'One,' I answered quickly. 'And now I'll tell you my story. But first I must ask for a drop of spirits out of one of those jars you have transhipped. A sudden change of this sort tries a man to the soul.'
'Ay, you're right,' growled one of the others. 'I know what it is to be plucked by the hair o' the head out of the hopen jaws of Death, and the sort of feelings what comes arter the plucking job's o'er. Which'll be the particler jar, sir?'
'Any one of them,' said I.
He explored with the lantern, found a little jar of brandy, and the glass, or rather I should say the pannikin, went round. I coaxed Helga into taking a sup; yet she continued silent at my side, as one still dazed and incapable of mastering what had happened. Indeed, with her woman's apparel, you might have believed that she had re-equipped herself with her woman's nature.