my own accidental
- 23:27Speaker 1: cart across the knuckles was a flea bite. Doctor Livesey
- 23:31Speaker 1: patched it up with plaster and pulled my ears for
- 23:34Speaker 1: me into the bargain. After dinner, the Squire and the
- 23:37Speaker 1: doctor sat by the captain's side, awhile in consultation, and
- 23:42Speaker 1: when they had talked to their heart's content, it being
- 23:44Speaker 1: down a little past noon, the doctor took up his
- 23:47Speaker 1: hat and pistols, girt on a cutlass, put the chart
- 23:51Speaker 1: in his pocket, and with a musket over his shoulder,
- 23:54Speaker 1: crossed the palisade on the north side, and set off
- 23:57Speaker 1: briskly through the trees. Grayham and I were sitting together
- 24:01Speaker 1: at the far end of the block house to be
- 24:03Speaker 1: out of earshot of our officers consulting, and Gray took
- 24:07Speaker 1: his pipe out of his mouth and fairly forgot to
- 24:10Speaker 1: put it back again. So thunderstruck was he at this occurrence.
- 24:14Speaker 1: Why in the name of Davy Jones, said he is
- 24:18Speaker 1: doctor Livesey mad? Why no, says I, He's about the
- 24:23Speaker 1: last of this crew. For that, I take it well, shipmate,
- 24:27Speaker 1: said Gray Mad. He may not be, but if he's
- 24:31Speaker 1: not my words, I am, I take it, replied I.
- 24:36Speaker 1: The doctor has his idea, and if I am right,
- 24:39Speaker 1: he's going now to see ben Gunn. I was right,
- 24:43Speaker 1: as appeared later. But in the meantime, the house being
- 24:46Speaker 1: stifling hot, and the little patch of sand inside the
- 24:50Speaker 1: palisade ablaze with midday sun, I began to get another
- 24:54Speaker 1: thought into my head, which was not by any means
- 24:56Speaker 1: so right. What I began to do was to envy
- 25:00Speaker 1: the doctor walking in the cool shadow of the woods,
- 25:03Speaker 1: with the birds about him and the pleasant smell of
- 25:05Speaker 1: the pines, while I sat grilling with my clothes stuck
- 25:10Speaker 1: to the hot resin and so much blood about me.
- 25:13Speaker 1: And so many poor dead bodies lying all around that
- 25:16Speaker 1: I took a disgust of that place that was almost
- 25:19Speaker 1: as strong as fear. All the time I was washing
- 25:22Speaker 1: out the blockhouse and then washing up the things from dinner,
- 25:26Speaker 1: this disgust and envy kept growing stronger and stronger, till
- 25:30Speaker 1: at last, being near a bread bag and no one
- 25:33Speaker 1: then observing me, I took the first steps toward my
- 25:37Speaker 1: escape and filled both pockets of my coat with biscuit.
- 25:41Speaker 1: I was a fool, if you like, and certainly I
- 25:43Speaker 1: was going to do a foolish, overbold act. But I
- 25:47Speaker 1: was determined to do it with all the precautions in
- 25:49Speaker 1: my power. These biscuits, should anything before me, would at
- 25:53Speaker 1: least keep me from starving till far on in the
- 25:57Speaker 1: next day. The next thing I laid hold of was
- 26:00Speaker 1: a brace of pistols. As I already had a powder
- 26:03Speaker 1: horn and bullets, I felt myself well supplied with arms.
- 26:07Speaker 1: As for the scheme I had in my head, it
- 26:10Speaker 1: was not a bad one in itself. It was to
- 26:12Speaker 1: go down the sandy spit that divides the anchorage on
- 26:15Speaker 1: the east from the open sea find the white rock
- 26:19Speaker 1: I had observed last evening and ascertained, whether it was
- 26:23Speaker 1: there or not, that ben Gunn had hidden his boat,
- 26:27Speaker 1: a thing quite worth doing, as I still believe. But
- 26:30Speaker 1: as I was certain I should not be allowed to
- 26:33Speaker 1: leave the enclosure, my only plan was to take French
- 26:36Speaker 1: leave and slip out when nobody was watching. And that
- 26:40Speaker 1: was so bad a way of doing it, as made
- 26:42Speaker 1: the thing itself wrong. But I was only a boy,
- 26:46Speaker 1: and I hadn't made my mind up will. As things
- 26:49Speaker 1: at last fell out, I found an admirable opportunity. The
- 26:54Speaker 1: Squire and Gray were busy helping the captain with his bandages.
- 26:58Speaker 1: The coast was clear, A bolt for it over the
- 27:01Speaker 1: stockade and into the thickest of the trees, and before
- 27:04Speaker 1: my absence was observed, I was out of cry of
- 27:07Speaker 1: my companions. This was my second folly, far worse than
- 27:12Speaker 1: the first, as I left but two sound men to
- 27:14Speaker 1: guard the house. But like the first, it was a
- 27:18Speaker 1: help towards saving all of us. I took my way
- 27:21Speaker 1: straight for the east coast of the island, for I
- 27:24Speaker 1: was determined to go down the sea side of the
- 27:27Speaker 1: spit to avoid all chance of observation from the anchorage.
- 27:31Speaker 1: It was already late in the afternoon although still warm
- 27:34Speaker 1: and sunny. As I continued to thread the tall woods,
- 27:38Speaker 1: I could hear from far before me not only the
- 27:41Speaker 1: continuous thunder of the surf, but a certain tossing of
- 27:45Speaker 1: foliage and grinding of boughs, which showed me the sea
- 27:48Speaker 1: breeze set in higher than usual. Soon, cool drafts of
- 27:52Speaker 1: air began to reach me, and a few steps farther
- 27:56Speaker 1: I came forth into the open borders of the grove
- 27:59Speaker 1: and saw the sea lying blue and sunny to the horizon,
- 28:03Speaker 1: and the surf tumbling and tossing its foam along the beach.
- 28:07Speaker 1: I have never seen the sea quiet round Treasure Island.
- 28:11Speaker 1: The sun might blaze overhead, the air be without a breath,
- 28:15Speaker 1: the surface smooth and blue. But still these great rollers
- 28:19Speaker 1: would be running along all the external coast, thundering and
- 28:23Speaker 1: thundering by day and night, and I scarce believe there
- 28:26Speaker 1: is one spot in the island where a man would
- 28:29Speaker 1: be out of earshot of their noise. I walked along
- 28:32Speaker 1: beside the surf with great enjoyment, till, thinking I was
- 28:36Speaker 1: now got far enough to the south, I took the
- 28:39Speaker 1: cover of some thick bushes and crept warily up to
- 28:42Speaker 1: the ridge of the spit. Behind me was the sea
- 28:45Speaker 1: in front the anchorage. The sea breeze, as though it
- 28:49Speaker 1: had the sooner blow itself out by its unusual violence,
- 28:53Speaker 1: was already at an end. It had been succeeded by
- 28:56Speaker 1: light variable airs from the south and southeast, carrying great
- 29:00Speaker 1: banks of fog, and the anchorage under lee of Skeleton
- 29:04Speaker 1: Island lay still and leaden as when first we entered it.
- 29:09Speaker 1: The Hispaniola on that unbroken mirror was exactly portrayed from
- 29:14Speaker 1: the truck to the water line. The jolly Roger hanging
- 29:17Speaker 1: from her peak alongside lay one of the gigs silver
- 29:23Speaker 1: in the stern sheets him I could always recognize. While
- 29:27Speaker 1: a couple of men were leaning over the stern bulwarks,
- 29:30Speaker 1: one of them with a red cap, the very rogue
- 29:33Speaker 1: that I had seen some hours before, stride legs upon
- 29:36Speaker 1: the palisade. Apparently they were talking and laughing, though at
- 29:41Speaker 1: that distance upward of a mile, I could of course
- 29:44Speaker 1: hear no word of what was said. All at once
- 29:47Speaker 1: there began the most horrid, unearthly screaming, which at first
- 29:52Speaker 1: startled me badly, though I had soon remembered the voice
- 29:55Speaker 1: of Captain Flint, and even thought I could make out
- 29:58Speaker 1: the bird by her bright pla plumage as she sat
- 30:01Speaker 1: perched upon her master's wrist. Soon after, the jolly boat
- 30:05Speaker 1: shoved off and pulled for shore, and the man with
- 30:07Speaker 1: the red cap and his comrade went below by the
- 30:10Speaker 1: cabin companion. Just about the same time, the sun had
- 30:14Speaker 1: gone down behind the spyglass, and as the fog was
- 30:17Speaker 1: collecting rapidly, it began to grow dark in earnest. I
- 30:21Speaker 1: saw I must lose no time if I were to
- 30:24Speaker 1: find the boat that evening. The white rock visible enough
- 30:28Speaker 1: above the brush was still some eighth of a mile
- 30:31Speaker 1: farther down the spit, and it took me a goodish
- 30:34Speaker 1: while to get up with it, crawling off and on
- 30:36Speaker 1: all fours among the scrub. Night had almost come when
- 30:40Speaker 1: I laid my hands on its rough sides. Right below it,
- 30:44Speaker 1: there was an exceeding small hollow of green turf hidden
- 30:48Speaker 1: by banks, and a thick understory about knee deep that
- 30:51Speaker 1: grew there very plentifully, and in the center of the
- 30:54Speaker 1: dal shore enough a little tent of goat skins, like
- 30:59Speaker 1: what the gypsies carry about with them in England. I
- 31:02Speaker 1: dropped into the hollow, lifted the side of the tent,
- 31:05Speaker 1: and there was ben Gunn's boat, home made, if ever
- 31:09Speaker 1: anything was homemade, a rude, lopsided framework of tough wood,
- 31:14Speaker 1: and stretched upon that a covering of goat skin with
- 31:18Speaker 1: the hair inside. The thing was extremely small, even for me,
- 31:23Speaker 1: and I can hardly imagine that it could have floated
- 31:26Speaker 1: with a full sized man. There was one a thwart
- 31:29Speaker 1: set as low as possible, a kind of stretcher in
- 31:32Speaker 1: the boughs, and a double paddle for propulsion. I had
- 31:36Speaker 1: not then seen a coracle such as the ancient Britons made,
- 31:40Speaker 1: but I have seen one since, and can give you
- 31:43Speaker 1: no fairer idea of ben Gunn's boat than by saying
- 31:46Speaker 1: it was like the first and the worst coracle ever
- 31:50Speaker 1: made by a man. But the great advantage of the
- 31:54Speaker 1: coracle it certainly possessed, for it was exceedingly light and portable.
- 32:00Speaker 1: Or now that I had found the boat, you would
- 32:02Speaker 1: have thought I had had enough of truancy for once.
- 32:05Speaker 1: But in the meantime I had taken another notion and
- 32:09Speaker 1: become so obstinately fond of it that I would have
- 32:12Speaker 1: carried it out. I believe in the teeth of Captain
- 32:14Speaker 1: Smollett himself. This was to slip out under cover of
- 32:19Speaker 1: the night, cut the Hispaniola adrift, and let her go
- 32:23Speaker 1: ashore where she fancied. I had quite made up my
- 32:26Speaker 1: mind that the mutineers, after their repulse of the morning,
- 32:30Speaker 1: had nothing nearer their hearts than to up anchor and
- 32:33Speaker 1: away to sea. This I thought it would be a
- 32:36Speaker 1: fine thing to prevent. And now that I had seen
- 32:39Speaker 1: how they left their watchmen unprovided with a boat, I
- 32:43Speaker 1: thought it might be done with little risk. Down I
- 32:47Speaker 1: sat to wait for darkness, and made a hearty meal
- 32:50Speaker 1: of biscuit. It was a night out of ten thousand
- 32:54Speaker 1: for my purpose. The fog had now buried all heaven.
- 32:59Speaker 1: As the last rays of daylight dwindled and disappeared, absolute
- 33:03Speaker 1: blackness settled down on Treasure Island, And when at last
- 33:08Speaker 1: I shouldered my coracle and groped my way stumblingly out
- 33:12Speaker 1: of the hollow where I had supped, there were but
- 33:15Speaker 1: two points visible on the whole anchorage. One was the
- 33:18Speaker 1: great fire on shore, by which the defeated pirates lay
- 33:22Speaker 1: carousing in the swamp. The other, a mere blur of
- 33:26Speaker 1: light upon the darkness, indicated the position of the anchored ship.
- 33:31Speaker 1: She had swung round to the Ebb. Her bow was
- 33:33Speaker 1: now toward me. The only lights on board were in
- 33:37Speaker 1: the cabin, and what I saw was merely a reflection
- 33:40Speaker 1: on the fog of the strong rays that flowed from
- 33:43Speaker 1: the stern window. The air had already run sometime, and
- 33:47Speaker 1: I had to wade through a long belt of swampy sand,
- 33:50Speaker 1: where I sank several times above the ankle before I
- 33:54Speaker 1: came to the edge of the retreating water, and wading
- 33:57Speaker 1: a little way in with some strength dexterity set my
- 34:02Speaker 1: coracle keel downward on the surface. End of chapter twenty two.
- 34:10Speaker 1: Chapter twenty three, the ebb tide runs the coracle, as
- 34:16Speaker 1: I had ample reason to know before I was done
- 34:19Speaker 1: with her, was a very safe boat for a person
- 34:22Speaker 1: in my height and weight, both buoyant and clever in
- 34:25Speaker 1: a seaway. But she was the most cross grained, lop
- 34:30Speaker 1: sided craft to manage. Do as you please. She always
- 34:34Speaker 1: made more leeway than anything else, and turning round and
- 34:38Speaker 1: round was the maneuver she was best at. Even ben
- 34:41Speaker 1: Gunn himself has admitted that she was queer to handle
- 34:46Speaker 1: till you knew her way. Certainly I did not know
- 34:50Speaker 1: her way. She turned in every direction but the one
- 34:54Speaker 1: I was bound to go. The most part of the
- 34:56Speaker 1: time we were broadside on, and I am very sure
- 34:59Speaker 1: I I never should have made the ship at all,
- 35:01Speaker 1: but for the tide. By good fortune, paddl as I pleased.
- 35:06Speaker 1: The tide was still sweeping me down, and there lay
- 35:09Speaker 1: the Hispaniola right in the fairway, hardly to be missed.
- 35:15Speaker 1: First she loomed before me like a blot of something
- 35:18Speaker 1: yecked blacker than darkness. Then her spars and hull began
- 35:22Speaker 1: to shake shape, and the next moment, as it seemed
- 35:26Speaker 1: for the further I went, the brisker grew the occurrent
- 35:29Speaker 1: of the ebb. I was alongside of her hawser and
- 35:33Speaker 1: had laid hold. The hawser was as taut as a bowstring,
- 35:37Speaker 1: and the current so strong she pulled upon her anchor
- 35:42Speaker 1: all round the hull. In the blackness. The rippling current
- 35:45Speaker 1: bubbled and chattered like a little mountain stream one cut
- 35:50Speaker 1: with my sea gully, and the Hispaniola would go humming
- 35:53Speaker 1: down the tide. So far, so good. But it next
- 35:58Speaker 1: occurred to my recollection that a tie right hawser suddenly
- 36:01Speaker 1: cut is a thing as dangerous as a kicking horse
- 36:05Speaker 1: ten to one. If I were so fool hardy as
- 36:07Speaker 1: to cut the Hispaniola from her anchor, I and the
- 36:11Speaker 1: coracle would be knocked clean out of the water. This
- 36:14Speaker 1: brought me to a full stop, and if fortune had
- 36:17Speaker 1: not again particularly favored me, I should have had to
- 36:21Speaker 1: abandon my design. But the light airs, which had begun
- 36:25Speaker 1: blowing from the southeast and south, had hauled round after
- 36:29Speaker 1: nightfall into the southwest. Just while I was meditating, a
- 36:33Speaker 1: puff came caught the Hispaniola and forced her up into
- 36:37Speaker 1: the current, And to my great joy, I felt the
- 36:41Speaker 1: horse a slacken in my grasp, and the hand by
- 36:44Speaker 1: which I held it dip for a second underwater. With
- 36:48Speaker 1: that I made my mind up, took out my gully,
- 36:52Speaker 1: opened it with my teeth, and cut one strand after another,
- 36:57Speaker 1: till the vessel swung only by two. Then I lay quiet,
- 37:02Speaker 1: waiting to sever these last when the strains should be
- 37:05Speaker 1: once more lightened by a breath of wind. At this
- 37:09Speaker 1: time I had heard the sound of loud voices from
- 37:11Speaker 1: the cabin. But to say the truth, my mind had
- 37:15Speaker 1: been so entirely taken up with other thoughts that I
- 37:18Speaker 1: had scarcely given ear now. However, when I had nothing
- 37:22Speaker 1: else to do, I began to pay more heed. One
- 37:26Speaker 1: I recognized for the coxswains israel hands that had been
- 37:30Speaker 1: Flint's gunner in former days. The other was, of course,
- 37:34Speaker 1: my friend of the red nightcap. Both men were plainly
- 37:38Speaker 1: the worst of drink, and they were still drinking for
- 37:43Speaker 1: even while I was listening. One of them, with a
- 37:45Speaker 1: drunken cry, opened the stern window and threw out something
- 37:50Speaker 1: which I divined to be an empty bottle. But they
- 37:53Speaker 1: were not only tipsy, It was plain that they were
- 37:57Speaker 1: furiously angry. Oaths flew like hailstones, and every now and
- 38:02Speaker 1: then there came forth such an explosion, as I thought,
- 38:06Speaker 1: was sure to end in blows. But each time the
- 38:08Speaker 1: quarrel passed off, and the voices grumbled lower for a while,
- 38:12Speaker 1: until the next crisis came and in its turn passed
- 38:16Speaker 1: away without result. On shore, I could see the glow
- 38:20Speaker 1: of the great campfire burning warmly through the shore side trees.
- 38:25Speaker 1: Someone was singing a dull, old droning sailor's song with
- 38:30Speaker 1: a droop and a quaver at the end of each verse,
- 38:32Speaker 1: and seemingly no end to it all, But the patience
- 38:36Speaker 1: of the singer. I had heard it on the voyage
- 38:39Speaker 1: more than once and remembered these words. But one man
- 38:44Speaker 1: of the crew were live what put to shee Wiz
- 38:48Speaker 1: seventy five? And I thought it was a ditty, rather
- 38:53Speaker 1: too dolefully appropriate for a company that had met such
- 38:57Speaker 1: cruel losses in the morning. But indeed, from what I saw,
- 39:01Speaker 1: all these buccaneers were as callous as the sea they
- 39:04Speaker 1: sailed on. At last, the breeze came, the schooner sidled
- 39:09Speaker 1: and drew nearer in the dark. I felt the haws
- 39:12Speaker 1: a slacken once more, and with a good tough effort,
- 39:17Speaker 1: cut the last fibers through. The breeze had but little
- 39:21Speaker 1: action on the coracle, and I was almost instantly swept
- 39:25Speaker 1: against the boughs of this spaniola. At the same time,
- 39:28Speaker 1: the schooner began to turn upon her heel, spinning slowly
- 39:32Speaker 1: end for end across the current. I wrought like a fiend,
- 39:37Speaker 1: for I expected every moment to be swamped, And since
- 39:40Speaker 1: I found I could not push the coracle directly off,
- 39:44Speaker 1: I now shoved straight astern at length. I was clear
- 39:48Speaker 1: of my dangerous neighbor, and just as I gave the
- 39:51Speaker 1: last impulsion my hands came across a light cord that
- 39:55Speaker 1: was trailing overboard across the stern bulwarks. Instance I grasped it.
- 40:02Speaker 1: Why I should have done so, I can hardly say
- 40:05Speaker 1: it was at first a mere instinct. But once I
- 40:08Speaker 1: had it in my hands and found it fast, curiosity
- 40:11Speaker 1: began to get the upper hand, and I determined I
- 40:14Speaker 1: should have one look through the cabin window. I pulled
- 40:18Speaker 1: in hand over hand on the cord, and when I
- 40:21Speaker 1: judged myself near enough, rose at infinite risk to about
- 40:26Speaker 1: half my height, and thus commanded the roof and a
- 40:29Speaker 1: slice of the interior of the cabin. By this time,
- 40:32Speaker 1: the schooner and her little consort were gliding pretty swiftly
- 40:36Speaker 1: through the water. Indeed, we had already fetched up level
- 40:40Speaker 1: with the camp fire. The ship was talking, as sailors say, loudly,
- 40:45Speaker 1: treading the immeasurable ripples with an incessant, weltering splash. And
- 40:51Speaker 1: until I got my eye above the window, still I
- 40:53Speaker 1: could not comprehend why the watchman had taken no alarm.
- 40:57Speaker 1: One glance, however, was sufficient, and it was only one
- 41:01Speaker 1: glance that I durst take from that unsteady skiff. It
- 41:06Speaker 1: showed me hands and his companion locked together in deadly wrestle,
- 41:12Speaker 1: each with a hand on the other's throat. I dropped
- 41:15Speaker 1: upon the thwart again, none too soon, for I was
- 41:18Speaker 1: near overboard. I could see nothing for the moment but
- 41:22Speaker 1: these two furious and crimsoned faces swaying together under the
- 41:27Speaker 1: smoky lamp, and I shut my eyes to let them
- 41:30Speaker 1: grow once more familiar with the darkness. The endless ballad
- 41:34Speaker 1: had come to an end at last, and the whole
- 41:36Speaker 1: diminished company about the campfire had broken into the chorus
- 41:41Speaker 1: I had heard so often, fifty.
- 41:45Speaker 2: Men on the dead man's chest, Yooo, and a bottle
- 41:50Speaker 2: of rum, drink and dever love and feather rest yo ram.
- 42:03Speaker 1: I was just thinking how busy drink and the devil
- 42:05Speaker 1: were at that very moment in the cabin of the Hispaniola,
- 42:08Speaker 1: when I was surprised by a sudden lurch of the coracle.
- 42:12Speaker 1: At the same moment, she yawed sharply and seemed to
- 42:16Speaker 1: change her course. The speed in the meantime had strangely increased.
- 42:22Speaker 1: I opened my eyes at once. All around me were
- 42:25Speaker 1: little ripples combing over with a sharp bristling sound, and
- 42:29Speaker 1: slightly phosphorescent. The Hispaniola, herself a few yards in whose
- 42:35Speaker 1: wake I was still being whirled along, seemed to stagger
- 42:38Speaker 1: in her course, and I saw her spars toss a
- 42:41Speaker 1: little against the blackness of the night. Nay, as I
- 42:45Speaker 1: looked longer, I made sure she also was wheeling to
- 42:49Speaker 1: the southward. I glanced over my shoulder, and my heart
- 42:53Speaker 1: jumped against my ribs. There right behind me was the
- 42:57Speaker 1: glow of the camp fire. The current had turned at
- 43:00Speaker 1: right angles, sweeping round along with it the tall schooner
- 43:04Speaker 1: and the little dancing coracle. Ever quickening, ever bubbling higher,
- 43:09Speaker 1: ever muttering louder, it went spinning through the narrows for
- 43:13Speaker 1: the open sea. Suddenly the schooner in front of me
- 43:17Speaker 1: gave a violent yaw, turning perhaps through twenty degrees, and
- 43:21Speaker 1: almost at the same moment, one shout followed another from
- 43:25Speaker 1: on board. I could hear feet pounding on the companion ladder,
- 43:29Speaker 1: and I knew that the two drunkards had at last
- 43:32Speaker 1: been interrupted in their quarrel and awakened to a sense
- 43:35Speaker 1: of their disaster. I laid down flat in the bottom
- 43:39Speaker 1: of that wretched skiff and devoutly recommended my spirit to
- 43:43Speaker 1: its maker. At the end of the straits. I had
- 43:46Speaker 1: made sure we must fall into some bar of raging breakers,
- 43:50Speaker 1: where all of my troubles would be ended speedily. And
- 43:53Speaker 1: though I could perhaps bear to die, I could not
- 43:56Speaker 1: bear to look upon my fate as it approached. So
- 44:00Speaker 1: I must have lain for hours, continually beaten to and
- 44:04Speaker 1: fro upon the billows, now and again, wetted with flying sprays,
- 44:08Speaker 1: and never ceasing to expect death of the next plunge.
- 44:13Speaker 1: Gradually weariness grew upon me, a numbness, an occasional stupor
- 44:19Speaker 1: fell upon my mind, even in the midst of my terrors,
- 44:23Speaker 1: until sleep at last intervened, and in my sea tossed Coracle,
- 44:28Speaker 1: I lay and dreamed of home and the old Admiral Benbo.
- 44:35Speaker 1: End of Chapter twenty three, Chapter twenty four, The Cruise
- 44:42Speaker 1: of the Coracle. It was broad day when I awoke
- 44:47Speaker 1: and found myself tossing at the southwest end of Treasure Island.
- 44:52Speaker 1: The sun was up, but was still hid from me
- 44:54Speaker 1: behind the great bulk of the spyglass, which on this
- 44:58Speaker 1: side descended almost to the sea. In formidable cliffs, Hall Bow,
- 45:04Speaker 1: Lion Head and Mizzenmass Hill were at my elbow. The
- 45:07Speaker 1: hill bare and dark, the head bound with cliffs forty
- 45:12Speaker 1: or fifty feet high, and fringed with great masses of
- 45:16Speaker 1: fallen rock. I was scarcely a quarter of a mile
- 45:19Speaker 1: to seaward, and it was my first thought to paddle
- 45:22Speaker 1: in and land. That notion was soon given over among
- 45:27Speaker 1: the fallen rocks. The breakers spouted and bellowed, loud reverberations,
- 45:33Speaker 1: heavy sprays, flying and falling succeeded one another from second
- 45:37Speaker 1: to second. And I saw myself if I ventured nearer
- 45:41Speaker 1: dashed to death upon the rough shore, or spending my
- 45:45Speaker 1: strength in vain to scale the beetling crags. Nor was
- 45:49Speaker 1: that all for crawling together on flat tables of rock,
- 45:53Speaker 1: or letting themselves drop into the sea with loud reports.
- 45:57Speaker 1: I beheld huge, slimy monsters, soft snails, as it were,
- 46:02Speaker 1: of incredible bigness, two or three score of them, together,
- 46:07Speaker 1: making the rocks to echo with their barkings. I have
- 46:11Speaker 1: understood since that they were sea lions and entirely harmless.
- 46:16Speaker 1: But the look of them added to the difficulty of
- 46:18Speaker 1: the shore and the high running of the surf, and
- 46:21Speaker 1: was more than enough to disgust me of that landing place.
