d have had to abandon my design. But the
light airs which had begun blowing from the southeast and south had
hauled round after nightfall into the southwest. Just while I was
meditating, a puff came, caught the _Hispaniola_, and forced her up into
the current; and, to my great joy, I felt the hawser slacken in my
grasp, and the hand by which I held it dip for a second under water.

With that I made my mind up, took out my gully, opened it with my teeth,
and cut one strand after another, till the vessel swung only by two.
Then I lay quiet, waiting to sever these last when the strain should be
once more lightened by a breath of wind.

All this time I had heard the sound of loud voices from the cabin; but,
to say truth, my mind had been so entirely taken up with other thoughts
that I had scarcely given ear. Now, however, when I had nothing else to
do, I began to pay more heed.

One I recognized for the coxswain's, Israel Hands, that had been Flint's
gunner in former days. The other was, of course, my friend of the red
nightcap. Both men were plainly the worse of drink, and they were still
drinking; for, even while I was listening, one of them, with a drunken
cry, opened the stern window and threw out something, which I divined
to be an empty bottle. But they were not only tipsy; it was plain that
they were furiously angry. Oaths flew like hailstones, and every now and
then there came forth such an explosion as I thought was sure to end in
blows. But each time the quarrel passed off, and the voices grumbled
lower for a while, until the next crisis came, and, in its turn, passed
away without result.

On shore, I could see the glow of the great camp fire burning warmly
through the shore-side trees. Someone was singing a dull, old droning
sailor's song, with a droop and a quaver at the end of every verse, and
seemingly no end to it at all but the patience of the singer. I had
heard it on the voyage more than once, and remembered these words:

"But one man of the crew alive,
What put to sea with seventy-five."

And I thought it was a ditty rather too dolefully appropriate for a
company that had met such cruel losses in the morning. But, indeed, from
what I saw, all these buccaneers were as callous as the sea they sailed
on.

At last the breeze came; the schooner sidled and drew nearer in the
dark; I felt the hawser slacken once more, and with a good, tough
effort, cut the last fibers through.

The breeze had b