Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson (best ebook reader txt) 📗

was thus looking and wondering, in a calm

moment, when the ship was still, Israel Hands turned

partly round and with a low moan writhed himself back

to the position in which I had seen him first. The

moan, which told of pain and deadly weakness, and the

way in which his jaw hung open went right to my heart.

But when I remembered the talk I had overheard from the

apple barrel, all pity left me.

 

I walked aft until I reached the main-mast.

 

“Come aboard, Mr. Hands,” I said ironically.

 

He rolled his eyes round heavily, but he was too far

gone to express surprise. All he could do was to utter

one word, “Brandy.”

 

It occurred to me there was no time to lose, and dodging

the boom as it once more lurched across the deck, I

slipped aft and down the companion stairs into the cabin.

 

It was such a scene of confusion as you can hardly

fancy. All the lockfast places had been broken open in

quest of the chart. The floor was thick with mud where

ruffians had sat down to drink or consult after wading

in the marshes round their camp. The bulkheads, all

painted in clear white and beaded round with gilt, bore

a pattern of dirty hands. Dozens of empty bottles

clinked together in corners to the rolling of the ship.

One of the doctor’s medical books lay open on the

table, half of the leaves gutted out, I suppose, for

pipelights. In the midst of all this the lamp still

cast a smoky glow, obscure and brown as umber.

 

I went into the cellar; all the barrels were gone, and

of the bottles a most surprising number had been drunk

out and thrown away. Certainly, since the mutiny

began, not a man of them could ever have been sober.

 

Foraging about, I found a bottle with some brandy left,

for Hands; and for myself I routed out some biscuit,

some pickled fruits, a great bunch of raisins, and a

piece of cheese. With these I came on deck, put down

my own stock behind the rudder head and well out of the

coxswain’s reach, went forward to the water-breaker,

and had a good deep drink of water, and then, and not

till then, gave Hands the brandy.

 

He must have drunk a gill before he took the bottle

from his mouth.

 

“Aye,” said he, “by thunder, but I wanted some o’ that!”

 

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

 

“Much hurt?” I asked him.

 

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

 

“If that doctor was aboard,” he said, “I’d be right

enough in a couple of turns, but I don’t have no manner

of luck, you see, and that’s what’s the matter with me.

As for that swab, he’s good and dead, he is,” he added,

indicating the man with the red cap. “He warn’t no

seaman anyhow. And where mought you have come from?”

 

“Well,” said I, “I’ve come aboard to take possession of

this ship, Mr. Hands; and you’ll please regard me as

your captain until further notice.”

 

He looked at me sourly enough but said nothing. Some

of the colour had come back into his cheeks, though he

still looked very sick and still continued to slip out

and settle down as the ship banged about.

 

“By the by,” I continued, “I can’t have these colours,

Mr. Hands; and by your leave, I’ll strike ‘em. Better

none than these.”

 

And again dodging the boom, I ran to the colour lines, handed

down their cursed black flag, and chucked it overboard.

 

“God save the king!” said I, waving my cap. “And

there’s an end to Captain Silver!”

 

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

on his breast.

 

“I reckon,” he said at last, “I reckon, Cap’n Hawkins,

you’ll kind of want to get ashore now. S’pose we talks.”

 

“Why, yes,” says I, “with all my heart, Mr. Hands. Say

on.” And I went back to my meal with a good appetite.

 

“This man,” he began, nodding feebly at the corpse “—

O’Brien were his name, a rank Irelander—this man and

me got the canvas on her, meaning for to sail her back.

Well, HE’S dead now, he is—as dead as bilge; and

who’s to sail this ship, I don’t see. Without I gives

you a hint, you ain’t that man, as far’s I can tell.

Now, look here, you gives me food and drink and a old

scarf or ankecher to tie my wound up, you do, and I’ll

tell you how to sail her, and that’s about square all

round, I take it.”

 

“I’ll tell you one thing,” says I: “I’m not going back

to Captain Kidd’s anchorage. I mean to get into North

Inlet and beach her quietly there.”

 

“To be sure you did,” he cried. “Why, I ain’t sich an

infernal lubber after all. I can see, can’t I? I’ve

tried my fling, I have, and I’ve lost, and it’s you has

the wind of me. North Inlet? Why, I haven’t no

ch’ice, not I! I’d help you sail her up to Execution

Dock, by thunder! So I would.”

 

Well, as it seemed to me, there was some sense in this.

We struck our bargain on the spot. In three minutes I

had the HISPANIOLA sailing easily before the wind

along the coast of Treasure Island, with good hopes of

turning the northern point ere noon and beating down

again as far as North Inlet before high water, when we

might beach her safely and wait till the subsiding tide

permitted us to land.