- 46:25Speaker 1: I felt willing rather to starve at sea than to
- 46:28Speaker 1: confront such perils. In the meantime, I had a better chance,
- 46:34Speaker 1: as I supposed before me. North of hall Bowling Head,
- 46:38Speaker 1: the land runs in a long way, leaving at low
- 46:41Speaker 1: tide a long stretch of yellow sand. To the north
- 46:45Speaker 1: of that again there comes another cape, Cape of the Woods,
- 46:49Speaker 1: as it was marked upon the chart, buried in tall
- 46:53Speaker 1: green pines, which descended to the margin of the sea.
- 46:57Speaker 1: I remembered what Silver had said about the current that
- 47:00Speaker 1: set northward along the whole west coast of Treasure Island,
- 47:04Speaker 1: and seeing from my position that I was already under
- 47:07Speaker 1: its influence, I preferred to leave Hall Bowlin Head behind
- 47:12Speaker 1: me and reserve my strength for an attempt to land
- 47:15Speaker 1: upon the kindlier looking Cape of the Woods. There was
- 47:19Speaker 1: a great smooth swell upon the sea, the wind blowing
- 47:23Speaker 1: steadily and gentle from the south. There was no contrarity
- 47:27Speaker 1: between that and the current, and the billows rose and
- 47:30Speaker 1: fell unbroken. Had it been otherwise, I must long ago
- 47:34Speaker 1: have perished. But as it was, it is surprising how
- 47:38Speaker 1: easily and securely my little and light boat could ride.
- 47:42Speaker 1: Often as I lay still at the bottom and kept
- 47:45Speaker 1: no more than an eye above the gunwale, I would
- 47:48Speaker 1: see a big blue summit heaving close above me. Yet
- 47:51Speaker 1: the coracle would but bounce a little dance, as if
- 47:55Speaker 1: on springs, and subside on the other side into the
- 47:58Speaker 1: trough as lightly as a bird. I began, after a
- 48:02Speaker 1: little to grow very bold, and sat up to try
- 48:06Speaker 1: my skill at paddling. But even a small change in
- 48:09Speaker 1: the disposition of the weight will produce violent changes in
- 48:13Speaker 1: the behavior of a coracle, and I had hardly moved
- 48:16Speaker 1: before the boat giving up at once her gentle dancing movement,
- 48:21Speaker 1: ran straight down a slope of water, so steep that
- 48:25Speaker 1: it made me giddy, and struck her nose with a
- 48:28Speaker 1: spout of spray deep into the side of the next wave.
- 48:33Speaker 1: I was drenched and terrified, and fell instantly back into
- 48:38Speaker 1: my old position, whereupon the coracle seemed to find her
- 48:41Speaker 1: head again and led me softly as before among the billows.
- 48:46Speaker 1: It was plain she was not to be interfered with,
- 48:49Speaker 1: and at any rate, since I could in no way
- 48:52Speaker 1: influence her course, what hope had I of reaching land?
- 48:57Speaker 1: I began to be horribly frightened, but I kept my
- 49:00Speaker 1: head for all that first, moving with all care I
- 49:04Speaker 1: gradually baled out the coracle with my sea cap. Then,
- 49:09Speaker 1: getting my eye once more above the gunwale, I set
- 49:12Speaker 1: myself to study how it was she managed to slip
- 49:15Speaker 1: so quietly through the rollers. I found each wave, instead
- 49:20Speaker 1: of the big, smooth, glossy mountain it looks from the
- 49:23Speaker 1: shore or from a vessel's deck, was for all the
- 49:26Speaker 1: world like any range of hills on the dry land,
- 49:30Speaker 1: full of peaks and smooth places and valleys. The coracle,
- 49:34Speaker 1: left to herself, turning from side to side, threaded so
- 49:38Speaker 1: to speak, her way through these lower parts, and avoided
- 49:42Speaker 1: the steep slopes and higher toppling summits of the wave. Well, now,
- 49:47Speaker 1: thought I to myself, it is plain I must lie
- 49:51Speaker 1: where I am and not disturb the balance. But it
- 49:54Speaker 1: is plain also that I can put the paddle over
- 49:57Speaker 1: the side, and from time to time, in smooth paces,
- 50:01Speaker 1: give her a shove or two towards land. No sooner
- 50:05Speaker 1: thought upon than done. There I lay on my elbows
- 50:09Speaker 1: in the most trying attitude, and every now and again
- 50:13Speaker 1: gave a weak stroke or two to turn her head
- 50:15Speaker 1: to shore. It was very tiring and slow work, yet
- 50:20Speaker 1: I did visibly gain ground, and as we drew near
- 50:23Speaker 1: the cape of the woods. Though I saw I must
- 50:26Speaker 1: infallibly miss that point, I had still made some hundred
- 50:30Speaker 1: yards of easting. I was indeed close in. I could
- 50:35Speaker 1: see the cool green tree tops swaying together in the breeze,
- 50:39Speaker 1: and I felt sure I should make the next promontory
- 50:43Speaker 1: without fail. It was high time for I now began
- 50:47Speaker 1: to be tortured with thirst. The glow of the sun
- 50:51Speaker 1: from above, its thousandfold reflection from the waves, The sea
- 50:55Speaker 1: water that fell and dried upon me, caking my very
- 50:59Speaker 1: lips with salt, combined to make my throat burn and
- 51:04Speaker 1: my brain ache. The sight of the trees so near
- 51:07Speaker 1: at hand had almost made me sick with longing. But
- 51:11Speaker 1: the current had soon carried me past the point, and
- 51:14Speaker 1: as the next reach of sea opened out, I beheld
- 51:18Speaker 1: a sight that changed the nature of my thoughts. Right
- 51:22Speaker 1: in front of me, not half a mile away, I
- 51:25Speaker 1: beheld the Hispaniola under sail. I made sure, of course,
- 51:30Speaker 1: that I should be taken, But I was so distressed
- 51:33Speaker 1: for want of water that I scarcely knew whether to
- 51:36Speaker 1: be glad or sorry at the thought. And long before
- 51:39Speaker 1: I had come to the conclusion, surprise had taken possession
- 51:42Speaker 1: of my mind, and I could do nothing but stare
- 51:46Speaker 1: and wonder. The Hispaniola was under her mainsail and two jibs,
- 51:51Speaker 1: and the beautiful white canvas shone in the sun like
- 51:54Speaker 1: snow or silver. When I first sighted her, all her
- 51:58Speaker 1: sails were drawing. She was laying a course about northwest,
- 52:02Speaker 1: and I presumed the men on board were going round
- 52:05Speaker 1: the island on their way back to the anchorage. Presently,
- 52:09Speaker 1: she began to fetch more and more to the westward,
- 52:12Speaker 1: so that I thought they had sighted me and were
- 52:14Speaker 1: going about in chase. At last, however, she fell right
- 52:19Speaker 1: into the wind's eye, was taken dead aback, and stood
- 52:22Speaker 1: there awhile helpless, with her sails shivering. Clumsy Fellows said I,
- 52:28Speaker 1: they must be still drunk as owls, and I thought
- 52:32Speaker 1: how Captain Smollett would have set them skipping. Meanwhile, the
- 52:36Speaker 1: schooner gradually fell off and filled again upon another tack,
- 52:41Speaker 1: sailed swiftly for a minute or so, and brought up
- 52:44Speaker 1: once more dead in the wind's eye. Again and again
- 52:48Speaker 1: this was repeated to and fro up and down north
- 52:52Speaker 1: southeast and west. The Hispaniola sailed by swoops and dashes,
- 52:57Speaker 1: and at each repetition ended as she had begun, with
- 53:02Speaker 1: widly flapping canvas. It became plain to me that nobody
- 53:07Speaker 1: was steering, and if so, where were the men. Either
- 53:12Speaker 1: they were dead, drunk, or had deserted her. I thought,
- 53:16Speaker 1: and perhaps if I could get on board, I might
- 53:18Speaker 1: return the vessel to her captain. The current was bearing
- 53:22Speaker 1: coracle and schooner southward at an equal rate as for
- 53:27Speaker 1: the latter's sailing. It was so wild and intermittent, and
- 53:30Speaker 1: she hung each time so long in irons that she
- 53:33Speaker 1: certainly gained nothing if she did not even lose. If
- 53:37Speaker 1: I only dared to sit up and paddle, I made
- 53:41Speaker 1: sure that I could overhaul her. The scheme had an
- 53:44Speaker 1: air of adventure that inspired me, and the thought of
- 53:48Speaker 1: the water breaker beside the foe companion doubled my growing courage.
- 53:52Speaker 1: Up I got was welcomed almost instantly by another cloud
- 53:56Speaker 1: of spray. But this time stuck to my purpose, and
- 54:00Speaker 1: I set myself with all my strength and caution to
- 54:02Speaker 1: paddle after the unsteered hispaniola. Once I shipped to sea
- 54:07Speaker 1: so heavy that I had to stop and bale, with
- 54:10Speaker 1: my heart fluttering like a bird. But Gradually I got
- 54:14Speaker 1: into the way of the thing, and guided my coracle
- 54:16Speaker 1: among the waves, with only now and then a blow
- 54:20Speaker 1: upon her bows and a dash of foam in my face.
- 54:24Speaker 1: I was now gaining rapidly on the schooner. I could
- 54:27Speaker 1: see the brass glisten on the tiller as it banged about,
- 54:31Speaker 1: And still no soul appeared upon her decks. I could
- 54:35Speaker 1: not choose, but suppose she was deserted. If not, the
- 54:39Speaker 1: men were lying drunk below, where I might batten them down, perhaps,
- 54:43Speaker 1: and do what I chose with the ship. For some
- 54:46Speaker 1: time she had been doing the worst thing possible for me.
- 54:49Speaker 1: Standing still, she headed nearly due south yawing of course
- 54:54Speaker 1: all the time. Each time she fell off, her sails
- 54:58Speaker 1: partly filled, and these brought her in a moment right
- 55:01Speaker 1: to the wind. Again. I have said this was the
- 55:04Speaker 1: worst thing possible for me. For helpless as she looked
- 55:07Speaker 1: in this situation, with the canvas crackling like cannon, and
- 55:11Speaker 1: the blocks trundling and banging on the deck, she still
- 55:14Speaker 1: continued to run away from me, not only with the
- 55:17Speaker 1: speed of the current, but by the whole amount of
- 55:20Speaker 1: her leeway, which was naturally great. But now at last
- 55:24Speaker 1: I had my chance. The breeze fell for some seconds,
- 55:28Speaker 1: very low, and the current gradually turning her. The hispaniola
- 55:33Speaker 1: revolved slowly around her center, and at last presented me
- 55:37Speaker 1: her stern, with the cabin windows still gaping open, and
- 55:41Speaker 1: the lamp over the table still burning on into the day.
- 55:46Speaker 1: The mainsail hung drooped like a banner. She was stock
- 55:49Speaker 1: still but for the current. For the last little while
- 55:52Speaker 1: I had even lost, but now redoubling my efforts, I
- 55:56Speaker 1: began once more to overhaul the chase. I was not
- 55:59Speaker 1: a hut regards from her. When the wind came again
- 56:02Speaker 1: in a clap, she filled on the port tack and
- 56:05Speaker 1: was off again, stooping and skimming like a swallow. My
- 56:09Speaker 1: first impulse was one of despair, but my second was
- 56:13Speaker 1: towards joy. Round she came till she was broadside on
- 56:17Speaker 1: to me, round still, till she had covered a half,
- 56:21Speaker 1: and then two thirds, and then three quarters of the
- 56:24Speaker 1: distance that separated us. I could see the waves boiling
- 56:28Speaker 1: white under her forefoot. Immensely tall, she looked to me
- 56:32Speaker 1: from my low station in the coracle, and then of
- 56:36Speaker 1: a sudden I began to comprehend I had scarce time
- 56:39Speaker 1: to think, scarce time to act and save myself. I
- 56:44Speaker 1: was on the summit of one swell when the schooner
- 56:47Speaker 1: came swooping over the next. The bowsprit was over my head.
- 56:51Speaker 1: I sprang on my feet and leapt, stamping the coracle
- 56:55Speaker 1: underwater with one hand. I caught the jiboom while my
- 56:59Speaker 1: foot was between the stay and the brace, And as
- 57:02Speaker 1: I still clung there, panting, a dull blow told me
- 57:06Speaker 1: that the schooner had charged down upon and struck the coracle,
- 57:10Speaker 1: and that I was left without retreat on the Hispaniola.
- 57:15Speaker 1: End of chapter twenty four, Chapter fifteen, I strike the
- 57:21Speaker 1: Jolly Roger. I had scarce gained a position on the
- 57:24Speaker 1: bowsprit when the flying jib flapped and filled on the
- 57:28Speaker 1: other tack with a report like a gun. The schooner
- 57:31Speaker 1: trembled to her keel under the reverse, but the next
- 57:34Speaker 1: moment the other sails, still drawing the jib, flapped back
- 57:39Speaker 1: again and hung idle. This had nearly tossed me off
- 57:42Speaker 1: into the sea, and now I lost no time. Crawled
- 57:46Speaker 1: back along the bowsprit and tumbled head foremost on the deck.
- 57:51Speaker 1: I was on the lee side of the forecastle, and
- 57:53Speaker 1: the mainsail, which was still drawing, concealed me. From a
- 57:56Speaker 1: certain portion of the after deck. Not a soul was
- 58:00Speaker 1: to be seen. The planks, which had not been swabbed
- 58:04Speaker 1: since the mutiny, bore the print of many feet, and
- 58:08Speaker 1: an empty bottle, broken by the neck, tumbled to and
- 58:12Speaker 1: fro like a live thing in the scuppers. Suddenly the
- 58:15Speaker 1: Hispaniola came right into the wind. The jibs behind me
- 58:19Speaker 1: cracked aloud. The rudder slammed too. The whole ship gave
- 58:23Speaker 1: a sickening heave and shudder, and at the same moment
- 58:27Speaker 1: the main boom swung inboard, the sheet groaning in the blocks,
- 58:32Speaker 1: and showed me the lee after deck there were the
- 58:35Speaker 1: two watchmen, sure enough, Red Cap on his back, as
- 58:38Speaker 1: stiff as a handspike, with his arms stretched out like
- 58:42Speaker 1: those of a crucifix, and his teeth showing through his
- 58:45Speaker 1: open lips. Israel, hands propped against the bulwarks, his chin
- 58:50Speaker 1: on his chest, his hands lying open before him on
- 58:54Speaker 1: the deck, his face as white under his tan as
- 58:57Speaker 1: a tallow candle. For a while while the ship kept
- 59:01Speaker 1: bucking and sidling like a vicious horse, the sails filling
- 59:05Speaker 1: now on one tack now on another, and the boom
- 59:08Speaker 1: swinging to and fro, till the mast groaned aloud under
- 59:11Speaker 1: the strain. Now and again too there would come a
- 59:14Speaker 1: cloud of light sprays under the bulwark, and a heavy
- 59:18Speaker 1: blow of the ship's boughs against the sweal. So much
- 59:21Speaker 1: heavier weather was made of it by this great rigged
- 59:24Speaker 1: ship than by my home made lopsided coracle, now gone
- 59:28Speaker 1: to the bottom of the sea. At every jump of
- 59:31Speaker 1: the schooner, red cap slipped to and fro. But what
- 59:35Speaker 1: was ghastly to behold? Neither his attitude nor his fixed
- 59:39Speaker 1: teeth disclosing Grin was in any way disturbed by this
- 59:43Speaker 1: rough usage. At every jump, too, Hands appeared still more
- 59:48Speaker 1: to sink into himself, and settled down upon the deck,
- 59:52Speaker 1: his feet sliding ever the farther out, and the whole
- 59:55Speaker 1: body canting toward the stern, so that his face became
- 1:00:00Speaker 1: little by little hid from me, And at last I
- 1:00:03Speaker 1: could see nothing beyond his ear and the frayed ringlet
- 1:00:06Speaker 1: of one whisker. At the same time I observed around
- 1:00:10Speaker 1: both of them splashes of dark blood upon the planks,
- 1:00:13Speaker 1: and began to feel sure that they had killed each
- 1:00:16Speaker 1: other in their drunken wrath. While I was thus looking
- 1:00:20Speaker 1: and wondering. In a calm moment, when the ship was
- 1:00:23Speaker 1: still Israel, Hands turned partly round, and, with a low moan,
- 1:00:28Speaker 1: writhed himself back to the position in which I had
- 1:00:32Speaker 1: seen him first. The moan, which told of pain and
- 1:00:36Speaker 1: deadly weakness, and the way in which his jaw hung open,
- 1:00:40Speaker 1: went right to my heart. But when I remembered the
- 1:00:43Speaker 1: talk I had overheard from the apple barrel, all pity
- 1:00:47Speaker 1: left me. I walked aft until I reached the mainmast.
- 1:00:51Speaker 1: Come aboard, mister Hands, I said, ironically. He rolled his
- 1:00:56Speaker 1: eyes round heavily, but he was far too gone to
- 1:00:59Speaker 1: expressed surprise. All he could do was utter one word, brandy.
- 1:01:06Speaker 1: It occurred to me that there was no time to lose, and,
- 1:01:10Speaker 1: dodging the boom as it once more lurched across the deck,
- 1:01:13Speaker 1: I slipped aft and down the companion stairs into the cabin.
- 1:01:17Speaker 1: It was such a scene of confusion as you can
- 1:01:20Speaker 1: hardly fancy. All the lockfast places had been broken open
- 1:01:24Speaker 1: in quest of the chart. The floor was thick with
- 1:01:27Speaker 1: mud where the Ruffians had sat down to drink or
- 1:01:31Speaker 1: consult after wading in the marshes, round their camp. The bulkheads,
- 1:01:36Speaker 1: all painted in clear white and beaded round with gilt,
- 1:01:39Speaker 1: bore a pattern of dirty hands. Dozens of empty bottles
- 1:01:44Speaker 1: clinked together in corners to the rolling of the ship.
- 1:01:47Speaker 1: One of the doctor's medical books lay open on the table,
- 1:01:50Speaker 1: half of the leaves gutted out, I suppose for pipe lights.
- 1:01:55Speaker 1: In the midst of all this, the lamp still cast
- 1:01:57Speaker 1: a smoky glow, obscure and brown as umber. I went
- 1:02:02Speaker 1: into the cellar. All the barrels were gone, and of
- 1:02:05Speaker 1: the bottle as a most surprising number had been drunk
- 1:02:08Speaker 1: out and thrown away. Certainly, since the mutiny began, not
- 1:02:12Speaker 1: a man of them could ever have been sober. Foraging about,
- 1:02:16Speaker 1: I found a bottle with some brandy left for hands
- 1:02:20Speaker 1: and for myself. I routed out some biscuit, some pickled fruits,
- 1:02:24Speaker 1: a great bunch of raisins, and a piece of cheese.
- 1:02:28Speaker 1: With these, I came on deck, put down my own
- 1:02:31Speaker 1: stock behind the rudderhead, and well out of the cocksin's reach,
- 1:02:36Speaker 1: went forward to the water breaker and had a good
- 1:02:39Speaker 1: deep drink of water, and then, not until then gave
- 1:02:43Speaker 1: hands the brandy. He must have drunk a jill before
- 1:02:47Speaker 1: he took the bottle from his mouth. Ah said, he aye, thunder,
- 1:02:53Speaker 1: but I wanted some of that, and he sat down
- 1:02:57Speaker 1: already in my corner and began to eat. Much hurt,
- 1:03:01Speaker 1: I asked him. He grunted, or rather I might say
- 1:03:05Speaker 1: he barked. If that doctor was aboard, he said, I'd
- 1:03:10Speaker 1: be right enough in a couple of turns. But I
- 1:03:13Speaker 1: don't have no manner of luck, you see. That's what's
- 1:03:16Speaker 1: the matter with me. And for that swab he's good
- 1:03:20Speaker 1: and dead, he is, he added, indicating the man with
- 1:03:24Speaker 1: the red cap. He weern't no seamen anyhow, And where
- 1:03:30Speaker 1: moret you've come from? Well, said I. I have come
- 1:03:34Speaker 1: aboard to take possession of the ship, mister Hans, and
- 1:03:37Speaker 1: you'll please regard me as your captain until further notice.
- 1:03:40Speaker 1: He looked at me sourly enough, but said nothing. Some
- 1:03:44Speaker 1: of the color had come back into his cheeks, though
- 1:03:47Speaker 1: he still looked very sick, and still continued to slip
- 1:03:50Speaker 1: out and settle down. As the ship banged about by
- 1:03:55Speaker 1: the bye, I continued, I can't have these colors, mister Hans,
- 1:03:59Speaker 1: and by your leave, i'll strike em better none than these,
- 1:04:04Speaker 1: And again dodging the boom, I ran to the color
- 1:04:07Speaker 1: lines and hauled down their cursed black flag and chucked
- 1:04:11Speaker 1: it overboard. God save the King, said I waving my cap,
- 1:04:16Speaker 1: and there's an end to Captain Silver. He watched me
- 1:04:20Speaker 1: keenly and slyly, his chin all the while on his breast.
- 1:04:26Speaker 1: I reckon, he said, at last, I reckon, Captain Hawkins,
- 1:04:32Speaker 1: you kinda want to get ashore. Now suppose we talks? Why, yes,
- 1:04:39Speaker 1: says I, with all my heart, mister Hans, say on.
- 1:04:43Speaker 1: And I went back to my meal with a good appetite.
- 1:04:46Speaker 1: This man, he began nodding feebly at the corpse, Oh
- 1:04:51Speaker 1: Brian was his name. A rank islander. This man and
- 1:04:56Speaker 1: me got the canvas on her, meaning for to sailor back. Well,
- 1:05:01Speaker 1: he's dead now, he is as dead as bilge. And
- 1:05:04Speaker 1: who's to sail this ship? I don't see. Without I'll
- 1:05:08Speaker 1: give you a hint. You ate that man, as far
- 1:05:11Speaker 1: as I can tell. Now, look here, you gives me
- 1:05:15Speaker 1: food and drink and an old scarf or handkerchief to
- 1:05:19Speaker 1: tie my wound up. You do, and I'll tell you
- 1:05:22Speaker 1: how to sail her. And that's about square all round,
- 1:05:26Speaker 1: I take it. I'll tell you one thing, says I.
- 1:05:29Speaker 1: I'm not going back to Captain Kid's anchorage. I mean
- 1:05:33Speaker 1: to get into north Inlet and beach her quietly there
- 1:05:37Speaker 1: to be sure you did. He cried. Why I ain't
- 1:05:41Speaker 1: such an infernal lubber, After all I can see he can't.
- 1:05:46Speaker 1: I I've tried, my fling, I have, and I've lost.
- 1:05:49Speaker 1: And it's you as the wind of me north Inlet.
- 1:05:53Speaker 1: Why I haven't no choice? Not I. I had to help
- 1:05:57Speaker 1: you sail her up to execution doc by thunder, so
- 1:06:00Speaker 1: I would well. As it seemed to me there was
- 1:06:03Speaker 1: some sense in this, we struck our bargain on the spot.
- 1:06:07Speaker 1: In three minutes, I had the Hispaniola sailing easily before
- 1:06:11Speaker 1: the wind along the coast of Treasure Island, with good
- 1:06:14Speaker 1: hopes of turning the northern point ere noon and beating
- 1:06:18Speaker 1: down again as far as north Inlet before high water,
- 1:06:21Speaker 1: when we might beach her safely and wait until the
- 1:06:24Speaker 1: subsiding tide permitted us to land. Then I lashed the
- 1:06:29Speaker 1: tiller and went below to my own chest, where I
- 1:06:32Speaker 1: got a soft silk handkerchief of my mother's. With this
- 1:06:36Speaker 1: and with my aid hands bound up the great bleeding
- 1:06:40Speaker 1: stab he had received in the thigh, And after he
- 1:06:43Speaker 1: had eaten a little and had a swallow or two
- 1:06:45Speaker 1: more of the brandy, he began to pick up visibly,
- 1:06:49Speaker 1: sat straighter, up, spoke louder and clearer, and looked in
- 1:06:53Speaker 1: every way another man. The breeze served us admirably. We
- 1:06:58Speaker 1: skimmed before it like a bird, the coast of the
- 1:07:01Speaker 1: island flashing by, and the view changing every minute. Soon
- 1:07:05Speaker 1: we were past the highlands and bowling beside low sandy country,
- 1:07:09Speaker 1: sparsely dotted with dwarf pines. And soon we were beyond
- 1:07:13Speaker 1: that again, and had turned the corner of the rocky
- 1:07:16Speaker 1: hill that ends the island on the north. I was
- 1:07:19Speaker 1: greatly elated with my new command, and pleased with the
- 1:07:23Speaker 1: bright sunshiny weather, and these different prospects of the coast.
- 1:07:27Speaker 1: I now had plenty of water and good things to eat,
- 1:07:30Speaker 1: and my conscience, which had smitten me hard for my desertion,
- 1:07:34Speaker 1: was quieted by the great conquest I had made. I should,
- 1:07:38Speaker 1: I think, have had nothing left me to desire but
- 1:07:42Speaker 1: for the eyes of the cocks, and as they followed
- 1:07:44Speaker 1: me derisively about the deck, and the odd smile that
- 1:07:48Speaker 1: appeared continually on his face. It was a smile that
- 1:07:53Speaker 1: had in it something both of pain and weakness, a
- 1:07:57Speaker 1: haggard old man's smile. But there was besides that a
- 1:08:02Speaker 1: grain of derision, a shadow of treachery in his expression,
- 1:08:06Speaker 1: as he craftily watched and watched and watched me at
- 1:08:10Speaker 1: my work. End of chapter twenty five. Chapter twenty six,
- 1:08:17Speaker 1: Israel hands the wind, serving us to a desire. Now
- 1:08:22Speaker 1: hauled into the west, we could run so much easier
- 1:08:26Speaker 1: from the northeast corner of the island to the mouth
- 1:08:29Speaker 1: of the north Inlet, only as we had no power
- 1:08:32Speaker 1: to anchor, and dared not beach her until the tide
- 1:08:35Speaker 1: had flowed a good deal farther. Time hung on our hands.
- 1:08:40Speaker 1: The coxwain told me how to lay the ship too.
- 1:08:43Speaker 1: After a good many trials, I succeeded, and we both
- 1:08:46Speaker 1: sat in silence over another meal. Cap'n said he at length,
- 1:08:51Speaker 1: with that same uncomfortable smile. Here is my old shipmate,
- 1:08:56Speaker 1: O brien. Suppose you was to heave him over. I
- 1:09:01Speaker 1: ate particular as a rule, and I don't take no
- 1:09:05Speaker 1: blame for settling his hash. But I don't reckon him ornamental, now,
- 1:09:11Speaker 1: do you. I'm not strong enough, and I don't like
- 1:09:14Speaker 1: the job. And there he lies for me, said I.
