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- Herausgeber: Blackmore Dennett
- Kategorie: Fachliteratur
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019
Robert Louis Stevenson was a Scottish novelist and travel writer, most noted for Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.
Born and educated in Edinburgh, Stevenson suffered from serious bronchial trouble for much of his life, but continued to write prolifically and travel widely, in defiance of his poor health. As a young man, he mixed in London literary circles, receiving encouragement from Andrew Lang, Edmund Gosse, Leslie Stephen and W. E. Henley, the last of whom may have provided the model for Long John Silver in Treasure Island. His travels took him to France, America and Australia, before he finally settled in Samoa, where he died.
A celebrity in his lifetime, Stevenson attracted a more negative critical response for much of the 20th century, though his reputation has been largely restored. He is currently ranked as the 26th most translated author in the world.
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THE
ROBERT LOUIS
STEVENSON
COLLECTION
Published 2019 by Blackmore Dennett
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Treasure Island
Part One - The Old Buccaneer.
Chapter I - The Old Sea-Dog At The Admiral Benbow.
Chapter II - Black Dog Appears And Disappears.
Chapter III - The Black Spot.
Chapter IV - The Sea-Chest.
Chapter V - The Last Of The Blind Man.
Chapter VI - The Captain’s Papers.
Part Two - The Sea-Cook.
Chapter VII - I Go To Bristol.
Chapter VIII - At The Sign Of The Spy-Glass.
Chapter IX - Powder And Arms.
Chapter X - The Voyage.
Chapter XI - What I Heard In The Apple Barrel.
Chapter XII - Council Of War.
Part Three - My Shore Adventure.
Chapter XIII - How My Shore Adventure Began.
Chapter XIV - The First Blow.
Chapter XV - The Man Of The Island.
Part Four - The Stockade.
Chapter XVI - Narrative Continued By The Doctor: How The Ship Was Abandoned.
Chapter XVII - Narrative Continued By The Doctor: The Jolly-Boat’s Last Trip.
Chapter XVIII - Narrative Continued By The Doctor: End Of The First Day’s Fighting.
Chapter XIX - Narrative Resumed By Jim Hawkins: The Garrison In The Stockade.
Chapter XX - Silver’s Embassy.
Chapter XXI - The Attack.
Part Five - My Sea Adventure.
Chapter XXII - How My Sea Adventure Began.
Chapter XXIII - The Ebb-Tide Runs.
Chapter XXIV - The Cruise Of The Coracle.
Chapter XXV - I Strike The Jolly Roger.
Chapter XXVI - Israel Hands.
Chapter XXVII - “Pieces Of Eight”
Part Six - Captain Silver.
Chapter XXVIII - In The Enemy’s Camp.
Chapter XXIX - The Black Spot Again.
Chapter XXX - On Parole.
Chapter XXXI - The Treasure-Hunt—Flint’s Pointer.
Chapter XXXII - The Treasure-Hunt—The Voice Among The Trees.
Chapter XXXIII - The Fall Of A Chieftain.
Chapter XXXIV - And Last.
The Black Arrow
Critic on the Hearth.
Prologue: John Amend-All.
Book I - The Two Lads.
Chapter I - At The Sign Of The Sun In Kettley.
Chapter II - In The Fen.
Chapter III - The Fen Ferry.
Chapter IV - A Greenwood Company.
Chapter V - “Bloody As The Hunter”
Chapter VI - To The Day’s End.
Chapter VII - The Hooded Face.
Book II - The Moat House.
Chapter I - Dick Asks Questions.
Chapter II - The Two Oaths.
Chapter III - The Room Over The Chapel.
Chapter IV - The Passage.
Chapter V - How Dick Changed Sides.
Book III - My Lord Foxham.
Chapter I - The House By The Shore.
Chapter II - A Skirmish In The Dark.
Chapter III - St. Bride’s Cross.
Chapter IV - The “Good Hope”
Chapter V - The “Good Hope” (Continued)
Chapter VI - The “Good Hope” (Concluded)
Book IV - The Disguise.
Chapter I - The Den.
Chapter II - “In Mine Enemies’ House”
Chapter III - The Dead Spy.
Chapter IV - In The Abbey Church.
Chapter V - Earl Risingham.
Chapter VI - Arblaster Again.
Book V - Crookback.
Chapter I - The Shrill Trumpet.
Chapter II - The Battle Of Shoreby.
Chapter III - The Battle Of Shoreby (Concluded)
Chapter IV - The Sack Of Shoreby.
Chapter V - Night In The Woods: Alicia Risingham.
Chapter VI - Night In The Woods (Concluded): Dick And Joan.
Chapter VII - Dick’s Revenge.
Chapter VIII - Conclusion.
Prince Otto
Preface.
Book I — Prince Errant.
Chapter I — In Which The Prince Departs On An Adventure.
