[CHAPTER VIII.]
I made up my mind as Stevens left me to bring this terrible time to an end on Friday afternoon, come what might. Let it fall a calm, let it blow a gale, on Friday afternoon I would tell the carpenter that the ship was off the coast of Florida, forty or fifty miles distant.
If, by the boatswain's ruse, I could keep the ship afloat and carry her to Bermuda, it would matter little whether we hove her to one hundred or even two hundred miles distant from the island. The suspense I endured, the horror of our situation, was more than I could bear. I believed that my health and strength would give way if I protracted the ship's journey to the spot where the men would leave her, even for twenty-four hours longer than Friday.
The task before me then was to prepare for the final struggle, to thoroughly mature my plans, to utilize the control I still had over the ship to the utmost advantage, and to put into shape all plausible objections and hints I could think upon, which would be helpful to me if adopted by the crew.
What I most felt was the want of firearms. The revolver I carried was indeed five-chambered, and there was much good fortune in my having been the first to get hold of it. But could I have armed the boatswain or even the steward with another pistol, I should have been much easier in my mind when I contemplated the chances of a struggle between us and the crew.
However, there is no evil that is not attended by some kind of compensation, and I found this out; for taking it into my head that there might be a pistol among Duckling's effects, though I was pretty sure that the weapon he had threatened me with was the one in my possession, I entered his cabin with the intention to begin a search, but had no sooner opened the lid of his chest than I perceived that I had been forestalled, for the clothes were tossed anyway, the pockets turned inside out, and articles taken out of wrappers, as I should judge from the paper coverings that lay among the clothes.
So now I could only hope that Duckling had not had a pistol, since whoever had rifled his box must have met with it. And that Stevens was the thief in this as in the case of the silver I had no doubt at all.
There being now only two of us to keep watch, Stevens and I did not meet at dinner. I took his place whilst he dined, and he then relieved me.