Silver

by Andrew Motion

  The squire was waiting for me at the stern window, all his faintness gone from him. He caught the painter and made it fast, and we fell to loading the boat for our very lives. Pork, powder, and biscuit was the cargo, with only a musket and a cutlass apiece for the squire and me and Redruth and the captain. The rest of the arms and powder we dropped overboard in two fathoms and a half of water, so that we could see the bright steel shining far below us in the sun, on the clean sandy bottom.

  By this time the tide was beginning to ebb, and the ship was swinging round to her anchor. Voices were heard faintly halloaing in the direction of the two gigs; and though this reassured us for Joyce and Hunter, who were well to the eastward, it warned our party to be off.

  Redruth retreated from his place in the gallery, and dropped into the boat, which we then brought round to the ship’s counter, to be handier for Captain Smollett.

  “Now, men,” said he, “do you hear me?”

  There was no answer from the forecastle.

  “It’s to you, Abraham Gray – it’s to you I am speaking.”

  Still no reply.

  “Gray,” resumed Mr Smollett, a little louder, “I am leaving this ship, and I order you to follow your captain. I know you are a good man at bottom, and I daresay not one of the lot of you’s as bad as he makes out. I have my watch here in my hand; I give you thirty seconds to join me in.”

  There was a pause.

  “Come, my fine fellow,” continued the captain, “don’t hang so long in stays. I’m risking my life, and the lives of these good gentlemen, every second.”

  There was a sudden scuffle, a sound of blows, and out burst Abraham Gray with a knife-cut on the side of the cheek, and came running to the captain, like a dog to the whistle.

  “I’m with you, sir,” said he.

  And the next moment he and the captain had dropped aboard of us, and we had shoved off and given way.

  We were clear out of the ship; but not yet ashore in our stockade.

  CHAPTER XVII

  Narrative continued by the Doctor:

  The Jolly-Boat’s Last Trip

  THIS FIFTH TRIP was quite different from any of the others. In the first place, the little gallipot of a boat that we were in was gravely overloaded. Five grown men, and three of them – Trelawney, Redruth, and the captain – over six feet high, was already more than she was meant to carry. Add to that the powder, pork, and bread-bags. The gunwale was lipping astern. Several times we shipped a little water, and my breeches and the tails of my coat were all soaking wet before we had gone a hundred yards.

  The captain made us trim the boat, and we got her to lie a little more evenly. All the same, we were afraid to breathe.

  In the second place, the ebb was now making – a strong rippling current running westward through the basin, and then south’ard and seaward down the straits by which we had entered in the morning. Even the ripples were a danger to our overloaded craft; but the worst of it was that we were swept out of our true course, and away from our proper landing-place behind the point. If we let the current have its way we should come ashore beside the gigs, where the pirates might appear at any moment.

  “I cannot keep her head for the stockade, sir,” said I to the captain. I was steering, while he and Redruth, two fresh men, were at the oars. “The tide keeps washing her down. Could you pull a little stronger?”

  “Not without swamping the boat,” said he. “You must bear up, sir, if you please – bear up until you see you’re gaining.”

  I tried, and found by experiment that the tide kept sweeping us westward until I had laid her head due east, or just about right angles to the way we ought to go.

  “We’ll never get ashore at this rate,” said I.

  “If it’s the only course that we can lie, sir, we must even lie it,” returned the captain. “We must keep up-stream. You see, sir,” he went on, “if once we dropped to leeward of the landing-place, it’s hard to say where we should get ashore, besides the chance of being boarded by the gigs; whereas, the way we go the current must slacken, and then we can dodge back along the shore.”

  “The current’s less a’ready, sir,” said the man Gray, who was sitting in the fore-sheets; “you can ease her off a bit.”

  “Thank you, my man,” said I, quite as if nothing had happened: for we had all quietly made up our minds to treat him like one of ourselves.

  Suddenly the captain spoke up again, and I thought his voice was a little changed.

