Before he could try again Brady had caught him round the neck, while Hatch, resigning the girl to Stanbury-Jones, ran in and snapped the handcuffs on his wrists.
"Jack," cried Brady, "we aren't going to hurt you. We're rescuing you from the hill tribes. Man, you're saved!"
"You never was no deserter," said Hatch.
"Mind you back us up, old fellow," said Winterslea.
"Give us your fin, boy," said Hotham.
It was some time before Jack could pull himself together. When at last he did so, and began to appreciate the generosity of his captain and shipmates and their astounding concern to save him from the penalty of his crime, he underwent one of those reactions when despair gives way to the maddest gayety. He swore at Hatch, and made him take off the irons; he got out a bottle of white rum and forced them all to drink his health; he kept them in a roar with the story of his adventures, and laughed and cried in turn as he described his life ashore.
"What does she want?" demanded Brady, as Tehea insistently repeated some words in native.
"She says," said Jack, calmly picking up the whistle from the floor and touching it to his lips, "she says I've only to blow this and you will all be dead in five minutes."
A hush fell upon the company.
Jack, with an oath, flung the whistle from him.