“That’s the chap,” said Harvey.
The man dropped his fist, put out a hand to Harvey, and they shook once more. The man’s face relaxed into a grim smile.
“Well, I’m another Jenkins recruit,” he said. “I’m an idiot, an ass, anything you’re a-mind to call me. There’s some excuse for you—but me, a man that’s travelled from one end of this United States to the other, and met every kind of a sharper between New York and San Francisco—to get caught in a scrape like this!”
“Why, then your name is not Tom Saunders,” exclaimed Harvey, who now recognized in his new acquaintance the man he had seen struggling with the men of the schooner. “They said you were a sailor.” The man made a gesture of disgust. “I hate the very smell of the salt water!” he cried.
There was a small sea chest next to the bulk-head at the forward end of the forecastle, and Harvey and the stranger seated themselves on it. The man relapsed for a moment into silence, his elbows on his knees, his face buried in his hands. Then, all of a sudden, he sat erect, and beat his fist down upon one knee.
“This ends it!” he cried, earnestly. “Never again as long as I live and breathe.”
Harvey stared at him in surprise.
“I mean the drink,” cried the man, excitedly. “Mind what I say, and I mean it. Never another drink as long as I live. I’ve said, before, that I’d stop it, but this ends it. Say, what’s your name, anyway?”
“Jack Harvey.”
“Well, my name’s Edwards—Tom Edwards. Now look here, Harvey, I mean what I say; if you ever see Tom Edwards try to take another drink, you just walk up and hit him the hardest knock you can give him. See?”