  “The gun!” said he.

  “I have thought of that,” said I, for I made sure he was thinking of a bombardment of the fort. “They could never get the gun ashore, and if they did, they could never haul it through the woods.”

  “Look astern, doctor,” replied the captain.

  We had entirely forgotten the long nine; and there, to our horror, were the five rogues busy about her, getting off her jacket, as they called the stout tarpaulin cover under which she sailed. Not only that, but it flashed into my mind at the same moment that the round-shot and the powder for the gun had been left behind, and a stroke with an axe would put it all into the possession of the evil ones aboard.

  “Israel was Flint’s gunner,” said Gray hoarsely.

  At any risk, we put the boat’s head direct for the landing-place. By this time we had got so far out of the run of the current that we kept steerage way even at our necessarily gentle rate of rowing, and I could keep her steady for the goal. But the worst of it was, that with the course I now held, we turned our broadside instead of our stern to the Hispaniola, and offered a target like a barn-door.

  I could hear, as well as see, that brandy-faced rascal, Israel Hands, plumping down a round-shot on the deck.

  “Who’s the best shot?” asked the captain.

  “Mr Trelawney, out and away,” said I.

  “Mr Trelawney, will you please pick me off one of these men, sir? Hands, if possible,” said the captain.

  Trelawney was as cool as steel. He looked to the priming of his gun.

  “Now,” cried the captain, “easy with that gun, sir, or you’ll swamp the boat. All hands stand by to trim her when he aims.”

  The squire raised his gun, the rowing ceased, and we leaned over to the other side to keep the balance, and all was so nicely contrived that we did not ship a drop.

  They had the gun, by this time, slewed round upon the swivel, and Hands, who was at the muzzle with the rammer, was, in consequence, the most exposed. However, we had no luck; for just as Trelawney fired, down he stooped, the ball whistled over him, and it was one of the other four who fell.

  The cry he gave was echoed, not only by his companions on board, but by a great number of voices from the shore, and looking in that direction I saw the other pirates trooping out from among the trees and tumbling into their places in the boats.

  “Here come the gigs, sir,” said I.

  “Give way then,” cried the captain. “We mustn’t mind if we swamp her now. If we can’t get ashore, all’s up.”

  “Only one of the gigs is being manned, sir,” I added, “the crew of the other most likely going round by shore to cut us off.”

  “They’ll have a hot run, sir,” returned the captain.

  “Jack ashore, you know. It’s not them I mind; it’s the round-shot. Carpet bowls! My lady’s maid couldn’t miss. Tell us, squire, when you see the match, and we’ll hold water.”

  In the meanwhile we had been making headway at a good pace for a boat so overloaded, and we had shipped but little water in the process. We were now close in; thirty or forty strokes and we should beach her; for the ebb had already disclosed a narrow belt of sand below the clustering trees. The gig was no longer to be feared; the little point had already concealed it from our eyes. The ebb-tide, which had so cruelly delayed us, was now making reparation, and delaying our assailants. The one source of danger was the gun.

  “If I durst,” said the captain, “I’d stop and pick off another man.”

  But it was plai
n that they meant nothing should delay their shot. They had never so much as looked at their fallen comrade, though he was not dead, and I could see him trying to crawl away.

  “Ready!” cried the squire.

  “Hold!” cried the captain, quick as an echo.

  And he and Redruth backed with a great heave that sent her stern bodily under water. The report fell in at the same instant of time. This was the first that Jim heard, the sound of the squire’s shot not having reached him. Where the ball passed, not one of us precisely knew; but I fancy it must have been over our heads, and that the wind of it may have contributed to our disaster.

  At any rate, the boat sank by the stern, quite gently, in three feet of water, leaving the captain and myself, facing each other, on our feet. The other three took complete headers, and came up again, drenched and bubbling.

