Ben Gunn goggled at us from the companionway.
"Drowned, they be!" he gasped to himself. "He done for 'em, Flint did!"
I was afraid he would run out on deck and cry an alarm, and I started for him to prevent this. But the poor creature was fettered by superstitious fear.
"Dear Christ!" he mumbled. "It's a-comin' for me. Oh, sweet Lord, don't 'ee let the ghostie take Ben Gunn. Don't 'ee, now! A good, pious lad I was, as went to church reg'lar and said my catechism, and if my old mother could——"
"Be still, Ben," I said. "We don't mean to hurt you."
He plucked up a little courage when I spoke.
"'Tain't right for ye to talk," he objected. "I never heard tell as how sperets——"
"We're not spirits," I answered. "We are as alive as you are. Here, feel this."
He shrank back as I placed my clammy, wet hand upon his neck, but the touch reassured him.
"Ye ain't sperets, says you," he repeated amazedly. "Nor ye ain't ghosts. And consekently ye ain't dead. And seein' as you're here, why, it do stand to reason as how ye ain't aboard the Walrus, which is where ye was and where ye oughter be."