Chapter II — In Which The Prince Plays Haroun-Al-Raschid.
Chapter III — In Which The Prince Comforts Age And Beauty And Delivers A Lecture On Discretion In Love.
Chapter IV — In Which The Prince Collects Opinions By The Way.
Book II — Of Love And Politics.
Chapter I — What Happened In The Library.
Chapter II — ‘On The Court Of Grünewald,’ Being A Portion Of The Traveller’s Manuscript.
Chapter III — The Prince And The English Traveller.
Chapter IV — While The Prince Is In The Ante-Room.
Chapter V — Gondremark Is In My Lady’s Chamber.
Chapter VI — The Prince Delivers A Lecture On Marriage, With Practical Illustrations Of Divorce.
Chapter VII — The Prince Dissolves The Council.
Chapter VIII — The Party Of War Takes Action.
Chapter IX — The Price Of The River Farm; In Which Vainglory Goes Before A Fall.
Chapter X — Gotthold’s Revised Opinion; And The Fall Completed.
Chapter XI — Providence Von Rosen: Act The First — She Beguiles The Baron.
Chapter XII — Providence Von Rosen: Act The Second — She Informs The Prince.
Chapter XIII — Providence Von Rosen: Act The Third — She Enlightens Seraphina.
Chapter XIV — Relates The Cause And Outbreak Of The Revolution.
Book III — Fortunate Misfortune.
Chapter I — Princess Cinderella.
Chapter II — Treats Of A Christian Virtue.
Chapter III — Providence Von Rosen: Act The Last — In Which She Gallops Off.
Chapter IV — Babes In The Wood.
Bibliographical Postscript To Complete The Story.
The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde
Story of the Door.
Search for Mr. Hyde.
Dr. Jekyll Was Quite at Ease.
The Carew Murder Case.
Incident of the Letter.
Incident of Dr. Lanyon.
Incident at the Window.
The Last Night.
Dr. Lanyon’s Narrative.
Henry Jekyll’s Full Statement of the Case.
Kidnapped
Preface To The Biographical Edition.
Dedication.
Chapter I - I Set Off Upon My Journey To The House Of Shaws.
Chapter II - I Come To My Journey’s End.
Chapter III - I Make Acquaintance Of My Uncle.
Chapter IV - I Run A Great Danger In The House Of Shaws.
Chapter V - I Go To The Queen’s Ferry.
Chapter VI - What Befell At The Queen’s Ferry.
Chapter VII - I Go To Sea In The Brig “Covenant” Of Dysart.
Chapter VIII - The Round-House.
Chapter IX - The Man With The Belt Of Gold.
Chapter X - The Siege Of The Round-House.
Chapter XI - The Captain Knuckles Under.
Chapter XII - I Hear Of The “Red Fox”
Chapter XIII - The Loss Of The Brig.
Chapter XIV - The Islet.
Chapter XV - The Lad With The Silver Button: Through The Isle Of Mull.
Chapter XVI - The Lad With The Silver Button: Across Morven.
Chapter XVII - The Death Of The Red Fox.
Chapter XVIII - I Talk With Alan In The Wood Of Lettermore.
Chapter XIX - The House Of Fear.
Chapter XX - The Flight In The Heather: The Rocks.
Chapter XXI - The Flight In The Heather: The Heugh Of Corrynakiegh.
Chapter XXII - The Flight In The Heather: The Moor.
Chapter XXIII - Cluny’s Cage.
Chapter XXIV - The Flight In The Heather: The Quarrel.
Chapter XXV - In Balquhidder.
Chapter XXVI - End Of The Flight: We Pass The Forth.
Chapter XXVII - I Come To Mr. Rankeillor.
Chapter XXVIII - I Go In Quest Of My Inheritance.
Chapter XXIX - I Come Into My Kingdom.
Chapter XXX - Good-Bye.
The Master of Ballantrae - A Winters Tale
To Sir Percy Florence And Lady Shelley.
Preface.
Summary Of Events During The Master’s Wanderings.
The Master’s Wanderings.
Persecutions Endured By Mr. Henry.
Account Of All That Passed On The Night Of February 27th, 1757.
Summary Of Events During The Master’s Second Absence.
Adventure Of Chevalier Burke In India.
The Enemy In The House.
Mr. Mackellar’s Journey With The Master.
Passages At New York.
The Journey In The Wilderness.
Narrative Of The Trader, Mountain.
The Journey In The Wilderness (Continued)
The Genesis Of The Master Of Ballantrae.
The Wrong Box
Preface.
Chapter I - In Which Morris Suspects.
Chapter II - In Which Morris takes Action.
Chapter III - The Lecturer at Large.
Chapter IV - The Magistrate in the Luggage Van.
Chapter V - Mr Gideon Forsyth and the Gigantic Box.
