"Don't go to makin' up your mind Pew can't see everything, Master Ormerod," said Silver, shifting his crutch. "I'd hate to have him decide to take a shot at me. Steer? Well now, what's needed in steerin'? A strong arm, says you, and you says true. Also and likewise, an ear for canvas. Lastly and leastwise, an eye for the course.
"Any man can read a compass, young gentleman; but not every sailorman can feel how his ship takes the wind and meet his rudder quick when she wants meetin'. Pew can. Give him some one like me to play eyes for him, and he'll steer as straight a course as a packet-boat wi' a bonus on the voyage."
"Are there many cripples in your crew?" I asked curiously.
"Cripples?" repeated Silver. "It all depends on what you might mean. There's cripples and cripples. Me and Pew now, we got ours in the same broadside. 'Twas a Injyman wi' a fighting master, and she stood to us, board and board."
He slapped the stump of his thigh.
"An eighteen-pounder did that. Whoof! Off she went. Pew, he was rammin' home a charge and leaned out through the port and caught the flash of a carronade. 'Tain't good for the eyes, nowise; but as I was a-sayin', don't you ever go for to believe Pew can't see. He's surprizin', he is.
"But we was talkin' of cripples. Yes, there's cripples and cripples. Some on 'em ye pays their screw——"
"Their what?" I interrupted.
"Their screw, the what d'ye call it—insurance money. So much we get from the prize money extry for the hurt. Pew, he got a thousand pounds, which same he blowed in three nights in St. Pierre. D'ye mind, Ezra? I got eight hundred pounds for my leg—and fair enough, if you asks me.
"And that eight hundred pounds I'll gamble you ha' stowed away in a safe hole, John," said Pew with a gentleness which gave the words a peculiarly sinister significance.