- 1:09:19Speaker 1: He is an unlucky shit. This Ispaniola, Jim, He went
- 1:09:23Speaker 1: on blinking. There's a power of men being killed on
- 1:09:27Speaker 1: this Ispaniola. A sight of poor seamen dead and gone.
- 1:09:31Speaker 1: Since you and me took the ship to Bristol, I've
- 1:09:35Speaker 1: never seen such dirty luck, not I. There was this hero'brien.
- 1:09:40Speaker 1: Now he's dead, ain't he? Well? Now, I'm no scholar
- 1:09:45Speaker 1: and you're a ladders can read and figure. And to
- 1:09:48Speaker 1: put it straight, do you take it as a dead
- 1:09:52Speaker 1: man he's dead for good? Or do he come alive again?
- 1:09:57Speaker 1: You can kill the body, mister hands, but not the spirit.
- 1:10:01Speaker 1: You must know that already, I replied O'Brien. There is
- 1:10:05Speaker 1: in another world and maybe watching us, Ah says he. Well,
- 1:10:11Speaker 1: that's unfortunate. Appears as if killing parties was a waste
- 1:10:16Speaker 1: of time. How some ever, spirits don't reckon for much,
- 1:10:22Speaker 1: by what I've seen. I'll chance it with the spirits, Jim.
- 1:10:26Speaker 1: And now you spoke up free and I'll take it
- 1:10:29Speaker 1: kind if you're step down into that deer cabin and
- 1:10:33Speaker 1: get me a well shiver my timbers. I can't hit
- 1:10:37Speaker 1: the name on, Well, you can get me a butler
- 1:10:40Speaker 1: of wine, Jim, This here, brandy is too strong for
- 1:10:44Speaker 1: my head. Now the Coxin's hesitation seemed to be unnatural,
- 1:10:50Speaker 1: And as for the notion of his preferring wine to brandy,
- 1:10:54Speaker 1: I entirely disbelieved it. The whole story was a pretext.
- 1:10:58Speaker 1: He wanted me to leave the dea. So much was plain,
- 1:11:02Speaker 1: But with what purpose I could in no way imagine.
- 1:11:06Speaker 1: His eyes never met mine, and they kept wandering to
- 1:11:09Speaker 1: and fro, up and down, now with a look to
- 1:11:11Speaker 1: the sky, now with a flitting glance upon the dead O'Brien.
- 1:11:15Speaker 1: All the time he kept smiling and putting his tongue
- 1:11:19Speaker 1: out in a most guilty, embarrassed manner, so that a
- 1:11:22Speaker 1: child could have told that he was bent on some deception.
- 1:11:26Speaker 1: I was prompt with my answer, however, for I saw
- 1:11:29Speaker 1: where my advantage lay, and that with a fellow so
- 1:11:33Speaker 1: densely stupid, I could easily conceal my suspicions to the end.
- 1:11:38Speaker 1: Some wine, I said, far better? Will you have white
- 1:11:42Speaker 1: or red? Well, I reckon, it's about the blessed same
- 1:11:46Speaker 1: to me, shipmate, he replied, So it's strong and plenty
- 1:11:51Speaker 1: of it. What's the odds? All right? I answered, I'll
- 1:11:56Speaker 1: bring you port, mister Hans, but I'll have to dig
- 1:11:59Speaker 1: for it. And with that I scuttled down the companion
- 1:12:02Speaker 1: with all the noise I could, slipped off my shoes,
- 1:12:05Speaker 1: ran quietly along the sparred gallery, mounted the forecastle ladder,
- 1:12:09Speaker 1: and popped my head out of the fore Companion. I
- 1:12:12Speaker 1: knew he would not expect to see me there, yet
- 1:12:15Speaker 1: I took every precaution possible, and certainly the worst of
- 1:12:19Speaker 1: my suspicions proved too true. He had risen from his
- 1:12:23Speaker 1: position to his hands and knees, and though his leg
- 1:12:26Speaker 1: obviously hurt him pretty sharply when he moved, for I
- 1:12:30Speaker 1: could hear him stifle a groan, Yet it was at
- 1:12:32Speaker 1: a good rattling rate that he trailed himself across the deck.
- 1:12:36Speaker 1: In half a minute he had reached the port scuppers
- 1:12:39Speaker 1: and picked up a coil of rope with a long knife,
- 1:12:42Speaker 1: or rather a short dirk, discolored to the hilt with blood.
- 1:12:47Speaker 1: He looked upon it for a moment, thrusting forth his underjaw,
- 1:12:51Speaker 1: tried the point upon his hand, and then hastily concealing
- 1:12:54Speaker 1: it in the bosom of his jacket trembled back again
- 1:12:57Speaker 1: into his old place against the bulwark. This was all
- 1:13:01Speaker 1: that I required to know. Israel could move about. He
- 1:13:05Speaker 1: was now armed, and if he had been at so
- 1:13:08Speaker 1: much trouble to get rid of me, it was plain
- 1:13:10Speaker 1: that I was meant to be the victim. What would
- 1:13:13Speaker 1: he do afterward? Whether he would try to crawl right
- 1:13:17Speaker 1: across the island from north Inlet to the camp among
- 1:13:20Speaker 1: the swamps, or whether he would fire long tom trusting
- 1:13:24Speaker 1: that his own comrades might first come to help him,
- 1:13:27Speaker 1: was of course more than I could say. Yet I
- 1:13:30Speaker 1: felt sure that I could trust him in one point,
- 1:13:33Speaker 1: since in that our interests jumped together, and that was
- 1:13:37Speaker 1: the disposition of the schooner. We both desired to have
- 1:13:40Speaker 1: her stranded safe enough in a sheltered place, so that
- 1:13:44Speaker 1: when the time came, she could be got off again
- 1:13:47Speaker 1: with as little labor and danger as might be. And
- 1:13:50Speaker 1: until that was done, I considered that my life would
- 1:13:53Speaker 1: certainly be spared. While I was thus turning the business over.
- 1:13:57Speaker 1: In my mind, I had not been idle with my body.
- 1:14:01Speaker 1: I had stolen back to the cabin, slipped once more
- 1:14:04Speaker 1: into my shoes, and laid my hand at random on
- 1:14:07Speaker 1: a bottle of wine. And now with this for an excuse,
- 1:14:10Speaker 1: I made my reappearance on the deck hands layers. I
- 1:14:14Speaker 1: had left him all fallen together in a bundle and
- 1:14:17Speaker 1: with his eyelids lowered, as though he were too weak
- 1:14:20Speaker 1: to bear the light. He looked up, however, at my coming,
- 1:14:24Speaker 1: knocked the neck off the bottle like a man who
- 1:14:27Speaker 1: had done the same thing often, and took a good
- 1:14:30Speaker 1: swig with his favorite toast of is luck. Then he
- 1:14:35Speaker 1: lay quiet for a little, and then, pulling out a
- 1:14:38Speaker 1: stick of tobacco, begged me to cut him a quid.
- 1:14:41Speaker 1: Cut me a junker, that says he, For I haven't
- 1:14:45Speaker 1: no knife and hardly the strength enough, so be as
- 1:14:49Speaker 1: I had ah Jim, Jim, I reckon I've missed stays.
- 1:14:55Speaker 1: Cut me a quid as likely to be the last lad,
- 1:14:58Speaker 1: for I'm for my long home, and no mistake, well
- 1:15:03Speaker 1: said I. I'll cut you some tobacco. But if I
- 1:15:06Speaker 1: was you, and thought myself so badly, I would go
- 1:15:10Speaker 1: to my prayers like a Christian man. Why said he?
- 1:15:14Speaker 1: N you tell me? Why? Why I cried? You were
- 1:15:19Speaker 1: asking me just now about the dead. You've broken your
- 1:15:22Speaker 1: trust You've lived in sin and lies and blood. There's
- 1:15:26Speaker 1: a man you killed lying at your feet this very moment,
- 1:15:29Speaker 1: and you asked me why. For God's mercy, mister Hans,
- 1:15:33Speaker 1: That's why I spoke with a little heat, thinking of
- 1:15:37Speaker 1: the bloody dirk he had hidden in his pocket and
- 1:15:40Speaker 1: designed in his ill thoughts to end me with. He,
- 1:15:45Speaker 1: for his part, took a great draft of the wine
- 1:15:48Speaker 1: and spoke with the most unusual solemnity for thirty year,
- 1:15:54Speaker 1: He said, I've sailed the seas and see good and bad,
- 1:15:59Speaker 1: better and worse, fair weather and foul provisions, running out,
- 1:16:04Speaker 1: knives going.
- 1:16:06Speaker 2: And what not.
- 1:16:07Speaker 1: Well, now I'll tell you I never seen good come
- 1:16:12Speaker 1: out of goodness. Yet him as strikes first is my
- 1:16:16Speaker 1: fancy dead men. Don't buy them's my views, Amen, so
- 1:16:21Speaker 1: be it. And now you look here, he added, suddenly
- 1:16:25Speaker 1: changing his tone. We've had enough for this foolery. The
- 1:16:29Speaker 1: tides made good enough by now you just take my orders,
- 1:16:34Speaker 1: Captain Hawkins, and we'll sail, slap in and be done
- 1:16:38Speaker 1: with it. All told, we had scarce two miles to run,
- 1:16:42Speaker 1: but the navigation was delicate. The entrance to this northern
- 1:16:46Speaker 1: anchorage was not only narrow and shoal, but lay east
- 1:16:50Speaker 1: and west, so that the schooner must be nicely handled
- 1:16:53Speaker 1: to be got in. I think I was a good
- 1:16:56Speaker 1: prompt subaltern, and I am sure that Hans was an
- 1:16:59Speaker 1: excellent pilot. For we went about and about and dodged in,
- 1:17:04Speaker 1: shaving the banks with a certainty and a neatness that
- 1:17:07Speaker 1: were a pleasure to behold. Scarcely had we passed the
- 1:17:10Speaker 1: head before the land closed around us. The shores of
- 1:17:14Speaker 1: North Inlet were as thickly wooded as those of the
- 1:17:17Speaker 1: southern anchorage, but the space was longer and narrower, and
- 1:17:21Speaker 1: more like what in truth it was, the estuary of
- 1:17:24Speaker 1: a river. Right before us, at the southern end, we
- 1:17:27Speaker 1: saw the wreck of a ship in the last stages
- 1:17:30Speaker 1: of dilapidation. It had been a great vessel of three masts,
- 1:17:34Speaker 1: but had lain so long exposed to the injuries of
- 1:17:37Speaker 1: the weather that it was hung about with great webs
- 1:17:40Speaker 1: of dripping seaweed, and on the decks of its shore
- 1:17:44Speaker 1: bushes had taken root and now flourished thick with flowers.
- 1:17:49Speaker 1: It was a sad sight, but it showed us that
- 1:17:52Speaker 1: the anchorage was calm. Now, said Hans. Look there, there's
- 1:17:59Speaker 1: a pet bit for to beach a ship in fine
- 1:18:03Speaker 1: flat sand, never a cat's pour. Trees all around of it,
- 1:18:08Speaker 1: and flowers are blowing like a guardian on that old ship.
- 1:18:13Speaker 1: And once beached, I inquired, how shall we get her
- 1:18:16Speaker 1: off again? Why? So he replied, you take a line
- 1:18:21Speaker 1: ashore there on the other side, at low water, take
- 1:18:25Speaker 1: a turn about one of them big pines, bring it back,
- 1:18:29Speaker 1: take a turn around the capstan, and lie to for
- 1:18:32Speaker 1: the tide. Come high water, all hands take a pull
- 1:18:37Speaker 1: upon the line, and off she comes, as sweet as nature.
- 1:18:41Speaker 1: And now, boy, you stand by. We've hit the bit now,
- 1:18:45Speaker 1: and she's too much way on her starboard, a little
- 1:18:49Speaker 1: so stair d starboard larbered a little stair d steady.
- 1:18:55Speaker 1: So he issued his commands, which I breathlessly obeyed, till
- 1:18:59Speaker 1: all of us sudden he cried, now, my hearty laugh,
- 1:19:03Speaker 1: and I put the helm hard up, and the hispaniola
- 1:19:06Speaker 1: swung round rapidly, and ran stem on for the low
- 1:19:10Speaker 1: wooded shore. The excitement of these last maneuvers had somewhat
- 1:19:15Speaker 1: interfered with the watch I had kept hitherto sharply enough
- 1:19:19Speaker 1: upon the cocksin. Even then I was still so much
- 1:19:22Speaker 1: interested waiting for the ship to touch that I had
- 1:19:26Speaker 1: quite forgotten the peril that hung over my head, and
- 1:19:29Speaker 1: stood craning over the starboard bulwarks and watching the ripples
- 1:19:33Speaker 1: spreading wide before the boughs. I might have fallen without
- 1:19:37Speaker 1: a struggle for my life, had not a sudden disquietude
- 1:19:41Speaker 1: seized upon me and made me turn my head. Perhaps
- 1:19:46Speaker 1: I had heard a creak or seen his shadow moving
- 1:19:49Speaker 1: with the tail of my eye. Perhaps it was an
- 1:19:52Speaker 1: instinct like a cat's. But sure enough, when I looked round,
- 1:19:57Speaker 1: there was hands already half way toward toward me, with
- 1:20:01Speaker 1: the dirk in his right hand. We must both have
- 1:20:04Speaker 1: cried out aloud when our eyes met, But while mine
- 1:20:08Speaker 1: was the shrill cry of terror, his was a roar
- 1:20:11Speaker 1: of fury, like a charging bull's. At the same instant,
- 1:20:15Speaker 1: he threw himself forward, and I leaped sideways toward the boughs.
- 1:20:19Speaker 1: As I did so, I let go of the tiller,
- 1:20:22Speaker 1: which sprung sharp to leeward, And I think this shaved
- 1:20:25Speaker 1: my life, for it struck hands across the chest and
- 1:20:28Speaker 1: stopped him for the moment dead. Before he could recover,
- 1:20:32Speaker 1: I was safe out of the corner where he had
- 1:20:34Speaker 1: me trapped with all the deck to dodge, About just
- 1:20:38Speaker 1: forward of the main mast, I stopped, drew a pistol
- 1:20:41Speaker 1: from my pocket, took a cool aim, though he had
- 1:20:44Speaker 1: already turned and was once more coming directly after me,
- 1:20:48Speaker 1: and drew the trigger. The hammer fell, but there followed
- 1:20:52Speaker 1: neither flash nor sound. The priming was useless with sea water.
- 1:20:57Speaker 1: I cursed myself for my neglect. Why had I not
- 1:21:01Speaker 1: long before reprimed and reloaded my only weapons, then I
- 1:21:05Speaker 1: should not have been as now a mere fleeing sheep
- 1:21:09Speaker 1: before this butcher. Wounded as he was, it was wonderful
- 1:21:14Speaker 1: how fast he could move, his grizzled hair tumbling over
- 1:21:17Speaker 1: his face, and his face itself as reared as a
- 1:21:20Speaker 1: red ensign. With his haste and fury, I had no
- 1:21:23Speaker 1: time to try my other pistol, nor indeed much inclination,
- 1:21:27Speaker 1: for I was sure it would be useless. One thing
- 1:21:30Speaker 1: I saw plainly, I must not simply retreat before him,
- 1:21:34Speaker 1: or he would speedily hold me boxed in the boughs
- 1:21:37Speaker 1: as a moment, since he had so neatly boxed me
- 1:21:40Speaker 1: in the stern. Once so caught, and nine or ten
- 1:21:44Speaker 1: inches of the blood stained dirk would be my last
- 1:21:47Speaker 1: experience on this side of eternity. I placed my palms
- 1:21:52Speaker 1: against the mainmast, which was of a goodish bigness, and
- 1:21:55Speaker 1: waited every nerve upon the stretch. Seeing that I meant
- 1:21:59Speaker 1: to dodge, he also paused, and a moment or two
- 1:22:03Speaker 1: passed in feints on his part and corresponding movements upon mine.
- 1:22:08Speaker 1: It was such a game as I had often played
- 1:22:10Speaker 1: at home about the rocks of Black Hill Cove, but
- 1:22:13Speaker 1: never before, you may be sure, with such a wildly
- 1:22:17Speaker 1: beating heart as now still as I say it. It
- 1:22:22Speaker 1: was a boy's game, and I thought I could hold
- 1:22:24Speaker 1: my own at it against an elderly seaman with a
- 1:22:27Speaker 1: wounded thigh. Indeed, my courage had began to rise so
- 1:22:31Speaker 1: high that I allowed myself a few darting thoughts on
- 1:22:35Speaker 1: what would be the end of the affair. And while
- 1:22:37Speaker 1: I saw certainly that I could spin it out for long,
- 1:22:40Speaker 1: I saw no hope in any ultimate escape. Well, while
- 1:22:44Speaker 1: things stood thus, suddenly the Hispaniola struck staggered ground for
- 1:22:50Speaker 1: an instant in the sand, and then, swift as a blow,
- 1:22:53Speaker 1: canted over to the port side, till the deck stood
- 1:22:56Speaker 1: at an angle of forty five degrees and about a
- 1:22:59Speaker 1: punch of water splashed into the scupper holes and lay
- 1:23:03Speaker 1: in a pool between the deck and the bulwark. We
- 1:23:06Speaker 1: were both of us capsized in a second, and both
- 1:23:09Speaker 1: of us rolled almost together into the scuppers, the dead
- 1:23:12Speaker 1: red cap with his arms still spread out, tumbling stiffly
- 1:23:16Speaker 1: after us. So near were we, indeed, that my head
- 1:23:20Speaker 1: came against the cockson's foot with a crack that made
- 1:23:23Speaker 1: my teeth rattle below and awe, I was the first
- 1:23:27Speaker 1: a foot again, for hands had got involved with the
- 1:23:30Speaker 1: dead body. The sudden canting of the ship had made
- 1:23:34Speaker 1: the deck no place for running on. I had found
- 1:23:37Speaker 1: some new way of escape, and that upon the instant
- 1:23:40Speaker 1: for my foe was almost touching me. Quick as thought,
- 1:23:44Speaker 1: I sprang into the mizzen shrouds, rattled up hand over hand,
- 1:23:49Speaker 1: and did not draw a breath till I was seated
- 1:23:51Speaker 1: on the cross trees. I had been saved by being prompt.
- 1:23:56Speaker 1: The dirk had struck not half a foot below me
- 1:23:59Speaker 1: as I I pursued my upward flight, and there stood
- 1:24:03Speaker 1: Israel hands with his mouth open and his face upturned
- 1:24:07Speaker 1: to mine, a perfect statue of surprise and disappointment. Now
- 1:24:12Speaker 1: that I had a moment to myself. I lost no
- 1:24:14Speaker 1: time in changing the priming of my pistol, and then,
- 1:24:17Speaker 1: having one ready for service, and to make assurance doubly sure,
- 1:24:21Speaker 1: I proceeded to draw the load of the other and
- 1:24:24Speaker 1: recharge it afresh. From the beginning my new employment struck
- 1:24:28Speaker 1: hands all of a heap. He began to see the
- 1:24:30Speaker 1: dice going against him, and after an obvious hesitation, he
- 1:24:35Speaker 1: also hauled himself heavily into the shrouds, and with the
- 1:24:38Speaker 1: dirk in his teeth, began slowly and painfully to mount.
- 1:24:43Speaker 1: It cost him no end of time and groans to
- 1:24:46Speaker 1: haul his wounded leg behind him, and I had quietly
- 1:24:49Speaker 1: finished my arrangements before he was much more than a
- 1:24:53Speaker 1: third of the way up. Then, with a pistol in
- 1:24:56Speaker 1: the hand, I addressed him one more step, mister Hans,
- 1:25:01Speaker 1: said I, and I'll blow your brains out. Dead men
- 1:25:05Speaker 1: don't bite you, know, I added, with a chuckle. He
- 1:25:08Speaker 1: stopped instantly. I could see by the workings of his
- 1:25:12Speaker 1: face that he was trying to think, And the process
- 1:25:15Speaker 1: was so slow and laborious that, in my newfound security,
- 1:25:19Speaker 1: I laughed out loud at last, with a swallow or
- 1:25:22Speaker 1: two he spoke, his face still wearing the same expression
- 1:25:26Speaker 1: of extreme perplexity. In order to speak, he had to
- 1:25:30Speaker 1: take the dagger from his mouth, but in all else
- 1:25:33Speaker 1: he remained unmoved. Jim says he, I reckon, we're fouled,
- 1:25:40Speaker 1: you and me, and we'll have to sign articles. I'd
- 1:25:44Speaker 1: have had you but for that there lurch. But I
- 1:25:48Speaker 1: don't have no luck, not aye, And I reckon, I'll
- 1:25:51Speaker 1: have to strike, which comes hard, you see, for a
- 1:25:54Speaker 1: master mariner to a ship's yunker like you, Jim, I
- 1:25:59Speaker 1: was drinking in his work birds and smiling away as
- 1:26:01Speaker 1: conceited as a cock upon a walk, when all in
- 1:26:04Speaker 1: a breath, back went his right hand over his shoulder.
- 1:26:08Speaker 1: Something sang like an arrow through the air. I felt
- 1:26:11Speaker 1: a blow, and then a sharp pang, and there I
- 1:26:15Speaker 1: was pinned by the shoulder to the mast. In the
- 1:26:18Speaker 1: horrid pain and surprise of the moment, I scarce can
- 1:26:22Speaker 1: say it was by my own volition, and I am
- 1:26:24Speaker 1: sure it was without a conscious aim. Both of my
- 1:26:28Speaker 1: pistols went off, and both escaped out of my hands.
- 1:26:33Speaker 1: They did not fall alone with a choked cry. The
- 1:26:37Speaker 1: cocks and loosed his grasp upon the shrouds and plunged
- 1:26:41Speaker 1: headfirst into the water. End of Chapter twenty six, Chapter
- 1:26:48Speaker 1: twenty seven, pieces of eight. Owing to the cant of
- 1:26:52Speaker 1: the vessel, the masts hung far out over the water,
- 1:26:56Speaker 1: and from my perch on the cross trees, I had
- 1:26:59Speaker 1: nothing below me but the surface of the bay. Hands,
- 1:27:03Speaker 1: who was not so far up, was, in consequence, nearer
- 1:27:07Speaker 1: to the ship, and fell between me and the bulwarks.
- 1:27:11Speaker 1: He rose once to the surface in a lather of
- 1:27:13Speaker 1: foam and blood, and then sank again for good. As
- 1:27:18Speaker 1: the water settled, I could see him lying huddled together
- 1:27:22Speaker 1: on the clean, bright sand in the shadow of the
- 1:27:25Speaker 1: vessel's sides. A fish or two whipped past his body,
- 1:27:30Speaker 1: sometimes by the quivering of the water. He appeared to
- 1:27:33Speaker 1: move a little, as if he were trying to rise,
- 1:27:36Speaker 1: But he was dead enough for all that, being both
- 1:27:39Speaker 1: shot and drowned, and was food for fish in the
- 1:27:43Speaker 1: very place where he had designed my slaughter. I was
- 1:27:47Speaker 1: no sooner certain of this than I began to feel sick, faint,
- 1:27:51Speaker 1: and terrified. The hot blood was running over my back
- 1:27:56Speaker 1: and chest. The dirk where it had pinned my shoulder
- 1:27:59Speaker 1: to the mark dust seemed to burn like a hot iron.
- 1:28:03Speaker 1: Yet it was not so much these real sufferings that
- 1:28:06Speaker 1: distressed me, For these, it seemed to me I could
- 1:28:09Speaker 1: bear without a murmur. It was the horror that I
- 1:28:13Speaker 1: had upon my mind of falling from the cross tree
- 1:28:16Speaker 1: into that still green water beside the body of the cocksin.
- 1:28:21Speaker 1: I clung with both hands till my nails ached, and
- 1:28:25Speaker 1: I shut my eyes as if to cover up the peril.
- 1:28:29Speaker 1: Gradually my mind came back again, my pulses quieted down
- 1:28:34Speaker 1: to a more natural time, and I was once more
- 1:28:37Speaker 1: in possession of myself. It was my first thought to
- 1:28:42Speaker 1: pluck forth the dirk, but either it struck too hard
- 1:28:45Speaker 1: or my nerve failed me, and I desisted with a
- 1:28:49Speaker 1: violent shudder. Oddly enough, that very shudder did the business.
- 1:28:54Speaker 1: The knife, in fact, had come the nearest in the
- 1:28:57Speaker 1: world to missing me altogether. It held me me by
- 1:29:00Speaker 1: a mere pinch of skin, and this the shudder tore away.
- 1:29:05Speaker 1: The blood ran down the faster, to be sure, but
- 1:29:09Speaker 1: I was my own master again, and only tacked to
- 1:29:12Speaker 1: the mast by my coat and shirt. These last I
- 1:29:16Speaker 1: broke through with a sudden jerk, and then regained the
- 1:29:19Speaker 1: deck by the starboard shrouds. For nothing in the world
- 1:29:23Speaker 1: would I have again ventured. Shaken as I was upon
- 1:29:27Speaker 1: the overhanging port shrouds from which Israel had so lately fallen,
- 1:29:34Speaker 1: I went below and did what I could for my wound.
- 1:29:37Speaker 1: It pained me a good deal, and still bled freely,
- 1:29:40Speaker 1: but it was neither deep nor dangerous, nor did it
- 1:29:43Speaker 1: greatly gall me when I used my arm. Then I
- 1:29:47Speaker 1: looked around me, and as the ship was now in
- 1:29:49Speaker 1: a sense my own, I began to think of clearing
- 1:29:52Speaker 1: it from its last passenger, the dead man O'Brien. He
- 1:29:57Speaker 1: had pitched, as I have said, against the bulwarks, where
- 1:30:01Speaker 1: he lay like some horrid, ungainly sort of puppet. Life
- 1:30:05Speaker 1: size indeed, but how different from life's color or life's comeliness.