Chapter VI - The Tribulations of Morris: Part the First.
Chapter VII. In Which William Dent Pitman takes Legal Advice.
Chapter VIII - In Which Michael Finsbury Enjoys a Holiday.
Chapter IX - Glorious Conclusion of Michael Finsbury’s Holiday.
Chapter X - Gideon Forsyth and the Broadwood Grand.
Chapter XI - The Maestro Jimson.
Chapter XII - Positively the Last Appearance of the Broadwood Grand.
Chapter XIII - The Tribulations of Morris: Part the Second.
Chapter XIV - William Bent Pitman Hears of Something to his Advantage.
Chapter XV - The Return of the Great Vance.
Chapter XVI - Final Adjustment of the Leather Business.
The Wrecker
Prologue - In The Marquesas.
Chapter I - A Sound Commercial Education.
Chapter II - Roussillon Wine.
Chapter III - To Introduce Mr. Pinkerton.
Chapter IV - In Which I Experience Extremes Of Fortune.
Chapter V - In Which I Am Down On My Luck In Paris.
Chapter VI - In Which I Go West.
Chapter VII - Irons In The Fire.
Chapter VIII - Faces On The City Front.
Chapter IX - The Wreck Of The “Flying Scud.”
Chapter X - In Which The Crew Vanish.
Chapter XI - In Which Jim And I Take Different Ways.
Chapter XII - The “Norah Creina.”
Chapter XIII - The Island And The Wreck.
Chapter XIV - The Cabin Of The “Flying Scud.”
Chapter XV - The Cargo Of The “Flying Scud.”
Chapter XVI - In Which I Turn Smuggler, And The Captain Casuist.
Chapter XVII - Light From The Man Of War.
Chapter XVIII - Cross-Questions And Crooked Answers.
Chapter XIX - Travels With A Shyster.
Chapter XX - Stallbridge-Le-Carthew.
Chapter XXI - Face To Face.
Chapter XXII - The Remittance Man.
Chapter XXIII - The Budget Of The “Currency Lass.”
Chapter XXIV - A Hard Bargain.
Chapter XXV - A Bad Bargain.
Epilogue: To Will H. Low.
Catriona.
Dedication.
Chapter I — A Beggar On Horseback.
Chapter II — The Highland Writer.
Chapter III — I Go To Pilrig.
Chapter IV — Lord Advocate Prestongrange.
Chapter V — In The Advocate’s House.
Chapter VI — Umquile The Master Of Lovat.
Chapter VII — I Make A Fault In Honour.
Chapter VIII — The Bravo.
Chapter IX — The Heather On Fire.
Chapter X — The Red-Headed Man.
Chapter XI — The Wood By Silvermills.
Chapter XII — On The March Again With Alan.
Chapter XIII — Gillane Sands.
Chapter XIV — The Bass.
Chapter XV — Black Andie’s Tale Of Tod Lapraik.
Chapter XVI — The Missing Witness.
Chapter XVII — The Memorial.
Chapter XVIII — The Tee’d Ball.
Chapter XIX — I Am Much In The Hands Of The Ladies.
Chapter XX — I Continue To Move In Good Society.
Chapter XXI — The Voyage Into Holland.
Chapter XXII — Helvoetsluys.
Chapter XXIII — Travels In Holland.
Chapter XXIV — Full Story Of A Copy Of Heineccius.
Chapter XXV — The Return Of James More.
Chapter XXVI — The Threesome.
Chapter XXVII — A Twosome.
Chapter XXVIII — In Which I Am Left Alone.
Chapter XXIX — We Meet In Dunkirk.
Chapter XXX — The Letter From The Ship.
Conclusion.
Weir Of Hermiston
To My Wife.
Introductory.
Chapter I — Life And Death Of Mrs. Weir.
Chapter II — Father And Son.
Chapter III — In The Matter Of The Hanging Of Duncan Jopp.
Chapter IV — Opinions Of The Bench.
Chapter V — Winter On The Moors.
Chapter VI — A Leaf From Christina’s Psalm-Book.
Chapter VII — Enter Mephistopheles.
Chapter VIII — A Nocturnal Visit.
Chapter IX — At The Weaver’s Stone.
Editorial Note.
Glossary.
The Ebb-Tide - A Trio Quartette
Chapter I - Night On The Beach.
Chapter II - Morning On The Beach — The Three Letters.
Chapter III - The Old Calaboose — Destiny At The Door.
Chapter IV - The Yellow Flag.
Chapter V - The Cargo Of Champagne.
Chapter VI - The Partners.
Chapter VII - The Pearl-Fisher.
Chapter VIII - Better Acquaintance.
Chapter IX - The Dinner Party.
Chapter X - The Open Door.
Chapter XI - David And Goliath.
Chapter XII - Tail-Piece.