 

Then I lashed the tiller and went below to my own

chest, where I got a soft silk handkerchief of my

mother’s. With this, and with my aid, Hands bound up

the great bleeding stab he had received in the thigh,

and after he had eaten a little and had a swallow or

two more of the brandy, he began to pick up visibly,

sat straighter up, spoke louder and clearer, and looked

in every way another man.

 

The breeze served us admirably. We skimmed before it

like a bird, the coast of the island flashing by and

the view changing every minute. Soon we were past the

high lands and bowling beside low, sandy country,

sparsely dotted with dwarf pines, and soon we were

beyond that again and had turned the corner of the

rocky hill that ends the island on the north.

 

I was greatly elated with my new command, and pleased

with the bright, sunshiny weather and these different

prospects of the coast. I had now plenty of water and

good things to eat, and my conscience, which had

smitten me hard for my desertion, was quieted by the

great conquest I had made. I should, I think, have had

nothing left me to desire but for the eyes of the

coxswain as they followed me derisively about the deck

and the odd smile that appeared continually on his

face. It was a smile that had in it something both of

pain and weakness—a haggard old man’s smile; but there

was, besides that, a grain of derision, a shadow of

treachery, in his expression as he craftily watched,

and watched, and watched me at my work.

 

26

 

Israel Hands

 

THE wind, serving us to a desire, now hauled into the west.

We could run so much the easier from the north-east corner

of the island to the mouth of the North Inlet. Only, as

we had no power to anchor and dared not beach her till the

tide had flowed a good deal farther, time hung on our hands.

The coxswain told me how to lay the ship to; after a good

many trials I succeeded, and we both sat in silence over

another meal.

 

“Cap’n,” said he at length with that same uncomfortable

smile, “here’s my old shipmate, O’Brien; s’pose you was

to heave him overboard. I ain’t partic’lar as a rule,

and I don’t take no blame for settling his hash, but I

don’t reckon him ornamental now, do you?”

 

“I’m not strong enough, and I don’t like the job; and

there he lies, for me,” said I.

 

“This here’s an unlucky ship, this HISPANIOLA,

Jim,” he went on, blinking. “There’s a power of men

been killed in this HISPANIOLA—a sight o’ poor

seamen dead and gone since you and me took ship to

Bristol. I never seen sich dirty luck, not I. There

was this here O’Brien now—he’s dead, ain’t he? Well

now, I’m no scholar, and you’re a lad as can read and

figure, and to put it straight, do you take it as a

dead man is dead for good, or do he come alive again?”

 

“You can kill the body, Mr. Hands, but not the spirit;

you must know that already,” I replied. “O’Brien there

is in another world, and may be watching us.”

 

“Ah!” says he. “Well, that’s unfort’nate—appears as

if killing parties was a waste of time. Howsomever,

sperrits don’t reckon for much, by what I’ve seen.

I’ll chance it with the sperrits, Jim. And now, you’ve

spoke up free, and I’ll take it kind if you’d step down

into that there cabin and get me a—well, a—shiver my

timbers! I can’t hit the name on ‘t; well, you get me

a bottle of wine, Jim—this here brandy’s too strong

for my head.”

 

Now, the coxswain’s hesitation seemed to be unnatural,

and as for the notion of his preferring wine to brandy,

I entirely disbelieved it. The whole story was a

pretext. He wanted me to leave the deck—so much was

plain; but with what purpose I could in no way imagine.

His eyes never met mine; they kept wandering to and

fro, up and down, now with a look to the sky, now with

a flitting glance upon the dead O’Brien. All the time

he kept smiling and putting his tongue out in the most

guilty, embarrassed manner, so that a child could have

told that he was bent on some deception. I was prompt

with my answer, however, for I saw where my advantage

lay and that with a fellow so densely stupid I could

easily conceal my suspicions to the end.

 

“Some wine?” I said. “Far better. Will you have

white or red?”

 

“Well, I reckon it’s about the blessed same to me,

shipmate,” he replied; “so it’s strong, and plenty of

it, what’s the odds?”

 

“All right,” I answered. “I’ll bring you port, Mr.

Hands. But I’ll have to dig for it.”

 

With that I scuttled down the companion with all the

noise I could, slipped off my shoes, ran quietly along

the sparred gallery, mounted the forecastle ladder, and

popped my head out of the fore companion. I knew he

would not expect to see me there, yet I took every

precaution possible, and certainly the worst of my

suspicions proved too true.

 

He had risen from his position to his hands and knees,

and though his leg obviously hurt him pretty sharply

when he moved—for I could hear him stifle a groan—yet

it was at a good, rattling rate that he trailed himself

across the deck. In half a minute he had reached the

port scuppers and picked, out of a coil of rope, a long

knife, or rather a short dirk, discoloured to the hilt

with blood. He looked upon it for a moment, thrusting

forth his under jaw, tried the point upon his hand, and

then, hastily concealing it in the bosom of his jacket,

trundled back again into his old place against the bulwark.

 

This was