- 1:30:12Speaker 1: In that position I could easily have my way with him,
- 1:30:15Speaker 1: And as the habit of tragical adventures had worn off
- 1:30:18Speaker 1: almost all my terror for the dead, I took him
- 1:30:21Speaker 1: by the waist as if he'd been a sack of bran,
- 1:30:25Speaker 1: and with one good heave tumbled him overboard. He went
- 1:30:29Speaker 1: in with a sounding plunge. The red cap came off
- 1:30:34Speaker 1: and remained floating on the surface, and as soon as
- 1:30:37Speaker 1: the splash subsided. I could see him in Israel, lying
- 1:30:41Speaker 1: side by side, both wavering with the tremulous movement of
- 1:30:46Speaker 1: the water. O'Brien, though still quite a young man, was
- 1:30:50Speaker 1: very bald. There he lay, with that bald head across
- 1:30:54Speaker 1: the knees of the man who had killed him, and
- 1:30:57Speaker 1: the quick fishes steering to and fro of both. I
- 1:31:01Speaker 1: was now alone within the ship. The tide had just turned.
- 1:31:06Speaker 1: The sun was within so few degrees of setting that
- 1:31:09Speaker 1: already the shadows of the pines upon the western shore
- 1:31:12Speaker 1: began to reach right across the anchorage and fall in
- 1:31:15Speaker 1: patterns on the deck. The evening breeze had sprung up,
- 1:31:20Speaker 1: and though it was well warded off by the hill
- 1:31:22Speaker 1: with the two peaks upon the east, the cordage had
- 1:31:26Speaker 1: begun to sing a little softly to itself, and the
- 1:31:29Speaker 1: idle sails to rattle to and fro. I began to
- 1:31:33Speaker 1: see a danger to the ship. The jibs I speedily
- 1:31:36Speaker 1: doused and brought tumbling to the deck. But the mainsail
- 1:31:40Speaker 1: was a harder matter of course. When the schooner canted over,
- 1:31:45Speaker 1: the boom had swung outward, and the cap of it
- 1:31:48Speaker 1: and a foot or two of sail hung even under water.
- 1:31:52Speaker 1: I thought this made it still more dangerous. Yet the
- 1:31:56Speaker 1: strain was so heavy that I half feared to meddle.
- 1:32:00Speaker 1: At last I got my knife and cut the hallyards.
- 1:32:03Speaker 1: The peak dropped instantly. The great belly of loose canvas
- 1:32:07Speaker 1: floated broad upon the water, and since pull as I liked,
- 1:32:11Speaker 1: I could not budge the down hall. That was the
- 1:32:14Speaker 1: extent of what I could accomplish. For the rest the
- 1:32:18Speaker 1: Hispaniola must trust to luck like myself. By this time
- 1:32:22Speaker 1: the whole anchorage had fallen into shadow. The last rays
- 1:32:26Speaker 1: I remember falling through a glade of the wood and
- 1:32:29Speaker 1: shining bright as jewels on the flowery mantle of the wreck.
- 1:32:33Speaker 1: It began to be chill. The tide was rapidly fleeting seaward,
- 1:32:38Speaker 1: the schooner settling more and more on her beam ends.
- 1:32:43Speaker 1: I scrambled forehead and looked over. It seemed shallow enough,
- 1:32:47Speaker 1: and holding the cut hawser in both hands for a
- 1:32:50Speaker 1: last security, I let myself drop softly overboard. The water
- 1:32:56Speaker 1: scarcely reached my waist. The sand was firm and cut
- 1:33:00Speaker 1: with ripple marks, and I waded ashore in great spirits,
- 1:33:04Speaker 1: leaving the Hispaniola on her side, with her mainsail trailing
- 1:33:08Speaker 1: wide upon the surface of the bay. About the same
- 1:33:12Speaker 1: time the sun went fairly down, and the breeze whistled
- 1:33:15Speaker 1: low in the dusk among the tossing pines. At least
- 1:33:20Speaker 1: and at last, I was off the sea. Nor had
- 1:33:23Speaker 1: I returned thence empty handed. There lay the schooner, clear
- 1:33:28Speaker 1: at last from buccaneers, and ready for our own men
- 1:33:31Speaker 1: to board and get to sea again. I had nothing
- 1:33:35Speaker 1: nearer my fancy than to get home to the stockade
- 1:33:38Speaker 1: and boast of my achievements. Possibly I might be blamed
- 1:33:42Speaker 1: a bit for my truanty, but the recapture of the
- 1:33:45Speaker 1: Hispaniola was a clinching answer, and I hoped that even
- 1:33:49Speaker 1: Captain Smollett would confess I had not lost my time. So,
- 1:33:53Speaker 1: thinking and in famous spirits, I began to set my
- 1:33:56Speaker 1: face homeward for the block house and my companions. I
- 1:34:01Speaker 1: remembered that the most easterly of the rivers which drain
- 1:34:03Speaker 1: into Captain Kidd's anchorage, ran from the two peaked hill
- 1:34:07Speaker 1: upon my left, and I bent my course in that
- 1:34:10Speaker 1: direction that I might pass the stream. While it was small,
- 1:34:14Speaker 1: the wood was pretty open and keeping along the lower spurs.
- 1:34:18Speaker 1: I had soon turned the corner of that hill, and
- 1:34:21Speaker 1: not long after waded to the mid calf across the
- 1:34:24Speaker 1: water course. This brought me near to where I had
- 1:34:27Speaker 1: encountered Ben Gunn the maroon, and I walked more circumspectully,
- 1:34:33Speaker 1: keeping an eye on every side. The dusk had come
- 1:34:36Speaker 1: nigh hand completely, and as I opened out of the
- 1:34:40Speaker 1: cleft between the two peaks, I became aware of a
- 1:34:43Speaker 1: wavering glow against the sky, where as I judged the
- 1:34:47Speaker 1: man of the island was cooking his supper before a
- 1:34:50Speaker 1: roaring fire. And yet I wondered in my heart that
- 1:34:54Speaker 1: he should show himself so careless, For if I could
- 1:34:58Speaker 1: see this radiance, might it not reached the eye of
- 1:35:01Speaker 1: Silver himself, where he camped upon the shore among the marshes.
- 1:35:06Speaker 1: Gradually the night fell blacker. It was all I could
- 1:35:10Speaker 1: do to guide myself even roughly toward my destination. The
- 1:35:13Speaker 1: double hill behind me, and the spyglass on my right
- 1:35:17Speaker 1: hand loomed fainter and fainter. The stars were few and pale,
- 1:35:22Speaker 1: and in the low ground where I wandered, I kept
- 1:35:24Speaker 1: tripping among bushes and rolling into sandy pits. Suddenly, a
- 1:35:30Speaker 1: kind of brightness fell about me. I looked up A
- 1:35:34Speaker 1: pale glimmer of moonbeams had alighted on the summit of
- 1:35:37Speaker 1: the spyglass. And soon after I saw something broad and
- 1:35:42Speaker 1: silvery moving low down behind the trees, and knew the
- 1:35:46Speaker 1: moon had risen with this to help me. I passed
- 1:35:50Speaker 1: rapidly over what remained to me of my journey, and
- 1:35:53Speaker 1: sometimes walking, sometimes running, impatiently drew near to the stockade.
- 1:36:00Speaker 1: Yet as I began to thread the grove that lies
- 1:36:02Speaker 1: before it, I was not so thoughtless but that I
- 1:36:06Speaker 1: slacked my pace and went a trifle Warily. It would
- 1:36:11Speaker 1: have been a poor end of my adventures to get
- 1:36:13Speaker 1: shot down by my own party in mistake. The moon
- 1:36:17Speaker 1: was climbing higher and higher. Its light began to fall
- 1:36:20Speaker 1: here and there in masses, through the more open districts
- 1:36:24Speaker 1: of the wood, and right in front of me a
- 1:36:26Speaker 1: glow of a different color appeared among the trees. It
- 1:36:30Speaker 1: was red and hot, and now and again it was
- 1:36:33Speaker 1: a little darkened, as it were the embers of a
- 1:36:36Speaker 1: bonfire smoldering. For the life of me, I could not
- 1:36:40Speaker 1: think what it might be. At last, I came right
- 1:36:43Speaker 1: down upon the borders of the clearing. The western end
- 1:36:47Speaker 1: was already steeped in moonshine. The rest and the block
- 1:36:50Speaker 1: house itself still lay in a black shadow, checkered with
- 1:36:54Speaker 1: long silvery streaks of light. On the other side of
- 1:36:57Speaker 1: the house, an immense fire had burned itself into clear
- 1:37:00Speaker 1: embers and shared a steadily red reverberation, contrasting strongly with
- 1:37:06Speaker 1: the mellow paleness of the moon. There was not a
- 1:37:09Speaker 1: soul stirring, nor a sound beside the noises of that breeze.
- 1:37:13Speaker 1: I stopped with much wonder in my heart, and perhaps
- 1:37:17Speaker 1: a little terror also. It had not been our way
- 1:37:21Speaker 1: to build great fires. We were, indeed, by the Captain's orders,
- 1:37:25Speaker 1: somewhat niggardly of firewood, and I began to fear that
- 1:37:29Speaker 1: something had gone wrong. While I was absent, I stole
- 1:37:33Speaker 1: round by the eastern end, keeping close in shadow, and
- 1:37:37Speaker 1: at a convenient place where the darkness was thickest, crossed
- 1:37:41Speaker 1: the palisade. To make assurance surer, I got upon my
- 1:37:45Speaker 1: hands and knees and crawled without a sound toward the
- 1:37:49Speaker 1: corner of the house. As I drew nearer, my heart
- 1:37:52Speaker 1: was suddenly and greatly lightened. It was not a pleasant
- 1:37:56Speaker 1: noise in itself, and I have often complained of it
- 1:37:59Speaker 1: in other times. But just then it was like music
- 1:38:03Speaker 1: to hear my friends snoring together, so loud and peaceful
- 1:38:07Speaker 1: in their sleep. The sea cry of the watch, that
- 1:38:11Speaker 1: beautiful all's well, never fell more reassuringly on my ear.
- 1:38:17Speaker 1: In the meantime. There was no doubt of one thing.
- 1:38:20Speaker 1: They kept, an infamous bad watch. If it had been
- 1:38:24Speaker 1: Silver and his lads that were now creeping in on them,
- 1:38:27Speaker 1: not a soul would have seen daybreak. That was what
- 1:38:31Speaker 1: it was thought I to have the captain wounded, And
- 1:38:35Speaker 1: again I blamed myself sharply for leaving them in that danger,
- 1:38:39Speaker 1: with so fute to mount guard. By this time I
- 1:38:42Speaker 1: had got to the door and stood up. All was
- 1:38:45Speaker 1: dark within, so that I could distinguish nothing by the eye.
- 1:38:49Speaker 1: As for sounds, there was the steady drone of the schnorers,
- 1:38:53Speaker 1: and a small occasional noise, a flickering or pecking, that
- 1:38:57Speaker 1: I could in no way account for with my arms.
- 1:39:00Speaker 1: Before me, I walked steadily in. I should lie down
- 1:39:04Speaker 1: in my own place, I thought, with a silent chuckle,
- 1:39:07Speaker 1: and enjoy their faces when they found me in the morning.
- 1:39:12Speaker 1: My foot struck something yielding. It was a sleeper's leg,
- 1:39:16Speaker 1: and he turned and groaned, but without awaking. And then
- 1:39:20Speaker 1: all of a sudden, a shrill voice broke forth out
- 1:39:23Speaker 1: of the darkness, paces.
- 1:39:25Speaker 3: Of eight, paces of eight, pieces of eight, pieces of
- 1:39:28Speaker 3: eight pieces.
- 1:39:29Speaker 1: Of eight, and so forth without paws or change, like
- 1:39:33Speaker 1: the clacking of a tiny mill. Silver's green parrot, Captain Flint.
- 1:39:38Speaker 1: It was she whom I had heard pecking at a
- 1:39:40Speaker 1: piece of bark. It was she, keeping better watch than
- 1:39:44Speaker 1: any human being, who thus announced my arrival with her
- 1:39:48Speaker 1: wearisome refrain. I had no time left me to recover.
- 1:39:52Speaker 1: At the sharp clicking tone of the parrot, the sleepers
- 1:39:55Speaker 1: awoke and sprang up, and with a mighty oath, the
- 1:39:59Speaker 1: voice of Silver cried, who goes? I turned to run,
- 1:40:04Speaker 1: struck violently against one person, recoiled and ran full into
- 1:40:09Speaker 1: the arms of a second, who, for his part, closed
- 1:40:12Speaker 1: upon and held me tight. Bring a torch, dick, said Silver,
- 1:40:18Speaker 1: when my capture was thus assured, and one of the
- 1:40:21Speaker 1: men left the log house and presently returned with a
- 1:40:24Speaker 1: lighted brand. End of Chapter twenty seven, Part six, Captain Silver,
- 1:40:33Speaker 1: Chapter twenty eight. In the enemy's camp, the bright glare
- 1:40:38Speaker 1: of the torch lighting up the interior of the blockhouse
- 1:40:41Speaker 1: showed me the worst of my apprehensions. Realized the pirates
- 1:40:46Speaker 1: were in possession of the house and stores. There was
- 1:40:49Speaker 1: the cask of cognac. There were the pork and bread
- 1:40:52Speaker 1: as before, and what tenfold increased my horror. Not a
- 1:40:57Speaker 1: sign of any prisoner. Could only judge that all had perished,
- 1:41:02Speaker 1: and my heart smote me sorely that I had not
- 1:41:06Speaker 1: been there to perish with them. There were six of
- 1:41:09Speaker 1: the buccaneers, all told, not another man was left alive.
- 1:41:14Speaker 1: Five of them were on their feet, flushed and swollen,
- 1:41:17Speaker 1: suddenly called out of the first sleep of drunkenness. The
- 1:41:21Speaker 1: sixth had only risen upon his elbow. He was deadly pale,
- 1:41:25Speaker 1: and the blood stained bandage round his head told that
- 1:41:28Speaker 1: he had recently been wounded, and was still more recently dressed.
- 1:41:32Speaker 1: I remembered the man who had been shot and ran
- 1:41:35Speaker 1: back among the woods in the great attack, and doubted
- 1:41:38Speaker 1: not that this was he. The parrot sat preening her
- 1:41:43Speaker 1: plumage on Long John's shoulder. He himself, I thought, looked
- 1:41:48Speaker 1: somewhat paler and more stern than I was used to.
- 1:41:51Speaker 1: He still wore his fine broadcloth suit in which he
- 1:41:55Speaker 1: had fulfilled his mission. But it was bitterly the worse
- 1:41:59Speaker 1: for wear, toubed with clay and torn with sharp briers
- 1:42:03Speaker 1: of the wood. So said he, here's Jim Hawkins shiver.
- 1:42:09Speaker 1: My timbers dropped in like ay, where come I take
- 1:42:14Speaker 1: that friendly? And thereupon he sat down across the brandy
- 1:42:19Speaker 1: cask and began to fill a pipe. Give me the
- 1:42:23Speaker 1: loan of a link, dick, said he. And then when
- 1:42:27Speaker 1: he had a good light, I'll do my lad, he added,
- 1:42:32Speaker 1: stick the glim in the wood heap, And you gentlemen
- 1:42:36Speaker 1: bring yourselves to You needn't stand up for mister Hawkins.
- 1:42:40Speaker 1: He'll excuse you. You may later that and sew Jim
- 1:42:45Speaker 1: stopping the tobacco. Here you are, and quite a pleasant
- 1:42:49Speaker 1: surprise for old John. I see you were smart when
- 1:42:54Speaker 1: first I set my eyes on you. But this here
- 1:42:57Speaker 1: gets away from me clean it do to all this,
- 1:43:02Speaker 1: as may be well supposed, I made no answer. They
- 1:43:06Speaker 1: had set me with my back against the wall, and
- 1:43:08Speaker 1: I stood there, looking silver in the face. Pluckily enough
- 1:43:12Speaker 1: I hoped to all outward appearance, But with black despair
- 1:43:16Speaker 1: in my heart, silver took a whiff or two of
- 1:43:18Speaker 1: his pipe with great composure, and then ran on again.
- 1:43:23Speaker 1: Now you see, Jim, so be as you are here,
- 1:43:27Speaker 1: said he. I'll give you a piece of my mind.
- 1:43:31Speaker 1: I've always liked you. I have for a lad of
- 1:43:34Speaker 1: spirit and the picture of my own self when I
- 1:43:38Speaker 1: was young and handsome, I always wanted to join and
- 1:43:42Speaker 1: take your share and dire gentlemen. And now my cock,
- 1:43:46Speaker 1: you've got to come smile it to find seamen as
- 1:43:51Speaker 1: oil own up to any day. But stiff undiscipline, dooty
- 1:43:55Speaker 1: is dooty, says he. And right he is just clear
- 1:44:00Speaker 1: of the cap'n The doctor himself is gone dead again,
- 1:44:04Speaker 1: you ungrateful scamp, was what he said. And the short
- 1:44:10Speaker 1: and the log of the old story is about here.
- 1:44:13Speaker 1: You can't go back to your own lot, for they
- 1:44:17Speaker 1: won't have you. And without you start a third ship's
- 1:44:20Speaker 1: company all by yourself, which might be lonely. You'll have
- 1:44:25Speaker 1: to join with cap'n Silver. So far, so good. My
- 1:44:30Speaker 1: friends then were still alive, And though I partly believed
- 1:44:34Speaker 1: the truth of Silver's statement that the cabin party were
- 1:44:37Speaker 1: incensed at me for my desertion, I was more relieved
- 1:44:41Speaker 1: than distressed. By what I heard, I don't say nothing
- 1:44:46Speaker 1: as to your being in our hands, continued Silver, though
- 1:44:50Speaker 1: there you are, and you may lay do it o
- 1:44:53Speaker 1: more for argument, I never seen good come out of threatening.
- 1:44:58Speaker 1: If you like the crists, well your join. And if
- 1:45:02Speaker 1: you don't, Jim, why you're free to answer? No, free
- 1:45:07Speaker 1: and welcome shipmate, And if fairer can be said by
- 1:45:11Speaker 1: mortal seamen, shiver my sides. Am I to answer? Then,
- 1:45:18Speaker 1: I asked, with a very tremulous voice. Through all this
- 1:45:23Speaker 1: sneering talk, I was made to feel the threat of
- 1:45:26Speaker 1: death that overhung me, and my cheeks burned, and my
- 1:45:29Speaker 1: heart beat painfully in my breast. Lad said Silver, No
- 1:45:36Speaker 1: one's oppress, and of you take your bearings, none of
- 1:45:40Speaker 1: us won't hurry you. Mate, Time goes so pleasant in
- 1:45:44Speaker 1: your company, you see, well, says I, growing a bit bolder.
- 1:45:50Speaker 1: If I'm to choose, I declare I have a right
- 1:45:53Speaker 1: to know what's what, and why you're here and where
- 1:45:56Speaker 1: my friends are. What's what? Repeated one of the buccaneers
- 1:46:01Speaker 1: in a deep growl. I'd be a lucky one as
- 1:46:05Speaker 1: know that you're perhaps bettin down your hatches till you
- 1:46:10Speaker 1: were spoken to my friend cried silver truculently to the speaker,
- 1:46:16Speaker 1: and then in his first gracious tones, he replied to me,
- 1:46:21Speaker 1: yesterday morning, mister Hawkins said he in the dog watch
- 1:46:27Speaker 1: down came Doctor Livesey with a flag O truce, says he,
- 1:46:31Speaker 1: cap'n silver, you're sold out. Ship's gone. Well maybe we'd
- 1:46:38Speaker 1: been takin a glass and a song to help it round.
- 1:46:42Speaker 1: I won't say no. Leastways none of us had looked out.
- 1:46:47Speaker 1: We looked out an boy thunder the old ship was gone.
- 1:46:52Speaker 1: I never seen a pack o fools look fishy? An
- 1:46:55Speaker 1: you made late that if I tells you that I
- 1:46:58Speaker 1: look the fishiest, Well, says the doctor. Let's boggin. We
- 1:47:05Speaker 1: bogged him and I and here we are stores brandy blockhouse.
- 1:47:10Speaker 1: The firewood you was thoughtful enough to cut, and in
- 1:47:14Speaker 1: a manner of speaking, the whole blessed boat from Crosstrees
- 1:47:18Speaker 1: to Kielsen. As for them, they've tramped. I don't know
- 1:47:23Speaker 1: where they are. He drew again quietly at his pipe.
- 1:47:28Speaker 1: Un Lest you should take it into that head of yours.
- 1:47:31Speaker 1: He went on that you was included in the treaty.
- 1:47:35Speaker 1: Here's the last word that was said. How many are you?
- 1:47:40Speaker 1: Says I to leave four, says he, for one of
- 1:47:45Speaker 1: us wounded. As for that boy, I don't know where
- 1:47:49Speaker 1: he is. Confound him, says he, nor I don't much care.
- 1:47:54Speaker 1: We're about sick of him. There was his words? Is
- 1:47:58Speaker 1: that all? I asked, Well, it's all you're to hear.
- 1:48:02Speaker 1: My son returned Silver, and now I am to choose.
- 1:48:08Speaker 1: And no, you are to choose, and you may laid that,
- 1:48:12Speaker 1: said Silver. Well said I. I am not such a fool,
- 1:48:16Speaker 1: but I know pretty well what I have to look for.
- 1:48:19Speaker 1: Let the worst come to the worst. It's little I care.
- 1:48:22Speaker 1: I've seen too many die since I fell in with you.
- 1:48:25Speaker 1: But there's a thing or two I have to tell you,
- 1:48:28Speaker 1: I said, And by this time I was quite excited.
- 1:48:31Speaker 1: And the first is this. Here you are in a
- 1:48:34Speaker 1: bad way, ship lost, treasure, lost men, lost your whole business,
- 1:48:39Speaker 1: gone to wreck. And if you want to know who
- 1:48:41Speaker 1: did it, it was I. I was in the apple
- 1:48:45Speaker 1: barrel that night we sighted land and heard you John
- 1:48:48Speaker 1: and you Dick Johnson and Hans who is now at
- 1:48:51Speaker 1: the bottom of the sea, and told every word you
- 1:48:54Speaker 1: said before the hour was out. And as for the schooner,
- 1:48:57Speaker 1: it was I who cut her cable, And it was
- 1:48:59Speaker 1: I who killed the men you had aboard her, and
- 1:49:02Speaker 1: it was I who brought her where you'll never see
- 1:49:04Speaker 1: her more, not one of you the laughs on my side.
- 1:49:09Speaker 1: I've had the top of this business from the first.
- 1:49:11Speaker 1: I no more fear you than I fear a fly.
- 1:49:15Speaker 1: Kill me if you please, or spare me, but one
- 1:49:17Speaker 1: thing I'll say, and no more. If you spare me,
- 1:49:20Speaker 1: bygones are bygones. And when you, fellows are in court
- 1:49:24Speaker 1: for piracy, I'll save you all I can. It is
- 1:49:28Speaker 1: for you to choose kill another and do yourselves no good,
- 1:49:32Speaker 1: or spare me and keep a witness to save you
- 1:49:34Speaker 1: from the gallows. I stopped now, for I tell you
- 1:49:38Speaker 1: I was out of breath, and to my wonder, not
- 1:49:41Speaker 1: a man of the move. But all sat staring at
- 1:49:44Speaker 1: me like as many sheep. And while they were still staring,
- 1:49:48Speaker 1: I broke out again. And now, mister Silver, I said,
- 1:49:52Speaker 1: I believe you're the best man here, and if things
- 1:49:55Speaker 1: go to the worst, I'll take it kind of you
- 1:49:58Speaker 1: to let the doctor know the way I took it.
- 1:50:01Speaker 1: I'll bear it in mind, said Silver, with an accent
- 1:50:06Speaker 1: so curious that I could not for the life of
- 1:50:08Speaker 1: me decide whether he was laughing at my request or
- 1:50:11Speaker 1: had been favorably affected by my courage. Oh put one
- 1:50:15Speaker 1: to that, cried the old mahogany faced seaman Morgan by name,
- 1:50:20Speaker 1: whom I had seen in long John's public house upon
- 1:50:23Speaker 1: the keys of Bristol. It was him that no black
- 1:50:26Speaker 1: dog well, and see her, added the sea cook. I'll
- 1:50:31Speaker 1: put another to that, by thunder. It was this same
- 1:50:36Speaker 1: boy that faked the chart from Billy Bones. First and
- 1:50:40Speaker 1: last we've split upon Jim Harkins. Then here goes, said Morgan,
- 1:50:46Speaker 1: with an oath, and he sprang up, drawing his knife
- 1:50:49Speaker 1: as if he had been twenty a vast there, cried silver,
- 1:50:54Speaker 1: Were you, Tom Morgan? Maybe you thought you were a
- 1:50:58Speaker 1: captain here perhaps boy the powers. But I'll teach you better.
- 1:51:04Speaker 1: Cross me and you'll go where many a good man's
- 1:51:07Speaker 1: gone before you. First and last, he's thirty years back,
- 1:51:13Speaker 1: some to the yard arms shiver moist sides, and some
- 1:51:17Speaker 1: by the board and ought to feed the fishes. There's
- 1:51:21Speaker 1: never man luck me between the eyes and seen a
- 1:51:24Speaker 1: good day afterwards, Tom mug And you may late that.
- 1:51:29Speaker 1: Morgan paused, but a hoarse murmur rose from the others.
- 1:51:34Speaker 1: Tom's right, said one, I stood hazing lone after from
- 1:51:38Speaker 1: one added another, I'll be hanged if i'll be hazed
- 1:51:42Speaker 1: by you, John Silver, Did any of you gentlemen want
- 1:51:46Speaker 1: have it out with me? Roared Silver, bending far forward
- 1:51:51Speaker 1: from his position on the keg, with his pipe still
- 1:51:54Speaker 1: glowing in his right hand. Put a name on what
- 1:51:58Speaker 1: you're at. You ain't dumb? I reckon him that once
- 1:52:02Speaker 1: shall get it? Have I lived this many years to
- 1:52:06Speaker 1: have a son of a rum punch and cockies at
- 1:52:09Speaker 1: thwart my org or at the latter end of it?
- 1:52:12Speaker 1: You know the way you're all gentleman of fortune by
- 1:52:16Speaker 1: your account. Well I'm ready take a cutlass in the
- 1:52:21Speaker 1: dares and i'll see the color of his inside crutch
- 1:52:25Speaker 1: at all before that pipe's empty. Not a man stirred.
- 1:52:30Speaker 1: Not a man answered, that's your sword, is it? He added,
- 1:52:35Speaker 1: returning his pipe to his mouth. Well you're a gay
- 1:52:39Speaker 1: lot to look at anyway, not worth much in a
- 1:52:42Speaker 1: foot you ain't. Perhaps you can understand King George's English.
