"For you!" The cry came from his narrow chest with jarring force. "You! You!" he repeated in rising voice. "It's always of yourself you're thinkin', Dan Sullivan!" He stopped, his face twitching in pain; then with both hands clenched he went on, his breast heaving at each word hurled at Dan:
"Do you think I followed you from ship to ship, dragged you out of every rum-hole in every port, for your own sake!"
He lay back exhausted, his chest rising and falling painfully, his eyelids fluttering over his burning eyes.
Dan stepped back, and, silenced, stared at the dying man.
Larry clung to his last moments of life, fighting for strength to finish. He struggled, and raised himself on one elbow.
"For you!" he screamed. "No, for Mary! For Mary, my own flesh and blood—Mary, the child of the woman I beat when I was drunk an' left to starve when I got ready!"
Through the stateroom door the sun's flat rays struck full on Larry's inspired face. He swayed on his elbow; his head fell forward. By a final effort he steadied himself. His last words came in ringing command.
"Go back! Go—" he faltered, gasping for breath—"go home sober to Mary an' the child that's comin'!"
The fire of anger drifted slowly from Larry's dying gaze. The little man fell back. The Bunker Mouse went out, all man, big at the end.