I had Boyd Madras taken to an empty cabin next to mine, which I used for operations, and there Hungerford and myself worked to resuscitate him. We allowed no one to come near. I had not much hope of bringing life back, but still we worked with a kind of desperation, for it seemed to Hungerford and myself that somehow we were responsible to humanity for him. His heart had been weak, but there had been no organic trouble: only some functional disorder, which open-air life and freedom from anxiety might have overcome. Hungerford worked with an almost fierce persistence. Once he said: “By God, I will bring him back, Marmion, to face that woman down when she thinks she has got the world on the hip!”
I cannot tell what delight we felt when, after a little time, I saw a quiver of the eyelids and a slight motion of the chest. Presently a longer breath came, and the eyes opened; at first without recognition. Then, in a few moments, I knew that he was safe—desperately against his will, but safe.
His first sentient words startled me. He gasped, “Does she think I am drowned?”
“Yes.”
“Then she must continue to do so!”
“Why?”
“Because”—here he spoke faintly, as if sudden fear had produced additional weakness—“because I had rather die a thousand deaths than meet her now; because she hates me. I must begin the world again. You have saved my life against my will: I demand that you give that life its only chance of happiness.”
As his words came to me, I remembered with a start the dead lascar, and, leading Hungerford to my cabin, I pointed to the body, and whispered that the sailor’s death was only known to me. “Then this is the corpse of Boyd Madras, and we’ll bury it for him,” he said with quick bluntness. “Do not report this death to Captain Ascott—he would only raise objections to the idea. This lascar was in my watch. It will be supposed he fell overboard during the accident to the boat. Perhaps some day the funeral of this nigger will be a sensation and surprise to her blessed ladyship on deck.”
I suggested that it seemed underhand and unprofessional, but the entreating words of the resuscitated man in the next room conquered my objections.
It was arranged that Madras should remain in the present cabin, of which I had a key, until we reached Aden; then he should, by Hungerford’s aid, disappear.