- 1:52:47Speaker 1: I am capt'n here by election. I am catt here
- 1:52:52Speaker 1: because I'm the best man by a long sea oil.
- 1:52:56Speaker 1: You won't fight as gentleman of fortune then by thunder
- 1:53:02Speaker 1: yellow Bay, and you made late to it. I like
- 1:53:06Speaker 1: that boy, No, I've never seen a better boy than that.
- 1:53:10Speaker 1: He's more a man than any pair of rats of
- 1:53:13Speaker 1: you in this ere house. And what I say is this,
- 1:53:17Speaker 1: let me see him. That'll lay a hand on him.
- 1:53:20Speaker 1: That's what I say, And you may lay to it.
- 1:53:24Speaker 1: There was a long pause after this. I stood straight
- 1:53:27Speaker 1: up against the wall. My heart's still going like a sledgehammer,
- 1:53:30Speaker 1: but with a ray of hope now shining in my bosom.
- 1:53:34Speaker 1: Silver leant back against the wall, his arms crossed, his
- 1:53:38Speaker 1: pipe in the corner of his mouth, as calm as
- 1:53:40Speaker 1: though he had been in church. Yet his eye kept
- 1:53:43Speaker 1: wandering furtively, and he kept the tail of it on
- 1:53:46Speaker 1: his unruly followers. They, on their part, drew gradually together
- 1:53:51Speaker 1: toward the far end of the blockhouse, and the low
- 1:53:54Speaker 1: hiss of their whispering sounded in my ears continuously like
- 1:53:58Speaker 1: a stream. One after another. They would look up, and
- 1:54:02Speaker 1: the red light of the torch would fall for a
- 1:54:04Speaker 1: second on their nervous faces. But it was not toward me.
- 1:54:09Speaker 1: It was towards Silver that they turned their eyes. You
- 1:54:12Speaker 1: seem to have a lot to say, remarked Silver. Spitting
- 1:54:17Speaker 1: far into the air. Pipe up and let me hear
- 1:54:20Speaker 1: it and lead to ax your pardon, sir, returned one
- 1:54:25Speaker 1: of the men. You're pretty free with some of the rules.
- 1:54:29Speaker 1: Maybe you kindly keep an eye upon the rest this cruise. Dissatisfied,
- 1:54:34Speaker 1: this crew, don't valley bully in lamlin spike. This crew
- 1:54:39Speaker 1: has its right like other crews. I'll make so free
- 1:54:42Speaker 1: as that, and by your own rules, I take it
- 1:54:46Speaker 1: we can talk together. I ax your pardon, sir, acknowledging
- 1:54:50Speaker 1: you for the captain at this present, but I claim
- 1:54:53Speaker 1: my right and steps outside for a council, and with
- 1:54:57Speaker 1: an elaborate sea salute, this fellow, long, ill looking, yellow
- 1:55:01Speaker 1: eyed man of five and thirty stepped coolly toward the
- 1:55:05Speaker 1: door and disappeared out of the house. One after another.
- 1:55:08Speaker 1: The rest followed his example, each making a salute as
- 1:55:12Speaker 1: he passed, each adding some apology. Called into rules, said
- 1:55:17Speaker 1: one forlkas or counsel, said Morgan. And so with one
- 1:55:22Speaker 1: remark or another, all marched out and left silver and
- 1:55:26Speaker 1: meat alone with the torch. The sea cook instantly removed
- 1:55:30Speaker 1: his pipe. Now look you here, Jim Harkins, he said,
- 1:55:34Speaker 1: in a steady whisper, that was no more than audible.
- 1:55:36Speaker 1: You're within half a plank of death and what's a
- 1:55:40Speaker 1: long sight worse of torture. They're going to throw me off,
- 1:55:45Speaker 1: but you Mark, I stand by you through thick and thin.
- 1:55:49Speaker 1: I didn't mean to no, not till you spoke up.
- 1:55:52Speaker 1: I was about desperate to lose that much blunt and
- 1:55:56Speaker 1: be hanged into the bargain. But I see you was
- 1:55:59Speaker 1: the right sword, I says to myself. You stand by Hawkins, John,
- 1:56:03Speaker 1: and Hawkins will stand by you. You're his last card,
- 1:56:07Speaker 1: and by the living thunder Johnny's yours back to back,
- 1:56:11Speaker 1: says I. You save your witness, and he'll save your neck.
- 1:56:16Speaker 1: I began dimly to understand you mean all's lost? I asked, aye,
- 1:56:22Speaker 1: by gum I do? He answered, ship gone, neck gone.
- 1:56:28Speaker 1: That's the size of it. Once I looked into that
- 1:56:30Speaker 1: beie Jim Hawkins and see no schooner. Well, I'm tough,
- 1:56:35Speaker 1: but I gave out as for that lot and their counsel,
- 1:56:39Speaker 1: mark me, they're outright fools and cowards. I'll save your
- 1:56:43Speaker 1: life if so be as I can from them. But
- 1:56:47Speaker 1: see here, Jim different tap you save lung John from swinging.
- 1:56:53Speaker 1: I was bewildered. It seemed a thing so hopeless. He
- 1:56:56Speaker 1: was asking, he the old buccaneer, the ringleader, throw it out.
- 1:57:01Speaker 1: What I can do that I'll do? I said, it's
- 1:57:04Speaker 1: a bargain, cried long John, you speak up, plucky and
- 1:57:09Speaker 1: both thunder. I have a chance. He hobbled to the torch,
- 1:57:13Speaker 1: where it stood propped among the firewood, and took a
- 1:57:16Speaker 1: fresh light to his pipe. Understand me, Jim, he said, returning,
- 1:57:21Speaker 1: I've had on my shoulders. I have him on Squire's side.
- 1:57:26Speaker 1: Now I know you've got that ship safe somewheres. Oh
- 1:57:31Speaker 1: you've done it. I don't know, but safe it is,
- 1:57:34Speaker 1: I guess. Hands and old Bryant turned soft. I never
- 1:57:38Speaker 1: much believed in neither of them. No, you mark me.
- 1:57:43Speaker 1: Oh ask no questions, nor won't let others. I know
- 1:57:48Speaker 1: when a game's up, I do. And I know a
- 1:57:51Speaker 1: lad that's storch Ah. You that's young you might You
- 1:57:58Speaker 1: and me might have done a good together. He drew
- 1:58:02Speaker 1: some cognac from the cask into a tin cannikin. Will
- 1:58:07Speaker 1: you taste mess me? He asked, And when I had refused, Well,
- 1:58:12Speaker 1: I'd take a drain myself, Jim said. He oh, I
- 1:58:16Speaker 1: need a corker for this trouble on hand. And then
- 1:58:21Speaker 1: and talking a trouble, Oh did that doctor give me
- 1:58:25Speaker 1: the chart? Jim My face expressed a wonder so unaffected
- 1:58:29Speaker 1: that he saw the needlessness of further questions. Ah well
- 1:58:34Speaker 1: he did, though, said he. And there was something under that,
- 1:58:38Speaker 1: no doubt, something surely under that, Jim bad or good?
- 1:58:43Speaker 1: And he took another swallow of the brandy, shaking his
- 1:58:47Speaker 1: great fair head like a man who looks forward to
- 1:58:50Speaker 1: the worst. End of Chapter twenty eight. Chapter twenty nine,
- 1:58:58Speaker 1: the black spot again. The council of the Buccaneers had
- 1:59:04Speaker 1: lasted some time when one of them re entered the house, and,
- 1:59:07Speaker 1: with the repetition of the same salute which had in
- 1:59:10Speaker 1: my eyes an ironical air, begged for a moment's loan
- 1:59:14Speaker 1: of the torch. Silver briefly agreed, and this emissary retired again,
- 1:59:20Speaker 1: leaving us together in the dark. There is a breeze,
- 1:59:23Speaker 1: come in, Jim, said Silver, who had by this time
- 1:59:26Speaker 1: adopted quite a friendly and familiar tone. I turned to
- 1:59:30Speaker 1: the loophole nearest me and looked out. The embers of
- 1:59:34Speaker 1: the great fire had so far burned themselves out, and
- 1:59:38Speaker 1: now glowed so low and duskily that I understood why
- 1:59:42Speaker 1: these conspirators desired a torch. About halfway down the slope
- 1:59:47Speaker 1: to the stockade, they were collected in a group. One
- 1:59:50Speaker 1: held the light, another was on his knees in their
- 1:59:53Speaker 1: midst and I saw the blade of an open knife
- 1:59:57Speaker 1: shine in his hand, with varying colors in them moon
- 2:00:00Speaker 1: and torchlight. The rest were all somewhat stooping, as though
- 2:00:05Speaker 1: watching the maneuvers of this last. I could just make
- 2:00:09Speaker 1: out that he had a book as well as a
- 2:00:11Speaker 1: knife in his hand, and was still wondering how anything
- 2:00:14Speaker 1: so incongruous had come in their possession. When the kneeling
- 2:00:18Speaker 1: figure rose once more to his feet, and the whole
- 2:00:21Speaker 1: party began to move together toward the house. Here they come,
- 2:00:27Speaker 1: said I, and returned to my former position, for it
- 2:00:30Speaker 1: seemed beneath my dignity that they should find me watching them. Wow,
- 2:00:35Speaker 1: let em come, lad, let em come, said Silver cheerily. Oh,
- 2:00:41Speaker 1: I've still a shot in my locker. The door opened,
- 2:00:45Speaker 1: and the five men standing huddled together just inside pushed
- 2:00:49Speaker 1: one of their number forward. In any other circumstances, it
- 2:00:53Speaker 1: would have been comical to see his slow advance, hesitating
- 2:00:57Speaker 1: as he set down each foot, holding his closed right
- 2:01:02Speaker 1: hand in front of him. Step up, lad, cried Silver,
- 2:01:06Speaker 1: I won't eat you. Hand it over, lubber. I know
- 2:01:10Speaker 1: the rules to I won't hurt a deputation. Thus encouraged,
- 2:01:15Speaker 1: the buccaneer stepped forth more briskly, and, having passed something
- 2:01:19Speaker 1: to Silver from hand to hand, slipped it yet more
- 2:01:22Speaker 1: smartly back again to his companions. The sea cook looked
- 2:01:27Speaker 1: at what had been given him, The black spot, he thought,
- 2:01:32Speaker 1: so he observed, where might you've got the paper? Oh? Hello,
- 2:01:38Speaker 1: look here, now I eat this? Lucky you've gone and
- 2:01:42Speaker 1: cut this out of a bible. A fool's cut a bible.
- 2:01:47Speaker 1: Oh there, said Morgan. There what did I say? No
- 2:01:52Speaker 1: good will come of that? I said, Well you've about
- 2:01:56Speaker 1: fixed it now among you, continued Silver. Y'all all swing
- 2:02:01Speaker 1: now way reckon what soft headed lubber and a bible?
- 2:02:06Speaker 1: It was? Dick said one, Dick? Was it? Then Dick
- 2:02:11Speaker 1: can get to prayers, said Silver. He's seen his slice,
- 2:02:16Speaker 1: and lookers, Dick, and you may later that. But here
- 2:02:20Speaker 1: the long man with the yellow eyes struck in belay
- 2:02:24Speaker 1: that talk John, Silver, He said, this crew has tipped
- 2:02:28Speaker 1: you the black spot in full council as duty bound.
- 2:02:33Speaker 1: Just you turn it over as in duty bound and
- 2:02:37Speaker 1: see what's wrote there, then you can talk. Thank you, George,
- 2:02:43Speaker 1: replied the sea cook. You always was brisk for business
- 2:02:47Speaker 1: and as the rules by heart, George, as I'm pleased
- 2:02:52Speaker 1: to see. Wow, what is it anyway? Ah deposed that's it?
- 2:03:00Speaker 1: Is it? Well? Very pretty? Wrote to be sure like print.
- 2:03:05Speaker 1: I swear your hand a right, George. Why you was
- 2:03:10Speaker 1: getting quite the leading man and this here crew you'll
- 2:03:13Speaker 1: be cap next. I shouldn't wonder. Just oblige me with
- 2:03:18Speaker 1: that tarch again? Will youer this pipe? Don't draw? Come now,
- 2:03:24Speaker 1: said George. You don't fool this crew no more. You're
- 2:03:28Speaker 1: a funny man by your account. But you're over now,
- 2:03:32Speaker 1: and you'll maybe step down off that barrel and help vote.
- 2:03:37Speaker 1: I thought you said you know the rules, returned silver contemptuously. Leastwise,
- 2:03:45Speaker 1: if you don't, I do. And I wait here, and
- 2:03:49Speaker 1: I'm still your cap mind to you out with your grievances,
- 2:03:54Speaker 1: and I reply in the meantime you're black spike with
- 2:03:58Speaker 1: a biscuit. After that we'll see, Oh, replied George. You
- 2:04:06Speaker 1: don't be under no kind of apprehension. We're all square.
- 2:04:10Speaker 1: We are. First, you've made a hash of this cruise.
- 2:04:15Speaker 1: You'll be a bold man to say no to that. Second,
- 2:04:19Speaker 1: you let the enemy out of this here trap for nothing.
- 2:04:23Speaker 1: Why did they want out? I don't know, but it's
- 2:04:26Speaker 1: pretty plain they wanted it. Third, you wouldn't let us
- 2:04:31Speaker 1: go at them upon the march. Ah, we see through you,
- 2:04:36Speaker 1: John Silver. You want to play booty, that's what's wrong
- 2:04:41Speaker 1: with you. And then fourth, there's this here boy? Is
- 2:04:47Speaker 1: that all? Asked Silver? Quietly enough too, retorted George. We'll
- 2:04:54Speaker 1: all swing and sundry for your bungling. Wow. Now look here,
- 2:05:00Speaker 1: answer these four points one after another. I'll answer him.
- 2:05:05Speaker 1: I made a hash of this cruise, did I? Well,
- 2:05:09Speaker 1: now you all know what I wanted, and you all
- 2:05:13Speaker 1: know if it had been done that we'd have been
- 2:05:16Speaker 1: a bore this spaniel of this night, as ever was
- 2:05:19Speaker 1: every man of us alive and fit and full of
- 2:05:23Speaker 1: good plum duff and the treasure in the hold of
- 2:05:26Speaker 1: her by thunder well who crushed me, who fassed my hand,
- 2:05:31Speaker 1: as was the lawful cap'n who tipped me the black spot.
- 2:05:35Speaker 1: The day we landed and began this dance, Ah, it's
- 2:05:39Speaker 1: a fine dance. I'm with you there. And it looks
- 2:05:43Speaker 1: mighty like a horn pipe in a rope, said Execution
- 2:05:46Speaker 1: Duck by London Town. It does. But who done it?
- 2:05:51Speaker 1: What it was? Anderson and hands? And you George, Mary,
- 2:05:56Speaker 1: and you're the last above border that same medley crew,
- 2:06:01Speaker 1: and you have the Davy Jones insolence to up and
- 2:06:04Speaker 1: stand for cap'n over me you that sunk the love
- 2:06:08Speaker 1: of us by their powers. But there's tops the stiffest
- 2:06:13Speaker 1: yarn to nothing. Silver paused, and I could see by
- 2:06:17Speaker 1: the faces of George and his late comrades that these
- 2:06:21Speaker 1: words had not been said in vain. That's for number one,
- 2:06:26Speaker 1: cried the accused, wiping the sweat from his brow, for
- 2:06:31Speaker 1: he had been talking with a vehemence that shook the house.
- 2:06:34Speaker 1: Why I give you my word. I am sick to
- 2:06:38Speaker 1: speak to you. You've neither sense nor memory, and I
- 2:06:43Speaker 1: leave it to fancy where your mother's were?
- 2:06:46Speaker 2: Is that?
- 2:06:46Speaker 1: Let you come to see see, gentlemen of fortune, I
- 2:06:51Speaker 1: reckon tailors? Is your trade? Go on, John, said Morgan.
- 2:06:58Speaker 1: Speak up to the others. Ah. The others returned John,
- 2:07:03Speaker 1: They're a nice lie. They you say this cruise is bungled.
- 2:07:07Speaker 1: Ah by gom. If you can understand how bad it's bungled,
- 2:07:12Speaker 1: you would see were that near the gibbet that my
- 2:07:15Speaker 1: necks stiff with thinking on it? You've seen them maybe
- 2:07:19Speaker 1: hanged in chains, birds about them, seemen pointing them out
- 2:07:23Speaker 1: as they go down with the tide. Who's that? Says one?
- 2:07:28Speaker 1: That Bye, that's John Silver, I knowed him well, says another.
- 2:07:34Speaker 1: And you near the chains of jangle as you go
- 2:07:36Speaker 1: about and reach for the other boy. Now that's about
- 2:07:41Speaker 1: where we are, every mother's son of us thanks to
- 2:07:44Speaker 1: him and Hans and Anderson and other ruination fools of you.
- 2:07:49Speaker 1: And if you want to know about number four, and
- 2:07:52Speaker 1: that boy was shiver my timbers. Isn't he a hostage?
- 2:07:57Speaker 1: Are we going to waste a hostage? Now? Oh? Not us?
- 2:08:01Speaker 1: He might be our last chance. I shouldn't wonder kill
- 2:08:05Speaker 1: that boy, not me mates. And number three, wow, well
- 2:08:11Speaker 1: there's a deal to say the number three. Maybe you
- 2:08:15Speaker 1: don't count it nothing to have a real college doctor
- 2:08:19Speaker 1: come to see you every day, You John with your
- 2:08:23Speaker 1: head broke, or you George Mary that add the EU
- 2:08:27Speaker 1: shakes upon you not six hours are gone and adds
- 2:08:30Speaker 1: your eyes the color of lemon peels to the same
- 2:08:33Speaker 1: moment on the clock. And maybe perhaps you didn't know
- 2:08:37Speaker 1: there was a concert coming either, but there is, and
- 2:08:41Speaker 1: not so long till then, and we'll see you. We'll
- 2:08:45Speaker 1: be glad I've hostage when it comes to that. And
- 2:08:49Speaker 1: as for number two, why I made a bargain, well,
- 2:08:53Speaker 1: you come crawling on your knees to me to make
- 2:08:55Speaker 1: it on your knees? You came, you was that down high?
- 2:09:00Speaker 1: Did and you'd have starved too if I hadn't. But
- 2:09:03Speaker 1: that's a trayfle you look there, that's why. And he
- 2:09:08Speaker 1: cast down upon the floor a paper that I instantly
- 2:09:11Speaker 1: recognized none other than the chart on yellow paper with
- 2:09:16Speaker 1: the three red crosses that I had found in the
- 2:09:19Speaker 1: oilcloth at the bottom of the captain's chest. Why the
- 2:09:23Speaker 1: doctor had given it to him was more than I
- 2:09:26Speaker 1: could fancy. But if it were inexplicable to me, the
- 2:09:30Speaker 1: appearance of the chart was incredible to the surviving mutineers.
- 2:09:34Speaker 1: They leaped upon it like cats upon a mouse. It
- 2:09:37Speaker 1: went from hand to hand, one tearing it from another.
- 2:09:41Speaker 1: And by the oaths and the cries and the childish
- 2:09:44Speaker 1: laughter with which they accompanied their examination, you would have
- 2:09:48Speaker 1: thought not only they were fingering the very gold, but
- 2:09:52Speaker 1: were at sea with it. Besides in safety, yes, said one.
- 2:09:57Speaker 1: That's flint for sure, Ja, and a score below with
- 2:10:02Speaker 1: a close hitch to it. So he ever done. Mighty pretty,
- 2:10:07Speaker 1: said George. But how are we to get away with it?
- 2:10:10Speaker 1: And ask no ship? Silver suddenly sprang up and supporting
- 2:10:15Speaker 1: himself with a hand against the wall. New I'll give
- 2:10:18Speaker 1: you warning, George, he cried, one more worthy or sauce,
- 2:10:24Speaker 1: and I'll call you down and fight you. Hell, how
- 2:10:29Speaker 1: do I know you had hard to tell me that
- 2:10:32Speaker 1: you and the rest that lost me my schooner with
- 2:10:36Speaker 1: your interference, burn you, but not you. You can't. You ain't
- 2:10:41Speaker 1: got the invention of a cupcroach. But civil you can speak,
- 2:10:45Speaker 1: and you shall. George, Mary, you mate later. That that's
- 2:10:49Speaker 1: fairy now, said the old man Morgan fair I reckon soul,
- 2:10:55Speaker 1: said the sea cook. You lost the ship, but he
- 2:10:57Speaker 1: found the treasure. Who's the better man at that? And
- 2:11:01Speaker 1: now I resigned by thunder elect whom you pleased to
- 2:11:05Speaker 1: be your cap'n Now I'm dumb with it. Silver, They cried,
- 2:11:11Speaker 1: barbecue forever, barbecue for captain. So that's the tune, is it?
- 2:11:17Speaker 1: Cried the cook George. I reckon, you'll have to wait
- 2:11:21Speaker 1: another turn, friend, and looky for you, as I'm not
- 2:11:25Speaker 1: a revengeful man. But that was never my way. And now, shipmates,
- 2:11:31Speaker 1: this black spot take much good, now, is it? Dick's
- 2:11:36Speaker 1: crust his luck and spoiled his bible. And that's about
- 2:11:40Speaker 1: all it will do to kiss the book on? Still,
- 2:11:43Speaker 1: won't it? Growled Dick, who was evidently uneasy at the
- 2:11:47Speaker 1: curse he had brought upon himself A bible with a
- 2:11:51Speaker 1: bit cut out, returned Silver derisively. Not it it don't
- 2:11:57Speaker 1: boil more than a ballad book. Don't yet, though, cried Dick,
- 2:12:02Speaker 1: with a sort of joy. Well, I reckon, that's worth
- 2:12:05Speaker 1: having too. Ere, Jim, here's a curiosity for ya, said Silver,
- 2:12:11Speaker 1: and he tossed me the paper. It was around about
- 2:12:15Speaker 1: the size of a crown piece. One side was blank,
- 2:12:18Speaker 1: for it had been the last leaf. The other contained
- 2:12:22Speaker 1: a verse or two of revelation, these words among the rest,
- 2:12:26Speaker 1: which struck sharply home upon my mind. Without our dogs
- 2:12:31Speaker 1: and murderers. The printed side had been blackened with wood ash,
- 2:12:36Speaker 1: which already began to come off and soil my fingers
- 2:12:40Speaker 1: on the blank side had been written with the same
- 2:12:43Speaker 1: material the one word deposed. I have that curiosity beside
- 2:12:49Speaker 1: me at this moment, But not a trace of writing
- 2:12:52Speaker 1: now remains, beyond a single scratch, such as a man
- 2:12:57Speaker 1: might make with his thumb nail. That was the end
- 2:13:00Speaker 1: of the night's business. Soon after, with a drink all round,
- 2:13:03Speaker 1: we lay down to sleep, and the outside of Silver's
- 2:13:06Speaker 1: vengeance was to put George Merry up for sentinel and
- 2:13:10Speaker 1: threaten him with death if he should prove unfaithful. It
- 2:13:15Speaker 1: was long ere I could close an eye, and Heaven
- 2:13:18Speaker 1: knows I hadn't matter enough for thought in the man
- 2:13:21Speaker 1: whom I had slain that afternoon, in my own most
- 2:13:24Speaker 1: perilous position, and above all in the remarkable game that
- 2:13:28Speaker 1: I saw Silver now engaged upon, keeping the mutineers together
- 2:13:33Speaker 1: with one hand and grasping with the other, after every
- 2:13:36Speaker 1: means possible and impossible, to make his peace and save
- 2:13:41Speaker 1: his miserable life. He himself slept peacefully and snored aloud.
- 2:13:46Speaker 1: Yet my heart was sore for him, wicked as he
- 2:13:50Speaker 1: was to think on the dark perils that environed and
- 2:13:54Speaker 1: the shameful gibbet that awaited him. And of chapter twenty nine,
- 2:14:02Speaker 1: chapter thirty on Parole. I was wakened. Indeed we were
- 2:14:08Speaker 1: all wakened, for I could see even the sentinel shake
- 2:14:11Speaker 1: himself together from where he had fallen against the doorpost,
- 2:14:15Speaker 1: by a clear, hearty voice hailing us from the margin
- 2:14:19Speaker 1: of the wood block house. Ahoy, it cried, here's the doctor,
- 2:14:26Speaker 1: and the doctor it was. Although I was glad to
- 2:14:29Speaker 1: hear the sound, yet my gladness was not without admixture.
- 2:14:34Speaker 1: I remembered with confusion my insubordinate and stealthy conduct. And
- 2:14:39Speaker 1: when I saw where it had brought me, among what companions,
- 2:14:43Speaker 1: and surrounded by what dangers, I had felt ashamed to
- 2:14:47Speaker 1: look him in the face. He must have risen in
- 2:14:49Speaker 1: the dark, for the day had hardly come. And when
- 2:14:52Speaker 1: I ran to a loophole and looked out, I saw
- 2:14:55Speaker 1: him standing like silver once before, up to the mid
- 2:14:58Speaker 1: leg in creeping you, doctor, top on the morning to you, sir,
- 2:15:05Speaker 1: cried Silver, broad awake and beaming with good nature in
- 2:15:09Speaker 1: a moment bright and early, to be sure, And it's
- 2:15:13Speaker 1: the early bird. As the saying goes against the rations, George,
- 2:15:18Speaker 1: shake up your timbers, son, and help ductor livesey over
- 2:15:21Speaker 1: the ship's side all a doin well, your patience was
- 2:15:25Speaker 1: all well and merry. So he patted on, standing on
- 2:15:30Speaker 1: the hilltop with his crutch under his elbow and one
- 2:15:33Speaker 1: hand upon the side of the log house, quite the
- 2:15:36Speaker 1: old John in voice, manner and expression. We've quite a
- 2:15:41Speaker 1: surprise for you too, sir, he continued. We've got a
- 2:15:45Speaker 1: little stranger here. He he a new border and lodger, sir,
- 2:15:50Speaker 1: and looking fit and taut as a fiddle. Slep like
- 2:15:54Speaker 1: a super cargo he did right alongside of John Stem
- 2:15:59Speaker 1: the Stem we was a night. Doctor Livesey was by
- 2:16:03Speaker 1: this time across the stockade and pretty near the cook
- 2:16:06Speaker 1: and I could hear the alternation in his voice as
- 2:16:09Speaker 1: he said, not Jim, the very same Jim, as ever
- 2:16:13Speaker 1: was said Silver. The doctor stopped outright, although he did
- 2:16:17Speaker 1: not speak, and it was some seconds before he seemed
- 2:16:21Speaker 1: able to move on. Well, well, he said, at last,
- 2:16:26Speaker 1: duty first, and pleasure afterwards, as you might have said yourself, Silver,
- 2:16:30Speaker 1: let us overhaul these patients of yours. A moment afterwards
- 2:16:35Speaker 1: he had entered the blockhouse, and with one grim nod
- 2:16:38Speaker 1: to me, proceeded with his work among the sick. He
- 2:16:42Speaker 1: seemed under no apprehension, though he must have known that
- 2:16:45Speaker 1: his life among these treacherous demons depended on a hair,
- 2:16:49Speaker 1: And he rattled on to his patients as if he
- 2:16:52Speaker 1: were paying an ordinary professional visit in a quiet English family.
