I followed out his instructions, and handed him the opened knife, when with one clever cut he divided the eel’s backbone, and its writhings almost ceased.
“There,” continued Jem, taking hold of the line, “let’s get you off. What a tangle! why, it’s reg’lar twissen all about your ankles. I must break it. Why, it’s tough as—look ye here,” he continued, tugging at the plaited silk, “it’s strong enough to hold a whale. I shall have to cut it. Bob Hopley won’t mind.”
Snick, and the line was divided, the eel thrown down, and Jem began to untwine the line from about Mercer’s legs, as the poor fellow, looking terribly white and scared, now sat up on the grass, looking dolefully from one to the other.
“My heye! you do look like a drownded rat, master,” said Jem, chuckling. “Lucky I come, warn’t it?”
I looked angrily at the man, for he seemed horribly unfeeling, and then, turning to Mercer,—
“How are you now?” I said.
“Very wet,” he replied feebly.
“Raw, haw!” laughed Jem. “There, get up, you’re clear now. Couldn’t swim a bit like that.”
“No,” said Mercer, getting up shivering, and shaking the water from his hair.
“Worse disasters at sea, lads. Here, come on along o’ me. Let’s put the rods back again;” and, taking the one he had dragged ashore with Mercer, he whipped the line round the other and pulled it ashore, swung the lines round both, and trotted with them to the boat-house, where he laid them on the pegs, and then came back to where we stood, so utterly upset that neither of us had spoken a word.