St. Ives - Being The Adventures of a French Prisoner In England
Chapter I — A Tale Of A Lion Rampant.
Chapter II — A Tale Of A Pair Of Scissors.
Chapter III — Major Chevenix Comes Into The Story, And Goguelat Goes Out.
Chapter IV — St. Ives Gets A Bundle Of Bank Notes.
Chapter V — St. Ives Is Shown A House.
Chapter VI — The Escape.
Chapter VII — Swanston Cottage.
Chapter VIII — The Hen-House.
Chapter IX — Three Is Company, And Four None.
Chapter X — The Drovers.
Chapter XI — The Great North Road.
Chapter XII — I Follow A Covered Cart Nearly To My Destination.
Chapter XIII — I Meet Two Of My Countrymen.
Chapter XIV — Travels Of The Covered Cart.
Chapter XV — The Adventure Of The Attorney’s Clerk.
Chapter XVI — The Home-Coming Of Mr. Rowley’s Viscount.
Chapter XVII — The Despatch-Box.
Chapter XVIII — Mr. Romaine Calls Me Names.
Chapter XIX — The Devil And All At Amersham Place.
Chapter XX — After The Storm.
Chapter XXI — I Become The Owner Of A Claret-Coloured Chaise.
Chapter XXII — Character And Acquirements Of Mr. Rowley.
Chapter XXIII — The Adventure Of The Runaway Couple.
Chapter XXIV — The Inn-Keeper Of Kirkby-Lonsdale.
Chapter XXV — I Meet A Cheerful Extravagant.
Chapter XXVI — The Cottage At Night.
Chapter XXVII — The Sabbath Day.
Chapter XXVIII — Events Of Monday: The Lawyer’s Party.
Chapter XXIX — Events Of Tuesday: The Toils Closing.
Chapter XXX — Events Of Wednesday; The University Of Cramond.
Heathercat
Chapter I — Traquairs Of Montroymont.
Chapter II — Francie.
Chapter III — The Hill-End Of Drumlowe.
The Great North Road
Chapter I — Nance At The ‘Green Dragon’
Chapter II — In Which Mr. Archer Is Installed.
Chapter III — Jonathan Holdaway.
Chapter IV — Mingling Threads.
Chapter V — Life In The Castle.
Chapter VI — The Bad Half-Crown.
Chapter VII — The Bleaching-Green.
Chapter VIII — The Mail Guard.
The Young Chevalier
Prologue — The Wine-Seller’s Wife.
Chapter I — The Prince.
New Arabian Nights
Dedication.
The Suicide Club.
Story Of The Young Man With The Cream Tarts.
Story Of The Physician And The Saratoga Trunk.
The Adventure Of The Hansom Cabs.
The Rajah’s Diamond.
Story Of The Bandbox.
Story Of The Young Man In Holy Orders.
Story Of The House With The Green Blinds.
The Adventure Of Prince Florizel And A Detective.
The Pavilion On The Links
Chapter I - Tells How I Camped In Graden Sea-Wood, And Beheld A Light In The Pavilion.
Chapter II - Tells Of The Nocturnal Landing From The Yacht.
Chapter III - Tells How I Became Acquainted With My Wife.
Chapter IV - Tells In What A Startling Manner I Learned That I Was Not Alone In Graden Sea-Wood.
Chapter V - Tells Of An Interview Between Northmour, Clara, And Myself.
Chapter VI - Tells Of My Introduction To The Tall Man.
Chapter VII - Tells How A Word Was Cried Through The Pavilion Window.
Chapter VIII - Tells The Last Of The Tall Man.
Chapter IX - Tells How Northmour Carried Out His Threat.
A Lodging For The Night: A Story Of Francis Villon
The Sire De Malétroit’s Door
Providence And The Guitar
Chapter I.
Chapter II.
Chapter III.
Chapter IV.
Chapter V.
Chapter VI.
More New Arabian Nights - The Dynamiter
Preface.
Prologue Of The Cigar Divan.
Challoner’s Adventure: The Squire Of Dames.
Story Of The Destroying Angel.
The Squire Of Dames (Concluded)
Somerset’s Adventure: The Superfluous Mansion.
Narrative Of The Spirited Old Lady.
The Superfluous Mansion (Continued).
Zero’s Tale Of The Explosive Bomb.
The Superfluous Mansion (Continued)
Desborough’s Adventure: The Brown Box.
Story Of The Fair Cuban.
The Brown Box (Concluded)
The Superfluous Mansion (Concluded)
Epilogue Of The Cigar Divan.
The Merry Men And Other Tales And Fables
Dedication.
The Merry Men.
Will O’ The Mill.
Markheim.
Thrawn Janet.
Olalla.
The Treasure Of Franchard.
Treasure Island
Part One - The Old Buccaneer.
Chapter I - The Old Sea-Dog At The Admiral Benbow.
