“Then why didn’t you put me ashore at once?” cried Fitz. “You were keeping me a prisoner here,” and he looked from father to son, the former where he had seated himself quietly by the head of the middy’s berth, the other standing leaning against the bulkhead folding and unfolding the clean towel, with the bucket of water and tin-bowl at his feet.
“Why didn’t I put you ashore at once?” replied the skipper. “Say, why didn’t I put myself and men all in prison for what I had done? Well, hardly likely, my lad. I couldn’t afford it, between ourselves. There! It was your people’s fault. You may call it duty, if you like. Mine was to save my schooner if I could—and I did. So now you know the worst. Come; be a good boy and let Poole there wash your face.”
“Oh, this is insufferable,” cried Fitz. “You are insulting a Queen’s officer, sir.”
“I am very sorry, sir,” said the skipper coolly, “but I have got another duty to do now, and that is to make you quite well. This is only a fast trading schooner, but in his way a skipper is as big a man as the captain of a Queen’s man-of-war. He is master, and you have got to obey—the more so because it is for your own good. Why don’t I set you ashore? Because I can’t. As soon as I safely can, off you go, but till then just you take it coolly and get well.”
“Put me aboard the first ship you see.”
“I shall put you where I like, my boy; so once more I tell you that you have got to obey me and get well. If you go on like this, exciting yourself, we shall have the fever back again, and then, mark this, the words of truth, you will be too ill to ask me to write to your mother and tell her how bad you are.”
Poor Fitz’s lips parted, and he lay back upon his pillow speechless and staring with a strange, wistful look in his eyes, making not the slightest resistance, not even attempting to speak again, as the skipper laid a hand once more upon his forehead, keeping it there a few minutes before he removed it.
“Not so hot,” he said, “as I expected to feel it. Go on, Poole, my boy, and get him his breakfast as soon as you can.”
The lad took his father’s place as he vacated it and moved towards the cabin-door, but only to return directly, step to the side of the berth, and take one of the middy’s hands and hold it between his own.
“There, there,” he said, “I am sorry to be so hard with you, my lad, for you have spoken very bravely and well. Come! A sailor has to take the ups and downs of his profession. You are all in the downs now, and are, so to speak, my prisoner; but we shan’t put you in irons, eh, Poole?”