  So far there was no great harm. No lives were lost, and we could wade ashore in safety. But there were all our stores at the bottom, and, to make things worse, only two guns out of five remained in a state for service. Mine I had snatched from my knees and held over my head, by a sort of instinct. As for the captain, he had carried his over his shoulder by a bandoleer, and, like a wise man, lock uppermost. The other three had gone down with the boat.

  To add to our concern, we heard voices already drawing near us in the woods along shore; and we had not only the danger of being cut off from the stockade in our half-crippled state, but the fear before us whether, if Hunter and Joyce were attacked by half a dozen, they would have the sense and conduct to stand firm. Hunter was steady, that we knew; Joyce was a doubtful case – a pleasant, polite man for a valet, and to brush one’s clothes, but not entirely fitted for a man of war.

  With all this in our minds, we waded ashore as fast as we could, leaving behind us the poor jolly-boat, and a good half of all our powder and provisions.

  CHAPTER XVIII

  Narrative continued by the Doctor:

  End of the First Day’s Fighting

  WE MADE OUR best speed across the strip of wood that now divided us from the stockade; and at every step we took the voices of the buccaneers rang nearer. Soon we could hear their footfalls as they ran, and the cracking of the branches as they breasted across a bit of thicket.

  I began to see we should have a brush for it in earnest, and looked to my priming.

  “Captain,” said I, “Trelawney is the dead shot. Give him your gun; his own is useless.”

  They exchanged guns, and Trelawney, silent and cool as he had been since the beginning of the bustle, hung a moment on his heel to see that all was fit for service. At the same time, observing Gray to be unarmed, I handed him my cutlass. It did all our hearts good to see him spit in his hand, knit his brows, and make the blade sing through the air. It was plain from every line of his body that our new hand was worth his salt.

  Forty paces farther we came to the edge of the wood and saw the stockade in front of us. We struck the enclosure about the middle of the south side, and, almost at the same time, seven mutineers – Job Anderson, the boatswain, at their head – appeared in full cry at the south-western corner.

  They paused, as if taken aback; and before they recovered, not only the squire and I, but Hunter and Joyce from the block-house, had time to fire. The four shots came in rather a scattering volley; but they did the business: one of the enemy actually fell, and the rest, without hesitation, turned and plunged into the trees.

  After reloading, we walked down the outside of the palisade to see to the fallen enemy. He was stone dead – shot through the heart.

  We began to rejoice over our good success, when just at that moment a pistol cracked in the bush, a ball whistled close past my ear, and poor Tom Redruth stumbled and fell his length on the ground. Both the squire and I returned the shot; but as we had nothing to aim at, it is probable we only wasted powder. Then we reloaded, and turned our attention to poor Tom.

  The captain and Gray were already examining him; and I saw with half an eye that all was over.

  I believe the readiness of our return volley had scattered the mutineers once more, for we were suffered without further molestation to get the poor old gamekeeper hoisted over the stockade, and carried, groaning and bleeding, into the log-house.

  Poor old fellow, he had not uttered one word of surprise, complaint, fear, or even acquiescence, from the very beginning of our troubles till now, when we had laid him down in the log-house to die. He had lain like a Trojan behind his mattress in the gallery; he had followed every order silently, doggedly, and well; he was the oldest of our party by a score of years; and now, sullen, old, serviceable servant, it was he that was to die.

  The squire dropped down beside him on his knees and kissed his hand, crying like a child.

  “Be I going, doctor?” he asked.

  “Tom, my man,” said I, “you’re going home.”

  “I wish I had had a lick at them with the gun first,” he replied.

  “Tom,” said the squire, “say you forgive me, won’t you?”

  “Would that be respectful like, from me to you, squire?” was the answer. “Howsoever, so be it – amen!”

  After a little while of silence, he said he thought somebody might read a prayer. “It’s the custom, sir,” he added apologetically. And not long after, without another word, he passed away.