SQUIRE TRELAWNEY, DR. LIVESEY, AND THE REST OF THESE GENTLEMEN HAVING asked me to write down the whole particulars about Treasure Island, from the beginning to the end, keeping nothing back but the bearings of the island, and that only because there is still treasure not yet lifted, I take up my pen in the year of grace 17_ and go back to the time when my father kept the Admiral Benbow inn and the brown old seaman with the sabre cut first took up his lodging under our roof.
I remember him as if it were yesterday, as he came plodding to the inn door, his sea-chest following behind him in a hand-barrow—a tall, strong, heavy, nut-brown man, his tarry pigtail falling over the shoulder of his soiled blue coat, his hands ragged and scarred, with black, broken nails, and the sabre cut across one cheek, a dirty, livid white. I remember him looking round the cover and whistling to himself as he did so, and then breaking out in that old sea-song that he sang so often afterwards:
“Fifteen men on the Dead Man’s Chest —
Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!”
in the high, old tottering voice that seemed to have been tuned and broken at the capstan bars. Then he rapped on the door with a bit of stick like a handspike that he carried, and when my father appeared, called roughly for a glass of rum. This, when it was brought to him, he drank slowly, like a connoisseur, lingering on the taste and still looking about him at the cliffs and up at our signboard.
“This is a handy cove,” says he at length; “and a pleasant sittyated grog-shop. Much company, mate?”
My father told him no, very little company, the more was the pity.
“Well, then,” said he, “this is the berth for me. Here you, matey,” he cried to the man who trundled the barrow; “bring up alongside and help up my chest. I’ll stay here a bit,” he continued. “I’m a plain man; rum and bacon and eggs is what I want, and that head up there for to watch ships off. What you mought call me? You mought call me captain. Oh, I see what you’re at—there”; and he threw down three or four gold pieces on the threshold. “You can tell me when I’ve worked through that,” says he, looking as fierce as a commander.
And indeed bad as his clothes were and coarsely as he spoke, he had none of the appearance of a man who sailed before the mast, but seemed like a mate or skipper accustomed to be obeyed or to strike. The man who came with the barrow told us the mail had set him down the morning before at the Royal George, that he had inquired what inns there were along the coast, and hearing ours well spoken of, I suppose, and described as lonely, had chosen it from the others for his place of residence. And that was all we could learn of our guest.
He was a very silent man by custom. All day he hung round the cove or upon the cliffs with a brass telescope; all evening he sat in a corner of the parlour next the fire and drank rum and water very strong. Mostly he would not speak when spoken to, only look up sudden and fierce and blow through his nose like a fog-horn; and we and the people who came about our house soon learned to let him be. Every day when he came back from his stroll he would ask if any seafaring men had gone by along the road. At first we thought it was the want of company of his own kind that made him ask this question, but at last we began to see he was desirous to avoid them. When a seaman did put up at the Admiral Benbow (as now and then some did, making by the coast road for Bristol) he would look in at him through the curtained door before he entered the parlour; and he was always sure to be as silent as a mouse when any such was present. For me, at least, there was no secret about the matter, for I was, in a way, a sharer in his alarms. He had taken me aside one day and promised me a silver fourpenny on the first of every month if I would only keep my “weather-eye open for a seafaring man with one leg” and let him know the moment he appeared. Often enough when the first of the month came round and I applied to him for my wage, he would only blow through his nose at me and stare me down, but before the week was out he was sure to think better of it, bring me my four-penny piece, and repeat his orders to look out for “the seafaring man with one leg.”
How that personage haunted my dreams, I need scarcely tell you. On stormy nights, when the wind shook the four corners of the house and the surf roared along the cove and up the cliffs, I would see him in a thousand forms, and with a thousand diabolical expressions. Now the leg would be cut off at the knee, now at the hip; now he was a monstrous kind of a creature who had never had but the one leg, and that in the middle of his body. To see him leap and run and pursue me over hedge and ditch was the worst of nightmares. And altogether I paid pretty dear for my monthly fourpenny piece, in the shape of these abominable fancies.
But though I was so terrified by the idea of the seafaring man with one leg, I was far less afraid of the captain himself than anybody else who knew him. There were nights when he took a deal more rum and water than his head would carry; and then he would sometimes sit and sing his wicked, old, wild sea-songs, minding nobody; but sometimes he would call for glasses round and force all the trembling company to listen to his stories or bear a chorus to his singing. Often I have heard the house shaking with “Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum,” all the neighbours joining in for dear life, with the fear of death upon them, and each singing louder than the other to avoid remark. For in these fits he was the most overriding companion ever known; he would slap his hand on the table for silence all round; he would fly up in a passion of anger at a question, or sometimes because none was put, and so he judged the company was not following his story. Nor would he allow anyone to leave the inn till he had drunk himself sleepy and reeled off to bed.
