‘I’m jolly sorry now,’ said Will, sinking his voice, ‘that we fell in with this brig. Not but that she isn’t deucedly useful and the very bucket to pray for—with such a cargo in her hold to salve, too, not to speak of the hooker herself—if it wasn’t for that smothering island of Tristan. But you’re never in earnest in deciding to settle there?’
‘Shall we be able to manage without further help, Mr. Bates?’ said I.
‘Why,’ said he, ‘it’ll be a tight fit. You’re pleased to speak of four of us.’ He smiled and gazed up at the masts. ‘Call us three sailors and four helmsmen. But at sea what must be done often will be done.’
‘If Captain Butler will let me wear my boy’s clothes,’ said I, ‘I’ll go aloft and try to be of use. But you can’t climb in petticoats, Mr. Bates.’
‘Marian, Butler will do anything for you,’ said Will. ‘Clap a purchase on his love and rouse this beastly island scheme out of him. We want to get home.’
‘Who?’ I asked.
‘Mr. Bates and I.’
‘I am pledged to stand by Captain Butler, Johnstone,’ said the mate. ‘He saved my life, and I’ll stick to him till he sees his way to let me go.’
I seized the worthy man’s hand and pressed it.
‘Will,’ said I, ‘were you to live to be a hundred, the whole of the wishes of your long life would weigh with me no more than a grain of sand against Tom’s safety.’