"Is it safe?" said the first mate to the chief engineer, gesturing with his weapon.
Harrigan snatched it away and waved it like a club above his head.
"Get out, or I'll bash your skull in."
His face was hideous, cut and blood-stained, starved with the long hunger and lighted with the victory. They slunk from the cabin, backing out as if they expected him to rush them. Harrigan locked the door and started to tend the captain. He washed McTee to the waist, cleansed the cut places carefully, and covered them with narrow strips of adhesive tape which he found in a small medicine chest. As the heavier breathing of the captain indicated that he was about to recover his senses, Harrigan performed the same services for himself. It was slow work, for now that the stimulus of action was gone, his weakness grew on him in recurrent waves. Finally a sound made him turn to see McTee propping himself up on the bunk with one elbow; his eyes, unconfused and steady, looked brightly out at Harrigan.
"You beat me?"
"It was the swing of the deck that rolled you over and broke your grip.
I've stayed to tell you that."
"Chances or no chances, you beat me."
"Man, you'd have busted my back if it hadn't been for that buck of the ship. When your hand came away, it took the skin with it."
"And that's why you didn't finish me?"
"Aye."