- 2:16:57Speaker 1: His manner, I suppose, reacted on the men, for they
- 2:17:00Speaker 1: behaved to him as if nothing had occurred, as if
- 2:17:03Speaker 1: he were still ship's doctor, and they still faithful hands
- 2:17:07Speaker 1: before the mast. You're doing well, my friend, he said
- 2:17:12Speaker 1: to the fellow with the bandaged head. And if ever
- 2:17:15Speaker 1: a person had a close shave, it was you. Your
- 2:17:18Speaker 1: head must be as hard as iron. Well, George, how
- 2:17:22Speaker 1: goes it? You're a pretty color. Certainly, why your liver
- 2:17:26Speaker 1: man is upside down? Did you take that medicine? Did
- 2:17:30Speaker 1: he take that medicine? Men? Oh aye, sir, he took
- 2:17:34Speaker 1: his sure enough, returned Morgan. Because you see, since I'm
- 2:17:39Speaker 1: a mucineer's doctor, or prison doctor, as I prefer to
- 2:17:43Speaker 1: call it, says doctor Livesey in his pleasantest way, I
- 2:17:46Speaker 1: make it a point of honor not to lose a
- 2:17:48Speaker 1: man for King George, God bless him and the gallows.
- 2:17:53Speaker 1: The rogues looked at each other, but swallowed the home
- 2:17:56Speaker 1: thrust in silence. Dick, don't feel well, sir, said one. Don't,
- 2:18:02Speaker 1: he replied the doctor. Well, step up here, Dick, and
- 2:18:05Speaker 1: let me see your tongue. No, I should be surprised
- 2:18:09Speaker 1: if he didn't. The man's tongue is fit to frighten
- 2:18:12Speaker 1: the French. Another fever. Oh there, said Morgan, that comed
- 2:18:18Speaker 1: of spilling bibles. That comed, as you call it, for
- 2:18:23Speaker 1: being arrant asses, retorted the doctor, and not having sense
- 2:18:28Speaker 1: enough to know honest air from prison and the dry
- 2:18:31Speaker 1: land from a vile pestifalous slough. I think it most probable, though,
- 2:18:37Speaker 1: of course it's only an opinion that you'll all have
- 2:18:40Speaker 1: the deuce to pay before you get that malaria out
- 2:18:43Speaker 1: of your systems. Camp in a bog would you Silver,
- 2:18:47Speaker 1: I'm surprised at you. You're less of a fool than
- 2:18:50Speaker 1: many take you all around, but you don't appear to
- 2:18:54Speaker 1: me to have the rudiments of a notion of the
- 2:18:56Speaker 1: rules of health. Well, he added, after he had dosed
- 2:19:00Speaker 1: them round and they had taken his prescriptions with real
- 2:19:04Speaker 1: laughable humility, more like charity school children, then blood guilty
- 2:19:09Speaker 1: mutineers and pirates. Well that's done for today, and now
- 2:19:14Speaker 1: I should wish to have a talk with that boy, please,
- 2:19:18Speaker 1: And he nodded his head in my direction carelessly. George
- 2:19:21Speaker 1: Mary was at the door, spitting and spluttering over some
- 2:19:24Speaker 1: bad tasting medicine. But at the first word of the
- 2:19:27Speaker 1: doctor's proposal he swung round with a deep flush and
- 2:19:31Speaker 1: cried no and swore Silver struck the barrel with his
- 2:19:37Speaker 1: open hand silence. He roared and looked about him positively
- 2:19:42Speaker 1: like a lion. Doctor he went on in his usual tones.
- 2:19:47Speaker 1: I was thinking of that, knowing as oh, you had
- 2:19:50Speaker 1: a fancy for the boy. We're all on lee grateful
- 2:19:53Speaker 1: for your kindness, and as you see, puts faith in
- 2:19:57Speaker 1: you and takes the drugs down like that that much grog,
- 2:20:01Speaker 1: and I'd take it. I found a waisle suit all
- 2:20:06Speaker 1: aw kids, Will you give me your word of honor
- 2:20:08Speaker 1: as a young gentleman for a young gelmer you are,
- 2:20:12Speaker 1: though poor born, your word of honor not to slip.
- 2:20:16Speaker 1: You're a cable. I readily gave the pledge required. Then
- 2:20:21Speaker 1: doctor said, Silver, you just step outside of that stuck
- 2:20:26Speaker 1: aide and once you're there, or bring the boy down
- 2:20:29Speaker 1: on the inside, and I reckon you can yarn through
- 2:20:32Speaker 1: the spas good day to you, sir, and all our
- 2:20:35Speaker 1: duties to the Squire and cap'n Smollett. The explosion of disapproval,
- 2:20:40Speaker 1: which nothing but Silver's black looks had restrained, broke out
- 2:20:44Speaker 1: immediately the doctor had left the house. Silver was roundly
- 2:20:48Speaker 1: accused of playing double, of trying to make a separate
- 2:20:52Speaker 1: piece for himself, of sacrificing the interests of his accomplishes
- 2:20:56Speaker 1: and victims, and in one word of the idea medical
- 2:21:00Speaker 1: exact thing that he was doing. It seemed to me
- 2:21:04Speaker 1: so obvious in this case that I should not imagine
- 2:21:07Speaker 1: how he was to turn their anger. But he was
- 2:21:10Speaker 1: twice the man the restore, and his last night's victory
- 2:21:15Speaker 1: had given him a huge preponderance in their minds. He
- 2:21:19Speaker 1: called them all the fools and dolts you can imagine,
- 2:21:23Speaker 1: said it was necessary I should talk to the doctor,
- 2:21:26Speaker 1: fluttered the chart in their faces, ask them if they
- 2:21:29Speaker 1: could afford to break the treaty the very day they
- 2:21:32Speaker 1: were bound a treasure hunting no boy thunder, He cried,
- 2:21:37Speaker 1: it's us must break the treaty when the time comes,
- 2:21:41Speaker 1: and tell then I'll gammon that doctor if I have
- 2:21:44Speaker 1: to oil his boots with brandy. And then he baded
- 2:21:48Speaker 1: them all get the fire lit, and stalked out upon
- 2:21:51Speaker 1: his crutch with his hand on my shoulder, leaving them
- 2:21:54Speaker 1: in disarray and silenced by his volubility. Rather than convinced.
- 2:22:00Speaker 1: Oh lad, slow, he said, they might round upon us
- 2:22:05Speaker 1: in a twinkle of an eye if we were seen
- 2:22:07Speaker 1: to hurry very deliberately. Then did we advance across the
- 2:22:11Speaker 1: sand to where the doctor awaited us on the other
- 2:22:14Speaker 1: side of the stockade. And soon as we were within
- 2:22:17Speaker 1: easy speaking distance, Silver stopped. You'll make a note of
- 2:22:22Speaker 1: this here also, doctor, said he, and the boy'll tell
- 2:22:27Speaker 1: you our saved his life, and we're deposed for it too.
- 2:22:30Speaker 1: You may light that, doctor. When a man steering as
- 2:22:35Speaker 1: near to the wind as me, playing chuck farthing with
- 2:22:38Speaker 1: the last breath in his body like you wouldn't think
- 2:22:42Speaker 1: it too much, mayapp to give him one good word.
- 2:22:46Speaker 1: You please bear in mind, it's not my life only
- 2:22:50Speaker 1: now it's that boys into the bargain, and ye speak me,
- 2:22:55Speaker 1: fair doctor, and give me a bit of hope to
- 2:22:58Speaker 1: go on for the sake of mercery. See Silver was
- 2:23:01Speaker 1: a changed man once he was out there and had
- 2:23:05Speaker 1: his back to his friends and the blockhouse. His cheeks
- 2:23:08Speaker 1: seemed to have fallen in his voice trembled. Never was
- 2:23:12Speaker 1: a soul more dead in earnest. Why John, you're not afraid,
- 2:23:18Speaker 1: asked Doctor Livesey, Doctor, I'm no coward, No not, I
- 2:23:24Speaker 1: not so much. And he snapped his fingers. If I was,
- 2:23:29Speaker 1: I wouldn't say it. But I alone up fairly. I've
- 2:23:32Speaker 1: had the shakes upon me for the gallows. You're a
- 2:23:35Speaker 1: good man and a true never seen a better man.
- 2:23:39Speaker 1: And you'll not forget why I done good, not anymore.
- 2:23:43Speaker 1: You'll forget the bad I know. And I stepped beside
- 2:23:47Speaker 1: see her, and leave you and Jim alone. And you'll
- 2:23:51Speaker 1: put that dome for me too, For it's a long stretch,
- 2:23:54Speaker 1: it is so saying. He stepped back a little way
- 2:23:58Speaker 1: till he was out of earshot, and there sat down
- 2:24:01Speaker 1: upon a tree stump, and began to whistle, spinning round
- 2:24:05Speaker 1: now and again upon his seat, so as to command
- 2:24:08Speaker 1: a sight, sometimes of me and the doctor, and sometimes
- 2:24:11Speaker 1: of his unruly ruffians. As they went to and fro
- 2:24:15Speaker 1: in the sand between the fire which they were busy rekindling,
- 2:24:19Speaker 1: and the house from which they brought forth pork and
- 2:24:22Speaker 1: bread to make the breakfast. So Jim said the doctor sadly,
- 2:24:28Speaker 1: here you are as you have brood. So shall you drink?
- 2:24:33Speaker 1: My boy? Heaven knows, I cannot find it in my
- 2:24:36Speaker 1: heart to blame you, but dismuch, I will say, be
- 2:24:40Speaker 1: it kind or unkind? When Captain Smollett was well, you
- 2:24:44Speaker 1: dared not have gone off, And when he was ill
- 2:24:47Speaker 1: and couldn't help it, by George, it was downright cowardly.
- 2:24:52Speaker 1: I will own that. I here began to weep. Doctor,
- 2:24:56Speaker 1: I said, you might spare me. I have blamed my
- 2:25:00Speaker 1: self enough. My life's forfeit anyway, and I should have
- 2:25:04Speaker 1: been dead now if Silver hadn't stood for me, and
- 2:25:07Speaker 1: doctor believed this, I can die, and I daresay I
- 2:25:10Speaker 1: deserve it for what I fear is torture. If they
- 2:25:15Speaker 1: come to torture me, Jim. The doctor interrupted, and his
- 2:25:19Speaker 1: voice was quite changed. Jim, I can't have this whip over,
- 2:25:23Speaker 1: and we'll run for it. Doctor said, I. I passed
- 2:25:27Speaker 1: my word. I know, I know, he cried. We can't
- 2:25:31Speaker 1: help that, Jim. Now I'll take it on my shoulders.
- 2:25:34Speaker 1: Holus bolus blame and shame, my boy, but stay here.
- 2:25:38Speaker 1: I cannot let you jump one jump and you're out,
- 2:25:42Speaker 1: and we'll run for it like antelopes. No, I replied,
- 2:25:47Speaker 1: you know right well, you wouldn't do the same thing yourself,
- 2:25:50Speaker 1: neither you nor squire, nor captain, nor more will I.
- 2:25:54Speaker 1: Silver trusted me. I passed my word, and back I go.
- 2:25:59Speaker 1: But doctor, you did not let me finish. If they
- 2:26:02Speaker 1: come to torture me, I might let slip a word
- 2:26:05Speaker 1: of where the ship is, for I got the ship,
- 2:26:08Speaker 1: part by luck and part by risking. And she lies
- 2:26:11Speaker 1: in the north inlet, on the southern beach, and just
- 2:26:14Speaker 1: below high water, at half tired. She must be high
- 2:26:18Speaker 1: and dry the ship, exclaimed the doctor. Rapidly I described
- 2:26:22Speaker 1: to him my adventures, and he heard me out in silence.
- 2:26:26Speaker 1: There's a kind of fate in this, he observed, when
- 2:26:29Speaker 1: I had done every step. It's you that save our lives.
- 2:26:33Speaker 1: And do you suppose, by any chance that we are
- 2:26:36Speaker 1: going to let you lose yours? That would be a
- 2:26:38Speaker 1: poor return. My boy, you'll found out the plot. You'll
- 2:26:43Speaker 1: found ben Gunn the best deed that you ever did
- 2:26:46Speaker 1: or will do, though you lived till ninety oh. By Jupiter,
- 2:26:50Speaker 1: And talking of ben Gunn, why this is the mischief
- 2:26:53Speaker 1: in person? Silver? He cried Silver. I'll give your piece
- 2:26:57Speaker 1: of advice, he continued, as the cook drew nearer. Again,
- 2:27:01Speaker 1: don't you be in any great hurry after that treasure? Why, sir,
- 2:27:06Speaker 1: I do my possible, which that ain't? Said Silver. I
- 2:27:10Speaker 1: can only ask in your pardon, save my life and
- 2:27:14Speaker 1: the boys boy seeking for that treasure. And you made
- 2:27:17Speaker 1: late that well, Silver replied the doctor. If that is so,
- 2:27:22Speaker 1: I'll go one step father, look out for squalls when
- 2:27:26Speaker 1: you find it, sir, said Silver, as between man and man,
- 2:27:32Speaker 1: that's too much and too little? What year after? Why
- 2:27:36Speaker 1: you left the blockhouse? Why you've given me that there chat?
- 2:27:40Speaker 1: I don't know now, do I? And yet I don't.
- 2:27:44Speaker 1: You're a bit with my eyes shut and never a
- 2:27:47Speaker 1: word of hope. But no, this here is too much.
- 2:27:50Speaker 1: If you won't tell me what you mean played out,
- 2:27:53Speaker 1: just say so and I'll leave the helm. No, said
- 2:27:57Speaker 1: the doctor, musingly, I have no right to say more.
- 2:28:01Speaker 1: It's not my secret, you see, Silver, or I give
- 2:28:04Speaker 1: you my word, I'd tell it you. But I'll go
- 2:28:07Speaker 1: as far with you as I dare go, not a
- 2:28:10Speaker 1: step beyond, for I'll have my wig sorted by the captain.
- 2:28:14Speaker 1: Or I'm mistaken and first, I'll give you a bit
- 2:28:17Speaker 1: of hope, Silver, if we both get out alive out
- 2:28:21Speaker 1: of this wolf track, I'll do my best to save
- 2:28:24Speaker 1: you short of perjury. Silver's face was radiant. You couldn't
- 2:28:30Speaker 1: say more. I'm sure, sir, not if you was my mother,
- 2:28:34Speaker 1: he cried. Well, that's my first concession, added the doctor.
- 2:28:39Speaker 1: My second is a piece of advice. Keep the boy
- 2:28:43Speaker 1: close beside you, and when you need help, helloo, I'm
- 2:28:48Speaker 1: off to seek it for you, and that itself will
- 2:28:51Speaker 1: show you if I speak at random. Goodbye, Jim and
- 2:28:55Speaker 1: Doctor Livesey shook hands with me through the stockade, nodded
- 2:28:58Speaker 1: to Silver, and set off at a brisk pace into
- 2:29:02Speaker 1: the wood. End of chapter thirty Chapter thirty one, The
- 2:29:09Speaker 1: Treasure Hunt, Flint's pointer, Jim said, Silver, when we were alone,
- 2:29:16Speaker 1: if I saved your life, you've saved mine, and I'll
- 2:29:21Speaker 1: not forget it. I seen the doctor waving you to
- 2:29:25Speaker 1: run for it with the tail of my eye. I did,
- 2:29:29Speaker 1: and I seen you say no as plain as hearing. Jim,
- 2:29:33Speaker 1: that's one to you. This is the first clint of
- 2:29:37Speaker 1: hope I had since the attack failed, and I owe
- 2:29:40Speaker 1: it to you. And now Jim we're to go in
- 2:29:44Speaker 1: for this treasure hunting. We have sealed orders too, and
- 2:29:50Speaker 1: I don't like it. And you and me must stick
- 2:29:53Speaker 1: close back to back like and we'll save our necks
- 2:29:57Speaker 1: in spite of fat and fortune. Just then a man
- 2:30:02Speaker 1: hailed us from the fire that breakfast was ready, and
- 2:30:05Speaker 1: we were soon seated here and there about the sand
- 2:30:07Speaker 1: over biscuit and fried junk. They had lighted a fire
- 2:30:12Speaker 1: fit to roast an ox, and it was now grown
- 2:30:15Speaker 1: so hot that they could only approach it from the windward,
- 2:30:19Speaker 1: and even there not without precaution. In the same wasteful spirit,
- 2:30:23Speaker 1: they had cooked I suppose three times more than we
- 2:30:26Speaker 1: could eat, and one of them, with an empty laugh,
- 2:30:29Speaker 1: threw what was left into the fire, which blazed and
- 2:30:33Speaker 1: roared again over this unusual fuel. I never in my
- 2:30:36Speaker 1: life saw men so careless of the morrow. Hand to
- 2:30:41Speaker 1: mouth is the only word that can describe their way
- 2:30:44Speaker 1: of doing, And what with wasted food and sleeping sentries,
- 2:30:48Speaker 1: though they were bold enough for a brush and be
- 2:30:50Speaker 1: done with it, I could see their entire unfitness for
- 2:30:54Speaker 1: anything like a prolonged campaign. Even Silver, eating away with
- 2:30:59Speaker 1: Captain flint upon his shoulder, had not a word of
- 2:31:02Speaker 1: blame for their recklessness. And this the more surprised me,
- 2:31:07Speaker 1: for I thought he had never showed himself so cunning
- 2:31:10Speaker 1: as he did. Then, oh, mates, said he, it's luck
- 2:31:15Speaker 1: you have barbecue to think for you with this here head,
- 2:31:19Speaker 1: I got, Why what did I did? Sure enough? They
- 2:31:22Speaker 1: have the ship where they have it? I don't know yet,
- 2:31:26Speaker 1: but once we hit the treasurer we'll have to jump
- 2:31:29Speaker 1: about and find. And then, Mates, it's that as the bolts,
- 2:31:34Speaker 1: I reckon as the Upperand thus he kept running on
- 2:31:38Speaker 1: with his mouth full of the hot bacon. Last he
- 2:31:41Speaker 1: restored their hope and confidence, and I, more than suspect,
- 2:31:45Speaker 1: repaired his own. At the same time. As for hostage,
- 2:31:50Speaker 1: he continued, that's my last talk, I guess with them,
- 2:31:54Speaker 1: he loved so dear. I've got my piece of news,
- 2:31:57Speaker 1: and thank you him for that. But it's over and done.
- 2:32:01Speaker 1: I'll take him in a lone when we go treasure unting,
- 2:32:05Speaker 1: for we'll keep him like so much gold in case
- 2:32:08Speaker 1: of accident, you mark. In the meantime, once we got
- 2:32:11Speaker 1: the ship and treasure both and off to sea like
- 2:32:14Speaker 1: jolly companions wall, then we'll talk mister Hawkins over we
- 2:32:19Speaker 1: will it will give him his share, to be sure,
- 2:32:22Speaker 1: for all his kindness, it was no wonder the men
- 2:32:26Speaker 1: were in good humor. Now for my part, I was
- 2:32:29Speaker 1: horribly cast down. Should the scheme he now sketched prove feasible,
- 2:32:35Speaker 1: silver already doubly a traitor would not hesitate to adopt it.
- 2:32:40Speaker 1: He had still a foot in either camp, and there
- 2:32:42Speaker 1: was no doubt he would prefer wealth and freedom with
- 2:32:45Speaker 1: the pirates to a bear escape from hanging, which was
- 2:32:48Speaker 1: the best he had to hope on our side. Nay,
- 2:32:51Speaker 1: and even if things fell out that he was forced
- 2:32:54Speaker 1: to keep his faith with Doctor Livesey, even then, what
- 2:32:58Speaker 1: danger lay before us? What a moment that would be
- 2:33:02Speaker 1: when the suspicions of his followers turned to certainty, and
- 2:33:06Speaker 1: he and I should have to fight for dear life,
- 2:33:09Speaker 1: he a cripple and I a boy against five strong
- 2:33:13Speaker 1: and active seamen. Add to this double apprehension the mystery
- 2:33:17Speaker 1: that still hung over the behavior of my friends, their
- 2:33:21Speaker 1: unexplained desertion of the stockade, their inexplicable session of the chart,
- 2:33:27Speaker 1: or harder still to understand the Doctor's last warning to silver,
- 2:33:32Speaker 1: look out for squalls when you find it, and you
- 2:33:35Speaker 1: will readily believe how little taste I found in my breakfast,
- 2:33:39Speaker 1: and with how uneasy a heart I set forth behind
- 2:33:43Speaker 1: my captors on the quest for treasure. We made a
- 2:33:47Speaker 1: curious figure had any one been there to see us,
- 2:33:50Speaker 1: all in soiled sailor clothes, and all but me armed
- 2:33:55Speaker 1: to the teeth. Silver had two guns slung about him,
- 2:33:58Speaker 1: one before and one behind, besides the great cutlass at
- 2:34:02Speaker 1: his waist, and a pistol in each pocket of his
- 2:34:05Speaker 1: square tailed coat. To complete his strange appearance, Captain Flint
- 2:34:10Speaker 1: sat perched upon his shoulder and gabbled odds and ends
- 2:34:14Speaker 1: of purposeless sea talk. I had a line about my
- 2:34:17Speaker 1: waist and followed obediently after the sea cook, who held
- 2:34:22Speaker 1: the loose end of the rope now in his free hand,
- 2:34:25Speaker 1: now between his powerful teeth. For all the world I
- 2:34:28Speaker 1: was led like a dancing bear. The other men were
- 2:34:32Speaker 1: variously burdened, some carrying picks and shovels, for that had
- 2:34:36Speaker 1: been the very first necessary They brought ashore from the hispaniola,
- 2:34:40Speaker 1: others laden with pork, bread and brandy for the midday meal.
- 2:34:45Speaker 1: All the stores I observed came from our stock. I
- 2:34:49Speaker 1: could see the truth of Silver's words the night before.
- 2:34:52Speaker 1: Had he not struck a bargain with the doctor, he
- 2:34:55Speaker 1: and his mutineers, deserted by the ship, must have been
- 2:34:58Speaker 1: driven to subsist on clear water, and the proceeds of
- 2:35:02Speaker 1: their hunting water would have been little to their taste.
- 2:35:05Speaker 1: A sailor is not usually a good shot, and besides
- 2:35:09Speaker 1: all that, when they were so short of eatables, it
- 2:35:11Speaker 1: was not likely they would be very flush of powder. Well.
- 2:35:16Speaker 1: Thus equipped, we all set out, even the fellow with
- 2:35:19Speaker 1: the broken head, who should certainly have kept in shadow,
- 2:35:23Speaker 1: and straggled one after another to the beach where the
- 2:35:26Speaker 1: two gigs awaited us. Even these bore trace of the
- 2:35:30Speaker 1: drunken folly of the pirates, one in a broken thwart,
- 2:35:34Speaker 1: and both in their muddied and unbailed condition. Both were
- 2:35:38Speaker 1: to be carried along with us for the sake of safety,
- 2:35:41Speaker 1: and so, with our numbers divided between them, we set
- 2:35:45Speaker 1: forth upon the bosom of the anchorage. As we pulled across,
- 2:35:49Speaker 1: there was some discussion on the chart. The red cross
- 2:35:53Speaker 1: was of course far too large to be a guide,
- 2:35:56Speaker 1: and the terms of the note on the back, as
- 2:35:58Speaker 1: you will hear, admitted of some ambiguity they ran. The
- 2:36:04Speaker 1: reader may remember thus tall tree spyglass shoulder bearing a
- 2:36:09Speaker 1: point to the n of n N E skeleton island
- 2:36:14Speaker 1: e s E, and by e ten feet a tall
- 2:36:19Speaker 1: tree was thus the principal mark. Now right before us.
- 2:36:23Speaker 1: The anchorage was bounded by a plateau from two to
- 2:36:26Speaker 1: three hundred feet high, adjoining on the north and sloping
- 2:36:30Speaker 1: southern shoulder of the Spyglass, and rising again toward the
- 2:36:34Speaker 1: south into the rough cliffy eminence called the Mizzenmast Hill.
- 2:36:39Speaker 1: The top of the plateau was dotted thickly with pine
- 2:36:42Speaker 1: trees of varying height. Here and there one of a
- 2:36:46Speaker 1: different species rose forty or fifty feet clear above its neighbors.
- 2:36:51Speaker 1: And which of these was the particular tall tree of
- 2:36:54Speaker 1: Captain Flint could only be decided on the spot and
- 2:36:58Speaker 1: by the readings of the compass. Yet, although that was
- 2:37:02Speaker 1: the case, every man on board the boats had picked
- 2:37:05Speaker 1: a favorite of his own. Ere we were half way
- 2:37:08Speaker 1: over long John alone, shrugging his shoulders and bidding them
- 2:37:12Speaker 1: wait till they were there. We pulled easily, by Silver's
- 2:37:16Speaker 1: directions not to weary the hands prematurely, and after quite
- 2:37:21Speaker 1: a long passage, landed at the mouth of the second river,
- 2:37:24Speaker 1: that which runs down a woody cleft of the spyglass.
- 2:37:28Speaker 1: Thence bending to our left, we began to ascend the
- 2:37:31Speaker 1: slope towards the plateau. At the very outset, heavy miry
- 2:37:36Speaker 1: ground and a matted marsh vegetation greatly delayed our progress.
- 2:37:42Speaker 1: But by little and little the hill began to steepen
- 2:37:46Speaker 1: and become stony under foot, and the wood to change
- 2:37:49Speaker 1: its character and to grow in a more open order.
- 2:37:53Speaker 1: It was indeed a most pleasant portion of the island
- 2:37:56Speaker 1: that we were now approaching. A heavy scented broom, and
- 2:38:00Speaker 1: many flowering shrubs had almost taken the place of grass.
