“I thank ’ee, sir, most respectful for ’em, and I don’t mean to hurt your feelin’s by refusin’; but I can’t take money for savin’ anybody’s life—and leastways from you, Cap’n Forrester—as was”— Jack Bell paused, smiled knowingly, and then continued: “This ’ere boy sings a song called ‘Old Shipmates.’”
“Yes, I know,” answered the captain, smiling back and knowing that Jack meant that he and the captain had been shipmates; “but think of the pleasure you would give me to know that this little present would make your old age comfortable.”
“True, sir,” answered Jack; “but I ain’t used to livin’ on my money, and I’d be a sight happier if I had sumpin’ to do, like bein’ a night watchman or some sich thing. You see, sir, I has had a watch now for more ’n forty year, and it seems so ornnateral for me to git into a standin’ bed place and know I ain’t got to hear the boatswain’s call when it’s time to turn out, that I can’t sleep a wink. Now it seems to me, sir, as if I had a watch on shore I could walk up and down this ’ere town callin’ out the hours, and it would seem like I was standin’ my reg’lar watch.”
“But couldn’t you stand watch on shore, as you call it, just as well if you knew you had a little money put away?”
“Not for savin’ a life, sir,” answered Jack as politely as ever; but the captain knew then there was no hope of his taking the money. “If you’d be so kind, sir, as to git me the place as watchman, I wouldn’t ax no better.”
“You shall certainly have a watchman’s place,” said the captain, who mentally added, “if I have to pay your wages out of my own pocket.”
“It would seem mightily like the lookout,” continued Jack evidently tickled with his new scheme. “I dessay I’d forgit and call out: ‘Eight bells! Bright light, weather cathead!’ instid o’ ‘Twelve o’clock, and all’s well!’”
The captain laughed at this and then turned to the Widow Stubbs:—
“And you, madam, and your son—will you not permit me to give you some little token of gratitude for your help in restoring my son?”
The Widow Stubbs blushed at this, but, like Jack Bell, she had scruples about taking any recompense for the saving of life, especially as she was a woman of some education and stood a little higher in the world than Jack Bell.