“Oh, sir!” I cried, “you can never forgive me!”
That, or something like it, I said. They were all the words I could utter.
I no longer looked him in the face. With my eyes fixed upon the deck, I awaited his reply.
“Come, my lad! rise up!” said a voice, in a tone of kindness; “rise up, and come with me into the cabin.”
A hand was placed upon mine, I was raised to my feet, and led away. He who walked by my side, and conducted me as I tottered along, was the captain himself! This did not look like giving me to the sharks. Was it possible that the ending should be of this merciful complexion?
As I passed into the cabin, I beheld my shadow in a mirror. I should not have known myself. My whole body was as white as if it had been lime-washed; but I remembered the flour. My face alone was to be seen, and that was almost as white as the rest—white, and wan, and bony as that of a skeleton! I saw that suffering and meagre fare had made sad havoc with my flesh.
The captain seated me on a sofa, and, having summoned his steward, ordered him to fill me out a glass of port wine. He uttered not a word till I had drunk it; and then, turning to me, with a look in which I could read nothing of sternness, he said—
“Now, my lad, tell me all about it!”
It was a long story, but I told it from first to last. I concealed nothing—neither of the motives that had led me to run away from my home, nor yet any item of the vast damage I had done to the cargo. This, however, was already well-known to him, as half the crew had long since visited my lair behind the water-butt, and ascertained everything.
When I had gone through every circumstance, I wound up with the proposal I had resolved to make to him; and then, with an anxious heart, I awaited his response. My anxiety was soon at an end.