- 2:38:04Speaker 1: Thickets of green nutmeg trees were dotted here and there
- 2:38:08Speaker 1: with the red columns and the broad shadow of the pines,
- 2:38:11Speaker 1: and the first mingled their spice with the aroma of
- 2:38:14Speaker 1: the others. The air, besides, was fresh and stirring, and this,
- 2:38:18Speaker 1: under the sheer sunbeams, was a wonderful refreshment to our senses.
- 2:38:23Speaker 1: The party spread itself abroad in a fan shape, shouting
- 2:38:27Speaker 1: and leaping to and fro about the center, and a
- 2:38:31Speaker 1: good way behind the rest. Silver and I followed, I
- 2:38:35Speaker 1: tethered by my rope, he plowing with deep pants among
- 2:38:39Speaker 1: the sliding gravel from time to time. Indeed, I had
- 2:38:43Speaker 1: to lend him a hand, or he must have missed
- 2:38:45Speaker 1: his footing and fallen backward down the hill. We had
- 2:38:49Speaker 1: thus proceeded for about half a mile and were approaching
- 2:38:52Speaker 1: the brow of the plateau when the man upon the
- 2:38:55Speaker 1: farthest left began to cry aloud, as if in terror.
- 2:38:59Speaker 1: Shout after shout came from him, and the others began
- 2:39:02Speaker 1: to run in his direction. He can't have found the treasure,
- 2:39:07Speaker 1: said old Morgan, hurrying past us from the right, for
- 2:39:11Speaker 1: that's cleaner top. Indeed, as we found when we also
- 2:39:15Speaker 1: reached the spot, it was something very different at the
- 2:39:19Speaker 1: foot of a pretty big pine, and involved in deep creeper,
- 2:39:23Speaker 1: which had even partly lifted some of the smaller bones.
- 2:39:28Speaker 1: A human skeleton lay with a few shreds of clothing
- 2:39:32Speaker 1: on the ground. I believe a chill struck for a
- 2:39:36Speaker 1: moment to every heart. He was a seaman, said George Merry,
- 2:39:41Speaker 1: who bolder than the rest, had gone up close and
- 2:39:44Speaker 1: was examining the rags of clothing. Leastways, this is good
- 2:39:49Speaker 1: sea cloth, aye, aye, said silver like enough. You wouldn't
- 2:39:55Speaker 1: look to find a bishop here, I reckon, But what
- 2:40:00Speaker 1: sort of a ways that for bones to low? Tain't
- 2:40:03Speaker 1: in nature? Indeed, on a second glance, it seemed impossible
- 2:40:07Speaker 1: to fancy that the body was in a natural position
- 2:40:11Speaker 1: but for some disarray, the work perhaps of the birds
- 2:40:14Speaker 1: that had fed upon him, or the slow growing creeper
- 2:40:17Speaker 1: that had gradually enveloped his remains. The man lay perfectly straight,
- 2:40:22Speaker 1: his feet pointing in one direction, his hands raised above
- 2:40:26Speaker 1: his head like a diver's, pointing directly in the opposite.
- 2:40:31Speaker 1: I've taken a notion into my old numbskull, observed silver.
- 2:40:36Speaker 1: Here's the compass. There's the tip top point of skeleton,
- 2:40:41Speaker 1: oiland sticking out like a tooth. Just take a bearing
- 2:40:46Speaker 1: will yer along the line, and then bones. It was done.
- 2:40:51Speaker 1: The body pointed straight in the direction of the island,
- 2:40:55Speaker 1: and the compass read duly east southeast by east, I thought,
- 2:41:02Speaker 1: so cried the cook. This here is a pointer. Right
- 2:41:07Speaker 1: up there is our loin for the pole star and
- 2:41:10Speaker 1: the jolly dollars by boy thunder. If it don't make
- 2:41:15Speaker 1: me cold inside to think of flint, this is one
- 2:41:20Speaker 1: of his jokes, And no mistake him in these six
- 2:41:24Speaker 1: was alone here he killed them, every man, and this
- 2:41:28Speaker 1: one he all here and laid down by the compass, shivering.
- 2:41:31Speaker 1: My timbers, their long bones, and air's been yellow. Aye,
- 2:41:38Speaker 1: that would be allered. Dice you mind aler, dice Tom Morgan? Aye, Aye,
- 2:41:46Speaker 1: returned Morgan. I mind him. He owed me money, he did,
- 2:41:51Speaker 1: and he took my knife ashore with him. Speaking of knives,
- 2:41:55Speaker 1: said another, Why don't we find he isn't lying around?
- 2:41:59Speaker 1: Flint the man to pick a seaman's pocket. And the birds,
- 2:42:03Speaker 1: I guess would leave it be bye, they're pourrs, And
- 2:42:07Speaker 1: that's true, cried Silver. There ain't a thing left here,
- 2:42:12Speaker 1: said Mary, still feeling round among the bones. Not a
- 2:42:15Speaker 1: copper doit, nor a backy box. It don't look natural
- 2:42:20Speaker 1: to me. No, boy, gomet don't agreed. Silver not natural
- 2:42:27Speaker 1: nor not nice, says you, great guns mess meats. But
- 2:42:32Speaker 1: if Flint was living, this would be a hot spot
- 2:42:35Speaker 1: for you and me. Six they were, and six are
- 2:42:38Speaker 1: a wee and bones is what they are now. I
- 2:42:42Speaker 1: saw him dead with these here, deadlights, said Morgan. Billy
- 2:42:47Speaker 1: took me in there he laid with penny pieces on
- 2:42:51Speaker 1: his eyes. Dead. Ay, sure enough he's dead, had gone below,
- 2:42:57Speaker 1: said the fellow with the bandage. But if ever spirit walked,
- 2:43:00Speaker 1: it would be Flint's dear harbor. He died bad, did
- 2:43:04Speaker 1: Flint aye that he did observed another? Now we raged,
- 2:43:10Speaker 1: and now he hollered for the rum, and now he sang.
- 2:43:13Speaker 1: Fifteen men were his only song mates. And I tell
- 2:43:17Speaker 1: you true, I never rightly liked to hear it, since
- 2:43:21Speaker 1: it was may not and the windy was open. And
- 2:43:24Speaker 1: I hear that old song are coming out as clear
- 2:43:27Speaker 1: as clear, and the death haul on the man already
- 2:43:32Speaker 1: come come, said Silver stole this tark. He's dead, and
- 2:43:38Speaker 1: he don't walk that I know, least the ways he
- 2:43:42Speaker 1: won't walk by day. You made later that care killed
- 2:43:46Speaker 1: a cat. Fetch a head for the do bloons. We started, certainly,
- 2:43:51Speaker 1: But in spite of the hot sun and the staring daylight,
- 2:43:55Speaker 1: the pirates no longer ran separate and shouting through the wood,
- 2:43:59Speaker 1: but kept side by side and spoke with bated breath.
- 2:44:03Speaker 1: The terror of the dead buccaneer had fallen on their spirits.
- 2:44:09Speaker 1: End of chapter thirty one. Chapter thirty two, the treasure
- 2:44:16Speaker 1: hunt the voice among the trees, partly from the damping
- 2:44:22Speaker 1: influence of this alarm, partly to rest Silver and the
- 2:44:25Speaker 1: sick folk. The whole party sat down as soon as
- 2:44:29Speaker 1: they had gained the brow of the ascent, the plateau
- 2:44:32Speaker 1: being somewhat tilted toward the west. This spot on which
- 2:44:36Speaker 1: we had paused, commanded a wide prospect on either hand
- 2:44:40Speaker 1: before us. Over the treetops, we held the cape of
- 2:44:43Speaker 1: the woods, fringed with surf. Behind. We not only looked
- 2:44:48Speaker 1: down upon the anchorage and Skeleton Island, but saw clear
- 2:44:51Speaker 1: across the spit and the eastern lowlands a great field
- 2:44:55Speaker 1: of open sea. Upon the east sheer. Above us rose
- 2:45:00Speaker 1: the spyglass, here dotted with single pines, there black with precipices.
- 2:45:06Speaker 1: There was no sound but that of the distant breakers
- 2:45:09Speaker 1: mounting from all around, and the chirp of countless insects
- 2:45:14Speaker 1: in the brush. Not a man, not a sail on
- 2:45:17Speaker 1: the sea. The very largeness of the view increased the
- 2:45:21Speaker 1: sense of solitude. Silver, as he sat, took certain bearings
- 2:45:27Speaker 1: with his compass. There are three tall trees, said he
- 2:45:32Speaker 1: about in the right lome from Skeleton Neyland spy glass shoulder.
- 2:45:38Speaker 1: I take it means that lure point there. It's child's play,
- 2:45:43Speaker 1: a foind the stuff. Now, if half a mind to
- 2:45:46Speaker 1: dine first, I don't feel sharp, growled Morgan, thinking a flint.
- 2:45:53Speaker 1: I think it were as done me. Well, MYI, sir,
- 2:45:58Speaker 1: you praise your stars. He's dead, said Silver. He was
- 2:46:03Speaker 1: an ugly devil, cried a third pirate with a shudder.
- 2:46:07Speaker 1: That blue in the face too, That was how the
- 2:46:11Speaker 1: rum took him, added merry Blue. Whoa, I reckon, he
- 2:46:15Speaker 1: was blue. That's a true word. Ever since they had
- 2:46:19Speaker 1: found the skeleton and got upon this train of thought,
- 2:46:22Speaker 1: they had spoken lower and lower, and they had almost
- 2:46:26Speaker 1: got to whispering by now, so that the sound of
- 2:46:29Speaker 1: their talk hardly interrupted the silence of the wood. All
- 2:46:33Speaker 1: of a sudden, out of the middle of the trees
- 2:46:36Speaker 1: in front of us, a thin, high, trembling voice struck
- 2:46:41Speaker 1: up the well known air and words, fifty men on
- 2:46:46Speaker 1: the dead man's chest, Yo, ho ho, and about twelve rum.
- 2:46:53Speaker 1: I never have seen men more dreadfully affected than the pirates.
- 2:46:58Speaker 1: The color went from their six feet faces like enchantment.
- 2:47:01Speaker 1: Some leaped to their feet, some clawed hold of others.
- 2:47:05Speaker 1: Morgan groveled on the ground. It flint pie, cried Mary.
- 2:47:11Speaker 1: The song had stopped as suddenly as it began broken off.
- 2:47:16Speaker 1: You would have said, in the middle of a note,
- 2:47:18Speaker 1: as though someone had laid his hand upon the singer's mouth.
- 2:47:22Speaker 1: Coming so far through the clear and sunny atmosphere among
- 2:47:26Speaker 1: the green tree tops, I thought it had sounded airily
- 2:47:29Speaker 1: and sweetly. And the effect on my companions was the
- 2:47:32Speaker 1: stranger come, said silver, struggling with his ashen lips to
- 2:47:38Speaker 1: get the word out. That won't do stand by to
- 2:47:41Speaker 1: go a belt. This is a room star. And I
- 2:47:44Speaker 1: can't name the voice, but it's someone's skylarkin, someone that's
- 2:47:50Speaker 1: flesh and blurred, and you may laid to that. His
- 2:47:54Speaker 1: courage had come back as he spoke, and some of
- 2:47:56Speaker 1: the color to his face along with it. All Ready
- 2:48:00Speaker 1: the others had began to lend an ear to this encouragement,
- 2:48:03Speaker 1: and were coming a little to themselves when the same
- 2:48:06Speaker 1: voice broke out again, not this time singing, but in
- 2:48:10Speaker 1: a faint, distant hail that echoed yet fainter among the
- 2:48:15Speaker 1: clefts of the spyglass. Darby McGraw. It wailed, for that
- 2:48:22Speaker 1: is the word that best describes the sound, Darby McGraw,
- 2:48:27Speaker 1: Darby mgral, again and again and again, and then rising
- 2:48:32Speaker 1: a little higher, and with an oath that I leave
- 2:48:35Speaker 1: out fetch half the rum Darby. The buccaneers remained rooted
- 2:48:40Speaker 1: to the ground, their eyes starting from their heads. Long
- 2:48:44Speaker 1: after the voice had died away, they still stared in silence,
- 2:48:49Speaker 1: dreadfully before them. That fixes it, gasped one. Let's go.
- 2:48:55Speaker 1: They was his last words, moaned Morgan, his last words
- 2:49:00Speaker 1: above Bold Dick had his bible out and was praying volubly.
- 2:49:05Speaker 1: He had been well brought up, had Dick. Before he
- 2:49:07Speaker 1: had come to sea and fell among bad companions. Still
- 2:49:11Speaker 1: silver was unconquered. I could hear his teeth rattle in
- 2:49:15Speaker 1: his head, but he had not surrendered. Nobody in this
- 2:49:19Speaker 1: ere island ever heard of Daby. He muttered, not one
- 2:49:23Speaker 1: but us that's here, And then making a great effort. Shipmates,
- 2:49:29Speaker 1: he cried, Oh, I'm here to get that stuff, and
- 2:49:32Speaker 1: I'll not be beat by man nor devil. I never
- 2:49:36Speaker 1: was feared of flint in his life, and by their powers,
- 2:49:39Speaker 1: I'll face him dead. There's seven hundred thousand pounds, not
- 2:49:44Speaker 1: a quarter of a mile from here. When did ever
- 2:49:47Speaker 1: a gentleman of fortune show his stirr into that much
- 2:49:50Speaker 1: dollars for a boozy old seaman with a blue mug,
- 2:49:54Speaker 1: and him dead too, But there was no sign of
- 2:49:57Speaker 1: reawakening courage in his followers, rather indeed of growing terror
- 2:50:02Speaker 1: at the irreverence of his words. Belay there, John said, Mary,
- 2:50:07Speaker 1: don't you cross a spirit? And the rest were all
- 2:50:10Speaker 1: too terrified to reply. They would have run away severally
- 2:50:14Speaker 1: had they dared, but fear kept them together and kept
- 2:50:17Speaker 1: them close to John. As if his daring helped them, He,
- 2:50:21Speaker 1: on his part, had pretty well fought his weakness down.
- 2:50:26Speaker 1: Spirit wah, maybe, he said, But there's one thing not
- 2:50:31Speaker 1: clearer than me. There was an echo. No, no mine
- 2:50:36Speaker 1: ever seen a spirit wear shadow? Well then was he
- 2:50:40Speaker 1: doing with an echo? To whom I should like to know? That?
- 2:50:44Speaker 1: A inneature charly This argument seemed weak enough to me,
- 2:50:50Speaker 1: but you can never tell what will affect the superstitious.
- 2:50:53Speaker 1: And to my worry, George Merry was greatly relieved. Well,
- 2:50:59Speaker 1: that's so, he said, you've had upon your shoulders, John,
- 2:51:03Speaker 1: And no mistake bout ship mates. This here crew is
- 2:51:08Speaker 1: on a wrong tack. I do believe, and you come
- 2:51:11Speaker 1: to think on it. It was like Flint's voice, I
- 2:51:14Speaker 1: grant you, but not just so clear away like it.
- 2:51:19Speaker 1: After all, it was like somebody else's voice now it
- 2:51:23Speaker 1: was like a boy the powrors. Ben Gunn roared Silver, Ah,
- 2:51:31Speaker 1: and so it were, cried Morgan, springing on his knees.
- 2:51:36Speaker 3: Ben Gunn, it were. It don't make much odds, do it, now,
- 2:51:40Speaker 3: asked Dick. Ben Gunn's not hearing the body anymore of flint.
- 2:51:45Speaker 3: But the older hands greeted this remark with scorn. Why
- 2:51:50Speaker 3: nobody minds? Ben Gunn cried Mary, dead or alive? Nobody
- 2:51:55Speaker 3: minds him. It was extraordinary how their spirits had returned,
- 2:52:00Speaker 3: and how the natural color had revived in their faces.
- 2:52:04Speaker 3: Soon they were chatting together with intervals of listening, and
- 2:52:08Speaker 3: not long after, hearing no further sound, they shouldered the
- 2:52:12Speaker 3: tools and set forth again, Mary walking first with Silver's
- 2:52:16Speaker 3: compass to keep them on the right line with Skeleton Island.
- 2:52:20Speaker 3: He had said the truth. Dead or alive, nobody minded
- 2:52:24Speaker 3: ben Gunn. Dick alone still held his Bible and looked
- 2:52:29Speaker 3: around him as he went with fearful glances. But he
- 2:52:33Speaker 3: found no sympathy, and Silver even joked him on his precautions.
- 2:52:38Speaker 1: Oh he told you, said he, Oh he told you
- 2:52:41Speaker 1: you had spoiled your boyble. If it ain't no good
- 2:52:44Speaker 1: to swear, boy, what you suppose a spirit will give
- 2:52:48Speaker 1: for it not that, And he snapped his big fingers,
- 2:52:52Speaker 1: halting a moment on his crutch. But Dick was not
- 2:52:55Speaker 1: to be comforted. Indeed, it was soon plain to me
- 2:52:59Speaker 1: that the lad was foralling sick, hastened by heat, exhaustion,
- 2:53:03Speaker 1: and the shock of his alarm. The fever predicted by
- 2:53:07Speaker 1: doctor Livesey was evidently growing swiftly higher. It was fine
- 2:53:12Speaker 1: open walking here upon the summit. Our way lay a
- 2:53:15Speaker 1: little down hill, for as I have said, the plateau
- 2:53:19Speaker 1: tilted toward the west. The pines great and small, grew
- 2:53:23Speaker 1: wide apart, and even between the clumps of nutmeg and azalea,
- 2:53:28Speaker 1: wide open spaces baked in the hot sunshine, Striking as
- 2:53:32Speaker 1: we did pretty near northwest across the island. We drew,
- 2:53:36Speaker 1: on the one hand, even nearer under the shoulders of
- 2:53:39Speaker 1: the spyglass, and on the other looked even wider over
- 2:53:43Speaker 1: that western bay where I had once tossed and trembled
- 2:53:46Speaker 1: in the coracle. The first of the tall trees was reached,
- 2:53:50Speaker 1: and by the bearing proved the wrong one. So with
- 2:53:54Speaker 1: the second and the third, rose nearly two hundred feet
- 2:53:58Speaker 1: into the air above a clump of un underwood, a
- 2:54:01Speaker 1: giant of a vegetable, with a red column as big
- 2:54:04Speaker 1: as a cottage, and a wide shadow around in which
- 2:54:07Speaker 1: a company could have maneuvered. It was conspicuous far to sea,
- 2:54:12Speaker 1: both on the east and west, and might have been
- 2:54:16Speaker 1: entered as a sailing mark upon the chart. But it
- 2:54:19Speaker 1: was not its size that now impressed my companions. It
- 2:54:23Speaker 1: was the knowledge that seven hundred thousand pounds in gold
- 2:54:27Speaker 1: lay somewhere buried below its spreading shadow. The thought of
- 2:54:32Speaker 1: the money, as they drew nearer, swallowed up their previous terrors.
- 2:54:37Speaker 1: Their eyes burned in their heads, their feet grew speedier
- 2:54:41Speaker 1: and lighter. Their whole soul was bound up in that fortune,
- 2:54:46Speaker 1: that whole lifetime of extravagance and pleasure that lay awaiting
- 2:54:51Speaker 1: there for each of them. Silver hobbled, grunting on his crutch.
- 2:54:57Speaker 1: His nostrils stood out and quivered. He curved stuck a madman.
- 2:55:01Speaker 1: When the flies settled on his hot and shiny countenance.
- 2:55:04Speaker 1: He plucked furiously at the lion that held me to him,
- 2:55:08Speaker 1: and from time to time turned his eyes upon me
- 2:55:12Speaker 1: with a deadly look. Certainly, he took no pains to
- 2:55:15Speaker 1: hide his thoughts and certainly I read them like print.
- 2:55:20Speaker 1: In the immediate nearness of the gold, all else had
- 2:55:23Speaker 1: been forgotten. His promise and the doctor's warning were both
- 2:55:27Speaker 1: things of the past, and I could not doubt that
- 2:55:30Speaker 1: he hoped to seize upon the treasure find and bored
- 2:55:34Speaker 1: the hispaniola under cover of night, cut every honest throat
- 2:55:38Speaker 1: about that island, and sail away as he had first intended.
- 2:55:43Speaker 1: Laden with crimes and riches. Shaken as I was with
- 2:55:47Speaker 1: these alarms, it was hard for me to keep up
- 2:55:50Speaker 1: with the rapid race of the treasure hunters. Now and
- 2:55:54Speaker 1: again I stumbled, And it was then that Silver plucked
- 2:55:57Speaker 1: so roughly at the rope and launched it me his
- 2:56:00Speaker 1: murderous glances. Dick, who had dropped behind us and now
- 2:56:05Speaker 1: brought up the rear, was babbling to himself both prayers
- 2:56:08Speaker 1: and curses, as his fever kept rising. This also added
- 2:56:13Speaker 1: to my wretchedness and to crown all. I was haunted
- 2:56:17Speaker 1: by the thought of the tragedy that had once been
- 2:56:19Speaker 1: acted on that plateau, When that ungodly buccaneer with the
- 2:56:23Speaker 1: blue face, he who had died at Savannah singing and
- 2:56:27Speaker 1: shouting for drink, had there with his own hand cut
- 2:56:30Speaker 1: down his six accomplices. This grove that was now so peaceful,
- 2:56:36Speaker 1: must have rung with cries, I thought, And even with
- 2:56:39Speaker 1: the thought, I could believe I heard it ringing. Still.
- 2:56:44Speaker 1: We were now at the margin of the thicket. Huzzah.
- 2:56:47Speaker 1: Mates altogether shouted merry, and the foremost broke into a run,
- 2:56:53Speaker 1: and suddenly, not ten yards farther we beheld them stop.
- 2:56:58Speaker 1: A low cry arose. Silver doubled his pace, digging away
- 2:57:02Speaker 1: with the foot of his crutch, like one possessed, And
- 2:57:05Speaker 1: the next moment he and I had come also to
- 2:57:08Speaker 1: a dead halt. Before us was a great excavation, not
- 2:57:13Speaker 1: very recent, for the sides had fallen in and grass
- 2:57:17Speaker 1: had sprouted on the bottom. In this were the shaft
- 2:57:20Speaker 1: of a pick broken in two, and the boards of
- 2:57:23Speaker 1: several packing cases strewn around. On one of these boards
- 2:57:27Speaker 1: I saw branded with a hot iron, the name Walrus,
- 2:57:31Speaker 1: the name of Flint's ship. All was clear to probation.
- 2:57:35Speaker 1: The cash had been found and rifled, the seven hundred
- 2:57:39Speaker 1: thousand pounds were gone, And of chapter thirty two Chapter
- 2:57:46Speaker 1: thirty three, The Fall of a Chieftain, there never was
- 2:57:51Speaker 1: such an overturn in this world. All of these six men,
- 2:57:56Speaker 1: was as through as he had been struck, but with
- 2:57:59Speaker 1: silver the blow passed almost instantly. Every thought of his
- 2:58:04Speaker 1: soul had been set full stretch, like a racer on
- 2:58:07Speaker 1: that money. Well, he was brought up in a single
- 2:58:10Speaker 1: second dead, and he kept his head, found his temper,
- 2:58:15Speaker 1: and changed his plan before the others had had time
- 2:58:18Speaker 1: to realize the disappointment. Jim, he whispered, take that, and
- 2:58:24Speaker 1: stand boy for trouble. And he passed me a double
- 2:58:27Speaker 1: barreled pistol. At the same time he began quietly moving northward,
- 2:58:33Speaker 1: and in a few steps had put the hollow between
- 2:58:36Speaker 1: us two and the other five. Then he looked at
- 2:58:38Speaker 1: me and nodded as much as to say, here is
- 2:58:41Speaker 1: a narrow corner. As indeed I thought it was. His
- 2:58:46Speaker 1: looks were now quite friendly, and I was so revolted
- 2:58:50Speaker 1: at these constant changes that I could not forbear whispering,
- 2:58:53Speaker 1: so you've changed sides again. There was no time left
- 2:58:57Speaker 1: for him to answer. In the buccaneer, with oaths and cries,
- 2:59:01Speaker 1: began to leap one after another into the pit, and
- 2:59:05Speaker 1: to dig with their fingers, throwing the boards aside as
- 2:59:08Speaker 1: they did so, Morgan found a piece of gold. He
- 2:59:12Speaker 1: held it up with a perfect spout of oaths. It
- 2:59:15Speaker 1: was a two guinea piece, and it went from hand
- 2:59:18Speaker 1: to hand among them for a quarter of a minute.
- 2:59:22Speaker 1: Two guineas, roared Mary, shaking it at Silver. That's your
- 2:59:27Speaker 1: seven hundred thousand pounds, is it? You're the man for bargains,
- 2:59:32Speaker 1: ain't you? You're him that never bungled nothing, You wooden
- 2:59:36Speaker 1: headed lubber dagg away boys, said Silver, with the coolest insolence.
- 2:59:43Speaker 1: Y'a'll find some pig nuts. I shouldn't wonder pig nuts,
- 2:59:49Speaker 1: repeated Mary in a scream. Mates, do you hear that?
- 2:59:53Speaker 1: I tell you now? That man there knew it all along.
- 2:59:58Speaker 1: Look in the face of him, and your see it
- 3:00:00Speaker 1: wrote there ah, Mary remarked, Silver, stand if a cut again?
- 3:00:08Speaker 1: You're a pushin lad, to be sure. But this time
- 3:00:12Speaker 1: every one was entirely in Mary's favor. They began to
- 3:00:17Speaker 1: scramble out of the excavation, darting furious glances behind them.
- 3:00:22Speaker 1: One thing I observed which looked well for us. They
- 3:00:25Speaker 1: all got out upon the opposite side from Silver. Well,
- 3:00:30Speaker 1: there we stood two on one side, five on the other.
- 3:00:34Speaker 1: The pit between us and nobody screwed up high enough
- 3:00:37Speaker 1: to offer the first blow. Silver never moved. He watched
- 3:00:42Speaker 1: them very upright on his crutch and looked as cool
- 3:00:46Speaker 1: as ever I saw him. He was brave and no mistake.
- 3:00:51Speaker 1: At last, Mary seemed to think a speech might help matters. Mates,
- 3:00:55Speaker 1: said he there's two of them alone here. One's the
- 3:00:59Speaker 1: other cripple that brought us all here and blundered us
- 3:01:03Speaker 1: down to this. The others that cub that I mean
- 3:01:07Speaker 1: to have the heart of now. Mates. He was raising
- 3:01:11Speaker 1: his arm and his voice and plainly meant to lead
- 3:01:14Speaker 1: a charge, But just then, crack, crack, crack, three musket
- 3:01:19Speaker 1: shots flashed out of the thicket. Merry tumbled head foremost
- 3:01:24Speaker 1: into the excavation. The man with the bandage spun round
- 3:01:28Speaker 1: like a teetotem and fell all his length upon his side,
- 3:01:32Speaker 1: where he lay dead but still twitching, and the other
- 3:01:35Speaker 1: three turned and ran for it with all their might.