His stories were what frightened people worst of all. Dreadful stories they were— about hanging, and walking the plank, and storms at sea, and the Dry Tortugas, and wild deeds and places on the Spanish Main. By his own account he must have lived his life among some of the wickedest men that God ever allowed upon the sea, and the language in which he told these stories shocked our plain country people almost as much as the crimes that he described. My father was always saying the inn would be ruined, for people would soon cease coming there to be tyrannized over and put down, and sent shivering to their beds; but I really believe his presence did us good. People were frightened at the time, but on looking back they rather liked it; it was a fine excitement in a quiet country life, and there was even a party of the younger men who pretended to admire him, calling him a “true sea-dog” and a “real old salt” and such like names, and saying there was the sort of man that made England terrible at sea.
In one way, indeed, he bade fair to ruin us, for he kept on staying week after week, and at last month after month, so that all the money had been long exhausted, and still my father never plucked up the heart to insist on having more. If ever he mentioned it, the captain blew through his nose so loudly that you might say he roared, and stared my poor father out of the room. I have seen him wringing his hands after such a rebuff, and I am sure the annoyance and the terror he lived in must have greatly hastened his early and unhappy death.
All the time he lived with us the captain made no change whatever in his dress but to buy some stockings from a hawker. One of the cocks of his hat having fallen down, he let it hang from that day forth, though it was a great annoyance when it blew. I remember the appearance of his coat, which he patched himself upstairs in his room, and which, before the end, was nothing but patches. He never wrote or received a letter, and he never spoke with any but the neighbours, and with these, for the most part, only when drunk on rum. The great sea-chest none of us had ever seen open.
He was only once crossed, and that was towards the end, when my poor father was far gone in a decline that took him off. Dr. Livesey came late one afternoon to see the patient, took a bit of dinner from my mother, and went into the parlour to smoke a pipe until his horse should come down from the hamlet, for we had no stabling at the old Benbow. I followed him in, and I remember observing the contrast the neat, bright doctor, with his powder as white as snow and his bright, black eyes and pleasant manners, made with the coltish country folk, and above all, with that filthy, heavy, bleared scarecrow of a pirate of ours, sitting, far gone in rum, with his arms on the table. Suddenly he—the captain, that is—began to pipe up his eternal song:
“Fifteen men on the Dead Man’s Chest —
Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!
Drink and the devil had done for the rest —
Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!”
At first I had supposed “the dead man’s chest” to be that identical big box of his upstairs in the front room, and the thought had been mingled in my nightmares with that of the one-legged seafaring man. But by this time we had all long ceased to pay any particular notice to the song; it was new, that night, to nobody but Dr. Livesey, and on him I observed it did not produce an agreeable effect, for he looked up for a moment quite angrily before he went on with his talk to old Taylor, the gardener, on a new cure for the rheumatics. In the meantime, the captain gradually brightened up at his own music, and at last flapped his hand upon the table before him in a way we all knew to mean silence. The voices stopped at once, all but Dr. Livesey’s; he went on as before speaking clear and kind and drawing briskly at his pipe between every word or two. The captain glared at him for a while, flapped his hand again, glared still harder, and at last broke out with a villainous, low oath, “Silence, there, between decks!”
“Were you addressing me, sir?” says the doctor; and when the ruffian had told him, with another oath, that this was so, “I have only one thing to say to you, sir,” replies the doctor, “that if you keep on drinking rum, the world will soon be quit of a very dirty scoundrel!”
The old fellow’s fury was awful. He sprang to his feet, drew and opened a sailor’s clasp-knife, and balancing it open on the palm of his hand, threatened to pin the doctor to the wall.
“If you do not put that knife this instant in your pocket, you shall hang at the next assizes”
The doctor never so much as moved. He spoke to him as before, over his shoulder and in the same tone of voice, rather high, so that all the room might hear, but perfectly calm and steady: “If you do not put that knife this instant in your pocket, I promise, upon my honour, you shall hang at the next assizes.”
Then followed a battle of looks between them, but the captain soon knuckled under, put up his weapon, and resumed his seat, grumbling like a beaten dog.
“And now, sir,” continued the doctor, “since I now know there’s such a fellow in my district, you may count I’ll have an eye upon you day and night. I’m not a doctor only; I’m a magistrate; and if I catch a breath of complaint against you, if it’s only for a piece of incivility like tonight’s, I’ll take effectual means to have you hunted down and routed out of this. Let that suffice.”
Soon after, Dr. Livesey’s horse came to the door and he rode away, but the captain held his peace that evening, and for many evenings to come.
Chapter II - Black Dog Appears And Disappears.
IT WAS NOT VERY LONG AFTER THIS THAT THERE OCCURRED THE FIRST OF THE mysterious events that rid us at last of the captain, though not, as you will see, of his affairs. It was a bitter cold winter, with long, hard frosts and heavy gales; and it was plain from the first that my poor father was little likely to see the spring. He sank daily, and my mother and I had all the inn upon our hands, and were kept busy enough without paying much regard to our unpleasant guest.