  In the meantime the captain, whom I had observed to be wonderfully swollen about the chest and pockets, had turned out a great many various stores – the British colours, a Bible, a coil of stoutish rope, pen, ink, the log-book, and pounds of tobacco. He had found a longish fir-tree lying felled and cleared in the enclosure, and, with the help of Hunter, he had set it up at the corner of the log-house where the trunks crossed and made an angle. Then, climbing on the roof, he had with his own hand bent and run up the colours.

  This seemed mightily to relieve him. He re-entered the log-house, and set about counting up the stores, as if nothing else existed. But he had an eye on Tom’s passage for all that; and as soon as all was over, came forward with another flag, and reverently spread it on the body.

  “Don’t you take on, sir,” he said, shaking the squire’s hand. “All’s well with him; no fear for a hand that’s been shot down in his duty to captain and owner. It mayn’t be good divinity, but it’s a fact.”

  Then he pulled me aside.

  “Dr Livesey,” he said, “in how many weeks do you and squire expect the consort?”

  I told him it was a question, not of weeks, but of months; that if we were not back by the end of August, Blandly was to send to find us; but neither sooner nor later. “You can calculate for yourself,” I said.

  “Why, yes,” returned the captain, scratching his head, “and making a large allowance, sir, for all the gifts of Providence, I should say we were pretty close hauled.”

  “How do you mean?” I asked.

  “It’s a pity, sir, we lost that second load. That’s what I mean,” replied the captain. “As for powder and shot, we’ll do. But the rations are short, very short – so short, Dr Livesey, that we’re perhaps as well without that extra mouth.”

  And he pointed to the dead body under the flag.

  Just then, with a roar and a whistle, a round-shot passed high above the roof of the log-house and plumped far beyond us in the wood.

  “Oho!” said the captain. “Blaze away! You’ve little enough powder already, my lads.”

  At the second trial, the aim was better, and the ball descended inside the stockade, scattering a cloud of sand, but doing no further damage.

  “Captain,” said the squire, “the house is quite invisible from the ship. It must be the flag they are aiming at. Would it not be wiser to take it in?”

  “Strike my colours!” cried the captain. “No, sir, not I;” and as soon as he had said the words I think we all agreed with him. For it was not only a piece of stout, seamanly, good feeling; it was good policy besides, and showed our enemies that we despised their cannonade.

  All through
the evening they kept thundering away. Ball after ball flew over or fell short, or kicked up the sand in the enclosure; but they had to fire so high that the shot fell dead and buried itself in the soft sand. We had no ricochet to fear; and though one popped in through the roof of the log-house, and out again through the floor, we soon got used to that sort of horse-play, and minded it no more than cricket.

  “There is one thing good about all this,” observed the captain: “the wood in front of us is likely clear. The ebb has made a good while; our stores should be uncovered. Volunteers to go and bring in pork.”

  Gray and Hunter were the first to come forward. Well armed, they stole out of the stockade; but it proved a useless mission. The mutineers were bolder than we fancied, or they put more trust in Israel’s gunnery. For four or five of them were busy carrying off our stores, and wading out with them to one of the gigs that lay close by, pulling an oar or so to hold her steady against the current. Silver was in the stern-sheets in command; and every man of them was now provided with a musket from some secret magazine of their own.

  The captain sat down to his log, and here is the beginning of the entry:

  “Alexander Smollett, master; David Livesey, ship’s doctor; Abraham Gray, carpenter’s mate; John Trelawney, owner; John Hunter and Richard Joyce, owner’s servants, landsmen – being all that is left faithful of the ship’s company – with stores for ten days at short rations, came ashore this day, and flew British colours on the log-house in Treasure Island. Thomas Redruth, owner’s servant, landsman, shot by the mutineers; James Hawkins, cabin-boy –”

  And at the same time I was wondering over poor Jim Hawkins’s fate.

  A hail on the land side.

  “Somebody hailing us,” said Hunter, who was on guard.

  “Doctor! Squire! Captain! Hullo, Hunter, is that you?” came the cries.

  And I ran to the door in time to see Jim Hawkins, safe and sound, come climbing over the stockade.