- 3:01:39Speaker 1: Before you could wink long, John fired two barrels of
- 3:01:43Speaker 1: a pistol into the struggling Merry, and as the man
- 3:01:46Speaker 1: rolled up his eyes at him in the last agony,
- 3:01:50Speaker 1: George said, he, I reck I selled you. In the
- 3:01:56Speaker 1: same moment, the doctor Gray and Ben Gunn joined us
- 3:01:59Speaker 1: with smoaking muskets from among the nutmeg trees. Forward, cried
- 3:02:05Speaker 1: the doctor double quick by, lads, we must head him
- 3:02:09Speaker 1: off the boats. And we set off at a great pace,
- 3:02:13Speaker 1: sometimes plunging through the bushes to the chest. I tell you,
- 3:02:17Speaker 1: but Silver was anxious to keep up with us. The
- 3:02:20Speaker 1: work that man went through, leaping on his crutch till
- 3:02:24Speaker 1: the muscles of his chest were fit to burst, was
- 3:02:28Speaker 1: work no sound man ever equalled. And so thinks the doctor.
- 3:02:33Speaker 1: As it was, he was already thirty yards behind us
- 3:02:37Speaker 1: and on the verge of strangling. When we reached the
- 3:02:40Speaker 1: brow of the slope, Doctor, he hailed, see the no hurry.
- 3:02:47Speaker 1: Sure enough there was no hurry. In a more open
- 3:02:51Speaker 1: part of the plateau, we could see the three survivors
- 3:02:54Speaker 1: still running in the same direction as they had started,
- 3:02:58Speaker 1: right for Middenmast Hill. We were already between them and
- 3:03:02Speaker 1: the boats, and so we four sat down to breathe,
- 3:03:05Speaker 1: while long John, mopping his face, came slowly up with us.
- 3:03:09Speaker 1: Thank ye, kindly, doctor, says he. You came in in
- 3:03:14Speaker 1: about the nick, I guess from me and Arkins, and
- 3:03:18Speaker 1: so it's you Ben Gunn. He added, well, You're a
- 3:03:23Speaker 1: nice one, to be sure. I'm Ben Gunn, I am,
- 3:03:28Speaker 1: replied the Maroon, wriggling like an eel in his embarrassment,
- 3:03:32Speaker 1: and he added, after a long pause, how do mister
- 3:03:36Speaker 1: Silver pretty well? I think you, says you. Ben Ben
- 3:03:42Speaker 1: murmured Silver to think as you've done me. The doctor
- 3:03:48Speaker 1: sent back Gray for one of the pickaxes deserted in
- 3:03:51Speaker 1: their flight by the mutineers, and then, as we proceeded
- 3:03:55Speaker 1: leisurely downhill to where the boats were lying, related in
- 3:03:59Speaker 1: a few words what had taken place. It was a
- 3:04:02Speaker 1: story that profoundly interested Silver, and Ben Gunn, the half
- 3:04:07Speaker 1: idiot Maroon, was the hero from beginning to end. Ben,
- 3:04:11Speaker 1: in his long lonely wanderings about the island, had found
- 3:04:15Speaker 1: the skeleton. It was he that had rifled it. He
- 3:04:19Speaker 1: had found the treasure, He had dug it up. It
- 3:04:22Speaker 1: was the haft of his pickaxe that lay broken in
- 3:04:24Speaker 1: the excavation. He had carried it on his back in
- 3:04:28Speaker 1: many weary journeys from the foot of the tall Pine
- 3:04:32Speaker 1: to a cave he had on the two pointed hill
- 3:04:35Speaker 1: at the northeast angle of the island, and there it
- 3:04:38Speaker 1: had lain stored in safety since two months before the
- 3:04:41Speaker 1: arrival of the Hispaniola, when the doctor had wormed the
- 3:04:45Speaker 1: secret from him on the afternoon of the attack, and
- 3:04:48Speaker 1: when next morning he saw the anchorage deserted, he had
- 3:04:51Speaker 1: gone to Silver, given him the chart which was now useless,
- 3:04:55Speaker 1: given him the stores for ben Gunn's cave was well supplied,
- 3:04:59Speaker 1: with the goat's meat salted by himself, given anything and
- 3:05:03Speaker 1: everything to get a chance of moving in safety from
- 3:05:06Speaker 1: the stockade to the two pointed hill, there to be
- 3:05:10Speaker 1: clear of malaria and keep a guard upon the money.
- 3:05:14Speaker 1: As for you, Jim, he said, it went against my heart,
- 3:05:19Speaker 1: but I did what I thought best for those who
- 3:05:21Speaker 1: had stood by their duty. And if you were not
- 3:05:24Speaker 1: one of these, whose fault was it? That morning, finding
- 3:05:28Speaker 1: that I was to be involved in the horrid disappointment
- 3:05:31Speaker 1: he had prepared for the mutineers, he had run all
- 3:05:34Speaker 1: the way to the cave, and, leaving squire to guard,
- 3:05:37Speaker 1: the captain, had taken Gray and the maroon and started
- 3:05:41Speaker 1: making the diagonal across the island to be at hand
- 3:05:44Speaker 1: beside the pine. Soon, however, he saw that our party
- 3:05:48Speaker 1: had the start of him, and ben Gunn, being fleet
- 3:05:51Speaker 1: of foot, had been dispatched in front to do his
- 3:05:55Speaker 1: best alone. Then it had occurred to him to work
- 3:05:58Speaker 1: upon the superstitions of his former shipmates, and he was
- 3:06:02Speaker 1: so far successful that Gray and the Doctor had come
- 3:06:05Speaker 1: up and were already ambushed before the arrival of the
- 3:06:08Speaker 1: treasure hunters. Ah said Silver, it was farch in it
- 3:06:14Speaker 1: for me that I had Hearken's ear. You would have
- 3:06:17Speaker 1: let old lung John be cut to bits, and never
- 3:06:21Speaker 1: a thought, Doctor, not a thought, replied Doctor Livesey cheerily.
- 3:06:27Speaker 1: And by this time we had reached the gigs. The
- 3:06:30Speaker 1: doctor with the pickaxe demolished one of them. Then we
- 3:06:34Speaker 1: all got aboard the other and set out to go
- 3:06:36Speaker 1: round by the sea for north Inlet. This was a
- 3:06:40Speaker 1: run of eight or nine miles. Silver, though he was
- 3:06:44Speaker 1: almost killed already with fatigue, was set to an oar
- 3:06:47Speaker 1: like the rest of us, and we were soon skimming
- 3:06:50Speaker 1: swiftly over a smooth sea. Soon we passed out of
- 3:06:54Speaker 1: the straits and doubled the southeast corner of the island,
- 3:06:58Speaker 1: round which four days ago we towed the Hispaniola. As
- 3:07:02Speaker 1: we passed the two pointed Hill, we could see the
- 3:07:05Speaker 1: black mouth of ben Gunn's cave, and a figure standing
- 3:07:09Speaker 1: by it, leaning on a musket. It was the Squire,
- 3:07:13Speaker 1: and we waved a handkerchief and gave him three cheers,
- 3:07:16Speaker 1: in which the voice of Silver joined as heartily as
- 3:07:19Speaker 1: any Three miles farther. Just inside the mouth of north Inlet,
- 3:07:24Speaker 1: what should we meet but the Hispaniola, cruising by herself.
- 3:07:29Speaker 1: The last flood had lifted her, and had there been
- 3:07:32Speaker 1: much wind or a strong tide current, as in the
- 3:07:35Speaker 1: southern anchorage, we should never have found her more, or
- 3:07:39Speaker 1: found her stranded beyond help. As it was, there was
- 3:07:42Speaker 1: little a miss beyond the wreck of the mainsail. Another
- 3:07:45Speaker 1: anchor was got ready and dropped in a fathom and
- 3:07:48Speaker 1: a half of water. We all pulled round to rum Cove,
- 3:07:52Speaker 1: the nearest point for Ben Gunn's treasure house. Then Gray,
- 3:07:56Speaker 1: single handed, returned with the gig to the Hispaniola, where
- 3:07:59Speaker 1: he was to pass the night on guard. A gentle
- 3:08:03Speaker 1: slope ran up from the beach to the entrance of
- 3:08:05Speaker 1: the cave. At the top, the Squire met us to me.
- 3:08:09Speaker 1: He was cordial and kind, saying nothing of my escapade
- 3:08:13Speaker 1: either in the way of blame or praise. At Silver's
- 3:08:17Speaker 1: polite salute, he somewhat flushed John Silver. He said, you're
- 3:08:22Speaker 1: a prodigious villain and impostor, a monstrous impostor, Sir, I
- 3:08:27Speaker 1: am told, I am not to prosecute you. Well, then
- 3:08:30Speaker 1: I will not. But the dead men, sir, hang about
- 3:08:34Speaker 1: your neck like Millstone's. Thank you kindly, sir, replied Long
- 3:08:39Speaker 1: John again, saluting, how dare you thank me? Cried the squire,
- 3:08:43Speaker 1: It is a gross dereliction of my duty. Stand back.
- 3:08:47Speaker 1: And thereupon we all entered the cave. It was a large,
- 3:08:51Speaker 1: airy place, with a little spring and a pool of
- 3:08:53Speaker 1: clear water, overhung with ferns. The floor was sand. Before
- 3:08:59Speaker 1: a big fire lay Captain Smollett, And in a far corner,
- 3:09:03Speaker 1: only duskily flitted over by the blaze, I beheld great
- 3:09:07Speaker 1: heaps of coin and quadrilaterals built of bars of gold.
- 3:09:13Speaker 1: That was Flint's treasure, that we had come so far
- 3:09:16Speaker 1: to seek, and that had cost already the lives of
- 3:09:19Speaker 1: seventeen men from the Hispaniola. How many it had cost
- 3:09:23Speaker 1: in the amassing? What blood and sorrow? What good ships
- 3:09:27Speaker 1: scuttled on the deep, What brave men walking the plank blindfold?
- 3:09:32Speaker 1: What shot of cannon? What shame and lies and cruelty?
- 3:09:36Speaker 1: Perhaps no man alive could tell. Yet there were still
- 3:09:41Speaker 1: three upon that island, Silver and Old Morgan and ben Gunn,
- 3:09:46Speaker 1: who had each taken his share in these crimes, as
- 3:09:50Speaker 1: each yet hoped in vain to share in the reward.
- 3:09:53Speaker 1: Come in, Jim, said the captain. You're a good boy
- 3:09:57Speaker 1: in your line. Jim, I don't think you and me'll
- 3:10:01Speaker 1: go to sea again. Your too much of the born
- 3:10:05Speaker 1: favorite for me is that you a john Silver? What
- 3:10:10Speaker 1: brings you here? Man? Come back to my duty, sir,
- 3:10:16Speaker 1: returned Silver. Oh, said the captain, And that was all
- 3:10:20Speaker 1: he said. What a supper I had of it that night,
- 3:10:24Speaker 1: with all my friends around me, And what a meal
- 3:10:27Speaker 1: it was, with ben Gunn's salted goat and some delicacies,
- 3:10:31Speaker 1: and a bottle of old wine from the Hispaniola. Never,
- 3:10:35Speaker 1: I am sure were people gayer or happier. And there
- 3:10:39Speaker 1: was Silver, sitting back, almost out of the firelight, but
- 3:10:43Speaker 1: eating heartily, prompt to spring forward when anything was wanted,
- 3:10:47Speaker 1: even joining quietly in our laughter. The same bland, obsequious
- 3:10:52Speaker 1: seamen of the voyage out end of chapter thirty three,
- 3:11:00Speaker 1: Chapter thirty four, and last the next morning we fell
- 3:11:05Speaker 1: early to work for the transportation of this great mass
- 3:11:09Speaker 1: of gold near a mile by land to the beach,
- 3:11:12Speaker 1: and thence three miles by boat to the Hispaniola was
- 3:11:16Speaker 1: a considerable task for so small a number of workmen.
- 3:11:20Speaker 1: The three fellows still abroad upon the island did not
- 3:11:23Speaker 1: greatly trouble us. A single century on the shoulder of
- 3:11:27Speaker 1: the hill was sufficient to ensure us against any sudden onslaught,
- 3:11:31Speaker 1: and we thought, besides they had had more than enough
- 3:11:34Speaker 1: of fighting. Therefore, the work was pushed on briskly. Gray
- 3:11:39Speaker 1: and ben Gunn came and went with the boat, while
- 3:11:42Speaker 1: the rest, during their absences, piled a treasure on the beach.
- 3:11:46Speaker 1: Two of the bars, slung in a rope's end, made
- 3:11:49Speaker 1: a good load for a grown man, one that he
- 3:11:53Speaker 1: was glad to walk slowly with. For my part, I
- 3:11:57Speaker 1: was not so much use at carrying. I was keret
- 3:12:00Speaker 1: busy all day in the cave packing the minted money
- 3:12:03Speaker 1: into bread bags. It was a strange collection, like billy
- 3:12:08Speaker 1: Bone's hoard for the diversity of coinage, but so much
- 3:12:12Speaker 1: larger and so much more varied than I think. I
- 3:12:16Speaker 1: never had more pleasure than in sorting them English, French, Spanish, Portuguese,
- 3:12:22Speaker 1: George's and Louise's to balloons and double guineas, and moire
- 3:12:27Speaker 1: doors and sequins, and pictures of all the kings of
- 3:12:30Speaker 1: Europe for the last one hundred years. Strange oriental pieces
- 3:12:35Speaker 1: stamped with what looked like wisps of string or bits
- 3:12:39Speaker 1: of spider's web, round pieces and square pieces, and pieces
- 3:12:43Speaker 1: bored through the middle, as if to wear them round
- 3:12:46Speaker 1: your neck. Nearly every variety of money in the world must,
- 3:12:50Speaker 1: I think, have found a place in that collection, And
- 3:12:54Speaker 1: for number I am sure they were like autumn leaves,
- 3:12:57Speaker 1: so that my back ached with stooping, and my fingers
- 3:13:01Speaker 1: with sorting them out. Day after day this work went on.
- 3:13:05Speaker 1: By every evening a fortune had been stowed aboard, but
- 3:13:09Speaker 1: there was another fortune waiting for the morrow. And all
- 3:13:13Speaker 1: this time we heard nothing of the three surviving mutineers.
- 3:13:18Speaker 1: At last, I think it was on the third night
- 3:13:21Speaker 1: the Doctor and I were strolling on the shoulder of
- 3:13:23Speaker 1: the hill where it overlooks the lowlands of the Isle,
- 3:13:26Speaker 1: when from out of the thick darkness below, the wind
- 3:13:29Speaker 1: brought us a noise between shrieking and singing. It was
- 3:13:33Speaker 1: only a snatch that reached our ears, followed by the
- 3:13:36Speaker 1: former silence Heaven forgive them, said the doctor Chos the mutineers,
- 3:13:43Speaker 1: all drunk, Sir struck in the voice of Silver from
- 3:13:47Speaker 1: behind us. Silver, I should say, was allowed his entire liberty, and,
- 3:13:51Speaker 1: in spite of daily rebuffs, seemed to regard himself once
- 3:13:55Speaker 1: more as quite a privileged and friendly dependent. Indeed, it
- 3:13:59Speaker 1: was remarkable how well he bore these slights, and with
- 3:14:03Speaker 1: what unwearying politeness he kept at trying to ingratiate himself
- 3:14:07Speaker 1: with all. Yet I think none treated him better than
- 3:14:11Speaker 1: a dog, unless it was ben Gunn, who was still
- 3:14:15Speaker 1: terribly afraid of his old quarter master, or myself, who
- 3:14:19Speaker 1: had really something to thank him for. Although for that matter,
- 3:14:23Speaker 1: I suppose I had reason to think even worse of
- 3:14:25Speaker 1: him than anybody else, for I had seen him meditating
- 3:14:29Speaker 1: a fresh treachery upon the plateau. Accordingly, it was pretty
- 3:14:34Speaker 1: gruffly that the doctor answered him. Drunk or raving said
- 3:14:38Speaker 1: he right, you were, sorrow, replied Silver, and precious let
- 3:14:43Speaker 1: lards witch to you and me. I suppose you would
- 3:14:47Speaker 1: hardly ask me to call you a humane man, returned
- 3:14:52Speaker 1: the doctor with a sneer. And so my feelings may
- 3:14:55Speaker 1: surprise you, Master Silver. But if I were sure they
- 3:14:59Speaker 1: were raving, as I am morally certain one at least
- 3:15:02Speaker 1: of them is down with fever. I should leave this
- 3:15:06Speaker 1: campad and whatever risked to my own caccas, take them
- 3:15:10Speaker 1: the assistance of my skill. Ask your pardon, sir. You
- 3:15:14Speaker 1: would be very wrong, quoth Silver. You would lose your
- 3:15:19Speaker 1: precious life, and you made late that. I'm on your
- 3:15:23Speaker 1: s now hand and glove, and I shouldn't wish for
- 3:15:27Speaker 1: it to see the party weakened, let alone yourself, seeing
- 3:15:32Speaker 1: as I know what I owes you. But these men
- 3:15:35Speaker 1: down there, they couldn't keep their word, no, not supposing
- 3:15:39Speaker 1: they wished to. And what's more, they couldn't believe as
- 3:15:43Speaker 1: you could. No, said the doctor. You're the man to
- 3:15:48Speaker 1: keep your word. We know that. Well. That was about
- 3:15:52Speaker 1: the last news we had of the three pirates. Only
- 3:15:56Speaker 1: once we heard a gunshot a great way off, and
- 3:15:59Speaker 1: suppose them to be hunting. A council was held and
- 3:16:02Speaker 1: it was decided that we must desert them on the island,
- 3:16:05Speaker 1: to the huge glee I must say of ben Gunn,
- 3:16:09Speaker 1: And with the strong approval of Gray, we left a
- 3:16:11Speaker 1: good stock of powder and shot the bulk of the
- 3:16:14Speaker 1: salt goat a few medicines, and some other necessities, tools, clothing,
- 3:16:20Speaker 1: a spare sail, a fathom or two of rope, and,
- 3:16:23Speaker 1: by the particular desire of the Doctor, a handsome present
- 3:16:27Speaker 1: of tobacco. That was about our last doing on the island.
- 3:16:31Speaker 1: Before that, we had got the treasure stowed, and had
- 3:16:34Speaker 1: shipped enough water and the remainder of the goat meat
- 3:16:37Speaker 1: in case of any distress. And at last, one fine
- 3:16:40Speaker 1: morning we weighed anchor, which was about all that we
- 3:16:44Speaker 1: could manage, and stood out of north Inlet, the same
- 3:16:48Speaker 1: colours flying that the captain had flown and fought under
- 3:16:51Speaker 1: at the palisade. The three fellows must have been watching
- 3:16:55Speaker 1: us closer than we thought, as we soon had proved
- 3:16:59Speaker 1: for coming through the narrows, we had to lie very
- 3:17:02Speaker 1: near the southern point, and there we saw all three
- 3:17:06Speaker 1: of them kneeling together on a spit of sand, with
- 3:17:09Speaker 1: their arms raised in supplication. It went to all our hearts,
- 3:17:13Speaker 1: I think, to leave them in that wretched state, but
- 3:17:17Speaker 1: we could not risk another mutiny, and to take them
- 3:17:20Speaker 1: home for the Gibbet would have been a cruel sort
- 3:17:22Speaker 1: of kindness. The Doctor hailed them and told them of
- 3:17:26Speaker 1: the stores we had left and where they were to
- 3:17:29Speaker 1: find them. But they continued to call us by name
- 3:17:32Speaker 1: and appeal to us for God's sake, to be merciful
- 3:17:35Speaker 1: and not to leave them to die in such a place.
- 3:17:39Speaker 1: At last, seeing the ship still bore on her course
- 3:17:42Speaker 1: and was now swiftly drawing out of earshot, one of them,
- 3:17:45Speaker 1: I know not which it was, leaped to his feet
- 3:17:48Speaker 1: with a hoarse cry, whipped his musket to his shoulder,
- 3:17:51Speaker 1: and sent a shot whistling over Silver's head and through
- 3:17:55Speaker 1: the mansil. After that we kept under cover of the bulwarks,
- 3:17:59Speaker 1: and when I looked out, they had disappeared from the spit,
- 3:18:03Speaker 1: and the spit itself had almost melted out of sight
- 3:18:06Speaker 1: in the growing distance. That was at least the end
- 3:18:09Speaker 1: of that, and before noon, to my inexpressionable joy, the
- 3:18:14Speaker 1: highest rock of Treasure Island had sunk into the blue
- 3:18:18Speaker 1: round of sea. We were so short of men that
- 3:18:21Speaker 1: everyone on board had to bear a hand, only the captain,
- 3:18:25Speaker 1: lying on a mattress in the stern, and giving his orders,
- 3:18:28Speaker 1: for though greatly recovered, he was still in want of quiet.
- 3:18:32Speaker 1: We laid her head for the nearest port in South America,
- 3:18:36Speaker 1: for we could not risk the voyage home without fresh hands,
- 3:18:40Speaker 1: and as it was, what with baffling winds and a
- 3:18:44Speaker 1: couple of fresh gales, we were all worn out before
- 3:18:47Speaker 1: we reached it. It was almost sundown when we cast
- 3:18:51Speaker 1: anchor in a most beautiful land locked gulf, and were
- 3:18:54Speaker 1: almost immediately surrounded by shore boats full of Negroes and
- 3:18:58Speaker 1: Mexican Indians and half bloods, selling fruits and vegetables and
- 3:19:02Speaker 1: offering to die for bits of money. The sight of
- 3:19:05Speaker 1: so many good humored faces, especially the blacks, the taste
- 3:19:09Speaker 1: of the tropical fruits, and above all the lights that
- 3:19:13Speaker 1: began to shine in the town made a most charming
- 3:19:16Speaker 1: contrast to our dark and bloody sojourn on the island.
- 3:19:21Speaker 1: And the doctor and the Squire, taking me along with them,
- 3:19:24Speaker 1: went ashore to pass the early part of the night.
- 3:19:28Speaker 1: Here they met the captain of an english man, O War,
- 3:19:31Speaker 1: fell in talk with him, went on board his ship,
- 3:19:34Speaker 1: and in short had so agreeable a time that day
- 3:19:37Speaker 1: was breaking when we came alongside the Hispaniola Ben Gunn
- 3:19:42Speaker 1: was on deck alone, and as soon as we came
- 3:19:45Speaker 1: on board, he began with wonderful contortions to make us
- 3:19:49Speaker 1: a confession. Silver was gone the maroon had connived at
- 3:19:54Speaker 1: his escape in a shore boat some hours ago, and
- 3:19:57Speaker 1: he now assured us that he had only done so
- 3:20:00Speaker 1: so to preserve our lives, which would certainly have been
- 3:20:03Speaker 1: forfeited if that man with the one leg had stayed
- 3:20:07Speaker 1: a bold. But this was not all. The sea cook
- 3:20:11Speaker 1: had not gone empty handed. He had cut through a
- 3:20:14Speaker 1: bulwark unobserved, and had removed one of the sacks of
- 3:20:17Speaker 1: coin worth perhaps three or four hundred guineas to help
- 3:20:21Speaker 1: him on his further wanderings. I think we were all
- 3:20:24Speaker 1: pleased to be so cheaply quit of him. Well, to
- 3:20:28Speaker 1: make a long story short, we got a few hands
- 3:20:31Speaker 1: on board, made a good cruise home, and the Hispaniola
- 3:20:35Speaker 1: reached Bristol just as mister Blandy was beginning to think
- 3:20:38Speaker 1: of fitting out her consort. Five men only of those
- 3:20:43Speaker 1: who sailed returned with her drink, and the devil had
- 3:20:47Speaker 1: done for the rest with a vengeance. Although to be sure,
- 3:20:51Speaker 1: we were not quite in so bad a case as
- 3:20:53Speaker 1: that other ship. They sung about with one man of
- 3:20:57Speaker 1: the crew alive, what put to sea with seventy five
- 3:21:02Speaker 1: All of us had an ample share of the treasure
- 3:21:05Speaker 1: and used it wisely or foolishly. According to our natures,
- 3:21:09Speaker 1: Captain Smollett is now retired from the sea. Gray not
- 3:21:12Speaker 1: only saved his money, but, being suddenly smit with the
- 3:21:16Speaker 1: desire to rise, also studied his profession. And he is
- 3:21:20Speaker 1: now mate and part owner of a fine full rigged ship,
- 3:21:24Speaker 1: married besides, and the father of a family. As for
- 3:21:28Speaker 1: Ben Gunn, he got a thousand pounds, which he spent
- 3:21:32Speaker 1: or lost in three weeks, or to be more exact,
- 3:21:35Speaker 1: in nineteen days, for he was back begging on the twentieth.
- 3:21:40Speaker 1: Then he was given a lodge to keep exactly as
- 3:21:43Speaker 1: he'd feared upon the island. And he still lives, a
- 3:21:46Speaker 1: great favorite, though something of a butt with the country boys,
- 3:21:50Speaker 1: and a notable singer in church on Sundays and Saints
- 3:21:53Speaker 1: Days of silver. We have heard no more. That formidable
- 3:21:59Speaker 1: seafaring man with one leg has at last gone clean
- 3:22:03Speaker 1: out of my life. But I dare say he met
- 3:22:07Speaker 1: his old Negress, and perhaps still lives in comfort with
- 3:22:11Speaker 1: her and Captain Flint. It is to be hoped, so
- 3:22:14Speaker 1: I suppose, for his chances of comfort in another world
- 3:22:17Speaker 1: are very small. The bar, silver and arms still lie,
- 3:22:22Speaker 1: for all that I know where Flint buried them, and
- 3:22:25Speaker 1: certainly they shall lie there. For me. Oxen and wain
- 3:22:29Speaker 1: ropes would not bring me back to that accursed island.
- 3:22:33Speaker 1: And the worst dreams that ever I have are when
- 3:22:36Speaker 1: I hear the surf booming about its coasts, or starting
- 3:22:40Speaker 1: up in bed, with the sharp voice of Captain Flint
- 3:22:43Speaker 1: still ringing in my ears. Peaces of eight, Peces of eight,
- 3:22:49Speaker 1: end of Chapter thirty three and end of Treasure Island