"No," he replied, after looking at him a moment, "and don't want to."
"I'm Percival, William Percival, that went mate of your ship with Captain Aldrich."
"Your own mother wouldn't know you, Percival. How came you in this condition?"
"I've had hard luck, cap'n: been cast away; lost everything but what I stood in."
The captain was the last man to be imposed upon. He had always believed that Percival and Aldrich both were two precious rascals, saw in an instant what had reduced him to his present state, and that the story of shipwreck was manufactured at the spur of the moment.
"You've cast yourself away," was the reply. "You might have been master of a ship if you had behaved yourself, and had any principle. Don't lie to me. You've got the shakes on you this blessed minute."
"That's so, cap'n," said the poor wretch, making a virtue of necessity; "but I only drank to drown misery. O, cap'n," he cried, stretching out his hands, which trembled like an aspen leaf, "give me a quarter, just to get a little rum to taper off with."
"Not a cent. You've had too much now."
"O, cap'n, dear cap'n, do," cried the miserable wretch; "only a fourpence ha'pp'ny, cap'n."
"No."