I was meant to be the victim. What he would do
afterward--whether he would try to crawl right across the island from
North Inlet to the camp among the swamps, or whether he would fire Long
Tom, trusting that his own comrades might come first to help him, was,
of course, more than I could say.

Yet I felt sure that I could trust him in one point, since in that our
interests jumped together, and that was in the disposition of the
schooner. We both desired to have her stranded safe enough, in a
sheltered place, and so that, when the time came, she could be got off
again with as little labor and danger as might be; and until that was
done I considered that my life would certainly be spared.

While I was thus turning the business over in my mind, I had not been
idle with my body. I had stolen back to the cabin, slipped once more
into my shoes, and laid my hand at random on a bottle of wine, and now,
with this for an excuse, I made my reappearance on the deck.

Hands lay as I had left him, all fallen together in a bundle, and with
his eyelids lowered, as though he were too weak to bear the light. He
looked up, however, at my coming, knocked the neck off the bottle, like
a man who had done the same thing often, and took a good swig, with his
favorite toast of "Here's luck!" Then he lay quiet for a little, and
then, pulling out a stick of tobacco, begged me to cut him a quid.

"Cut me a junk o' that," says he, "for I haven't no knife, and hardly
strength enough, so be as I had. Ah, Jim, Jim, I reckon I've missed
stays! Cut me a quid, as'll likely be the last, lad; for I'm for my long
home, and no mistake."

"Well," said I, "I'll cut you some tobacco; but if I was you and thought
myself so badly, I would go to my prayers, like a Christian man."

"Why?" said he. "Now, you tell me why."

"Why?" I cried. "You were asking me just now about the dead. You've
broken your trust; you've lived in sin and lies and blood; there's a man
you killed lying at your feet this moment; and you ask me why! For God's
mercy, Mr. Hands, that's why."

I spoke with a little heat, thinking of the bloody dirk he had hidden in
his pocket, and designed, in his ill thoughts, to end me with. He, for
his part, took a great draught of the wine, and spoke with the most
unusual solemnity.

"For thirty years," he said, "I've sailed the seas, and seen good and
bad, better and worse, fair weather and foul, provisions running out,
knives going, and what not.