It was one January morning, very early—a pinching, frosty morning—the cove all grey with hoar-frost, the ripple lapping softly on the stones, the sun still low and only touching the hilltops and shining far to seaward. The captain had risen earlier than usual and set out down the beach, his cutlass swinging under the broad skirts of the old blue coat, his brass telescope under his arm, his hat tilted back upon his head. I remember his breath hanging like smoke in his wake as he strode off, and the last sound I heard of him as he turned the big rock was a loud snort of indignation, as though his mind was still running upon Dr. Livesey.
Well, mother was upstairs with father and I was laying the breakfast-table against the captain’s return when the parlour door opened and a man stepped in on whom I had never set my eyes before. He was a pale, tallowy creature, wanting two fingers of the left hand, and though he wore a cutlass, he did not look much like a fighter. I had always my eye open for seafaring men, with one leg or two, and I remember this one puzzled me. He was not sailorly, and yet he had a smack of the sea about him too.
I asked him what was for his service, and he said he would take rum; but as I was going out of the room to fetch it, he sat down upon a table and motioned me to draw near. I paused where I was, with my napkin in my hand.
“Come here, sonny,” says he. “Come nearer here.”
I took a step nearer.
“Is this here table for my mate Bill?” he asked with a kind of leer.
I told him I did not know his mate Bill, and this was for a person who stayed in our house whom we called the captain.
“Well,” said he, “my mate Bill would be called the captain, as like as not. He has a cut on one cheek and a mighty pleasant way with him, particularly in drink, has my mate Bill. We’ll put it, for argument like, that your captain has a cut on one cheek— and we’ll put it, if you like, that that cheek’s the right one. Ah, well! I told you. Now, is my mate Bill in this here house?”
I told him he was out walking.
“Which way, sonny? Which way is he gone?”
And when I had pointed out the rock and told him how the captain was likely to return, and how soon, and answered a few other questions, “Ah,” said he, “this’ll be as good as drink to my mate Bill.”
The expression of his face as he said these words was not at all pleasant, and I had my own reasons for thinking that the stranger was mistaken, even supposing he meant what he said. But it was no affair of mine, I thought; and besides, it was difficult to know what to do. The stranger kept hanging about just inside the inn door, peering round the corner like a cat waiting for a mouse. Once I stepped out myself into the road, but he immediately called me back, and as I did not obey quick enough for his fancy, a most horrible change came over his tallowy face, and he ordered me in with an oath that made me jump. As soon as I was back again he returned to his former manner, half fawning, half sneering, patted me on the shoulder, told me I was a good boy and he had taken quite a fancy to me. “I have a son of my own,” said he, “as like you as two blocks, and he’s all the pride of my ‘art. But the great thing for boys is discipline, sonny—discipline. Now, if you had sailed along of Bill, you wouldn’t have stood there to be spoke to twice—not you. That was never Bill’s way, nor the way of sich as sailed with him. And here, sure enough, is my mate Bill, with a spy-glass under his arm, bless his old ‘art, to be sure. You and me’ll just go back into the parlour, sonny, and get behind the door, and we’ll give Bill a little surprise—bless his ‘art, I say again.”
So saying, the stranger backed along with me into the parlour and put me behind him in the corner so that we were both hidden by the open door. I was very uneasy and alarmed, as you may fancy, and it rather added to my fears to observe that the stranger was certainly frightened himself. He cleared the hilt of his cutlass and loosened the blade in the sheath; and all the time we were waiting there he kept swallowing as if he felt what we used to call a lump in the throat.
At last in strode the captain, slammed the door behind him, without looking to the right or left, and marched straight across the room to where his breakfast awaited him.
“Bill,” said the stranger in a voice that I thought he had tried to make bold and big.
The captain spun round on his heel and fronted us; all the brown had gone out of his face, and even his nose was blue; he had the look of a man who sees a ghost, or the evil one, or something worse, if anything can be; and upon my word, I felt sorry to see him all in a moment turn so old and sick.
“Come, Bill, you know me; you know an old shipmate, Bill, surely,” said the stranger.
The captain made a sort of gasp.
“Black Dog!” said he.
“And who else?” returned the other, getting more at his ease. “Black Dog as ever was, come for to see his old shipmate Billy, at the Admiral Benbow inn. Ah, Bill, Bill, we have seen a sight of times, us two, since I lost them two talons,” holding up his mutilated hand.
“Now, look here,” said the captain; “you’ve run me down; here I am; well, then, speak up; what is it?”
“That’s you, Bill,” returned Black Dog, “you’re in the right of it, Billy. I’ll have a glass of rum from this dear child here, as I’ve took such a liking to; and we’ll sit down, if you please, and talk square, like old shipmates.”
