“Stop your clapper, Jack,” vociferated a third; “give the boy a junck o’ meat. Don’t you see he’s a’most goin’ to kick the bucket?”
“And no wonder,” said the first speaker, with an oath, “after the tumble you gave him into the boat. I guess it would have broke your neck if you had got it.”
I did indeed feel somewhat faint; which was owing, doubtless, to the combined effects of ill-usage and hunger; for it will be recollected that I had dived out of the cave that morning before breakfast, and it was now near mid-day. I therefore gladly accepted a plate of boiled pork and a yam, which were handed to me by one of the men from the locker on which some of the crew were seated eating their dinner. But I must add that the zest with which I ate my meal was much abated in consequence of the frightful oaths and the terrible language that flowed from the lips of these godless men, even in the midst of their hilarity and good-humour. The man who had been alluded to as Bloody Bill was seated near me, and I could not help wondering at the moody silence he maintained among his comrades. He did indeed reply to their questions in a careless, off-hand tone, but he never volunteered a remark. The only difference between him and the others was his taciturnity and his size, for he was nearly, if not quite, as large a man as the captain.
During the remainder of the afternoon I was left to my own reflections, which were anything but agreeable, for I could not banish from my mind the threat about the thumb-screws, of the nature and use of which I had a vague but terrible conception. I was still meditating on my unhappy fate when, just after night-fall, one of the watch on deck called down the hatchway,—
“Hallo there! one o’ you, tumble up and light the cabin lamp, and send that boy aft to the captain—sharp!”
“Now then, do you hear, youngster? the captain wants you. Look alive,” said Bloody Bill, raising his huge frame from the locker on which he had been asleep for the last two hours. He sprang up the ladder and I instantly followed him, and, going aft, was shown into the cabin by one of the men, who closed the door after me.
A small silver lamp which hung from a beam threw a dim soft light over the cabin, which was a small apartment, and comfortably but plainly finished. Seated on a camp-stool at the table, and busily engaged in examining a chart of the Pacific, was the captain, who looked up as I entered, and, in a quiet voice, bade me be seated, while he threw down his pencil, and, rising from the table, stretched himself on a sofa at the upper end of the cabin.
“Boy,” said he, looking me full in the face, “what is your name?”
“Ralph Rover,” I replied.
“Where did you come from, and how came you to be on that island? How many companions had you on it? Answer me, now, and mind you tell no lies.”