Such a catastrophe would, I am assured, have driven me distracted.
In the wild life I led there, on the Island of Alphonso, it was strange how sharp, how keenly acute every sense became, but more especially those of touch and hearing.
I had been thirty-six hours without seeing my pleasant chum, the Cubano, or being near him with food. I knew that his rage would be great, and feeling myself unusually weak, after all the mental excitement and bodily exposure I had undergone, necessity now compelled me to avoid him strictly, as I was totally incapable of contending with him in any way.
If he found me, to plead that I had lost my way or had missed him, in a space so small as our island, though wild and wooded, would scarcely prove an excuse.
Another dread haunted me, that if a ship of any nation, but more especially of Spain, hove in sight, Antonio, to provide for his own future safety, might deem it necessary to dispose of me forever, lest I should accuse him of the many crimes he had committed.
Without the evidence of Hislop and others, such accusations, if made by me alone, would have no great weight; but he might not think of that; and, moreover, was no doubt a steady believer in the old buccaneer maxim, "that dead men tell no tales."
When searching for berries, about sunrise, on the western side of the isle, and while the sun, though up, was yet below the great mountain, and cast its shadow to the extreme horizon of the hazy morning sea, I encountered Antonio at last.
Stooping on my hands and knees, I was turning over the great leaves of some creeping plants that were unknown to me in search of some wild berries, which, as I had seen the birds eat them, must, I knew, be harmless, when a severe blow on the head almost stunned me.
On looking up, there stood Antonio bending over me, with a savage scowl on his face, and his pistol clubbed as if about to repeat the assault. His intentions were evidently hostile, as he placed a foot upon my hatchet, which lay near, and his left hand grasped his knife.
Every way I was totally at his mercy!