"Is such wickedness possible?"
"To a madman living chiefly on rum anything is possible."
"He deserves to die."
"Richly. He deserves no mercy. The thought of cutting him down with an axe was horrible. But after this——"
"There is no safety for us while he lives."
"I'm afraid there isn't."
Sleep, he knew, would brace her unstrung nerves better than any thing else, so, after bathing her hands in luke-warm water and anointing them with some of the rendered pork fat she kept for her cooking, he induced her to go and lie down in her bunk. Her other scratches she said she would attend to when she could see them properly.
Then he went on deck and drew up a bucket of water and washed off his own stains, and afterwards smoked many pipes as he pondered the unpleasantly weighty subject of Macro. For that matters could go on like this was out of the question.
XLII
He had cakes made and breakfast all ready long before she came out of her room, still visibly feeling the effects of the night's proceedings.