When I returned with the rum, they were already seated on either side of the captain’s breakfast-table—Black Dog next to the door and sitting sideways so as to have one eye on his old shipmate and one, as I thought, on his retreat.
He bade me go and leave the door wide open. “None of your keyholes for me, sonny,” he said; and I left them together and retired into the bar.
“For a long time, though I certainly did my best to listen, I could hear nothing but a low gattling; but at last the voices began to grow higher, and I could pick up a word or two, mostly oaths, from the captain.
“No, no, no, no; and an end of it!” he cried once. And again, “If it comes to swinging, swing all, say I.”
Then all of a sudden there was a tremendous explosion of oaths and other noises— the chair and table went over in a lump, a clash of steel followed, and then a cry of pain, and the next instant I saw Black Dog in full flight, and the captain hotly pursuing, both with drawn cutlasses, and the former streaming blood from the left shoulder. Just at the door the captain aimed at the fugitive one last tremendous cut, which would certainly have split him to the chine had it not been intercepted by our big signboard of Admiral Benbow. You may see the notch on the lower side of the frame to this day.
That blow was the last of the battle. Once out upon the road, Black Dog, in spite of his wound, showed a wonderful clean pair of heels and disappeared over the edge of the hill in half a minute. The captain, for his part, stood staring at the signboard like a bewildered man. Then he passed his hand over his eyes several times and at last turned back into the house.
“Jim,” says he, “rum”; and as he spoke, he reeled a little, and caught himself with one hand against the wall.
“Are you hurt?” cried I.
“Rum,” he repeated. “I must get away from here. Rum! Rum!”
I ran to fetch it, but I was quite unsteadied by all that had fallen out, and I broke one glass and fouled the tap, and while I was still getting in my own way, I heard a loud fall in the parlour, and running in, beheld the captain lying full length upon the floor. At the same instant my mother, alarmed by the cries and fighting, came running downstairs to help me. Between us we raised his head. He was breathing very loud and hard, but his eyes were closed and his face a horrible colour.
“Dear, deary me,” cried my mother, “what a disgrace upon the house! And your poor father sick!”
In the meantime, we had no idea what to do to help the captain, nor any other thought but that he had got his death-hurt in the scuffle with the stranger. I got the rum, to be sure, and tried to put it down his throat, but his teeth were tightly shut and his jaws as strong as iron. It was a happy relief for us when the door opened and Doctor Livesey came in, on his visit to my father.
“Oh, doctor,” we cried, “what shall we do? Where is he wounded?”
“Wounded? A fiddle-stick’s end!” said the doctor. “No more wounded than you or I. The man has had a stroke, as I warned him. Now, Mrs. Hawkins, just you run upstairs to your husband and tell him, if possible, nothing about it. For my part, I must do my best to save this fellow’s trebly worthless life; Jim, you get me a basin.”
The next instant I saw Black Dog in full flight
When I got back with the basin, the doctor had already ripped up the captain’s sleeve and exposed his great sinewy arm. It was tattooed in several places. “Here’s luck,” “A fair wind,” and “Billy Bones his fancy,” were very neatly and clearly executed on the forearm; and up near the shoulder there was a sketch of a gallows and a man hanging from it— done, as I thought, with great spirit.
“Prophetic,” said the doctor, touching this picture with his finger. “And now, Master Billy Bones, if that be your name, we’ll have a look at the colour of your blood. Jim,” he said, “are you afraid of blood?”
“No, sir,” said I.
“Well, then,” said he, “you hold the basin”; and with that he took his lancet and opened a vein.
A great deal of blood was taken before the captain opened his eyes and looked mistily about him. First he recognized the doctor with an unmistakable frown; then his glance fell upon me, and he looked relieved. But suddenly his colour changed, and he tried to raise himself, crying, “Where’s Black Dog?”
“There is no Black Dog here,” said the doctor, “except what you have on your own back. You have been drinking rum; you have had a stroke, precisely as I told you; and I have just, very much against my own will, dragged you headforemost out of the grave. Now, Mr. Bones—”
“That’s not my name,” he interrupted.
“Much I care,” returned the doctor. “It’s the name of a buccaneer of my acquaintance; and I call you by it for the sake of shortness, and what I have to say to you is this; one glass of rum won’t kill you, but if you take one you’ll take another and another, and I stake my wig if you don’t break off short, you’ll die—do you understand that?—die, and go to your own place, like the man in the Bible. Come, now, make an effort. I’ll help you to your bed for once.”
Between us, with much trouble, we managed to hoist him upstairs, and laid him on his bed, where his head fell back on the pillow as if he were almost fainting.
“Now, mind you,” said the doctor, “I clear my conscience—the name of rum for you is death.”
And with that he went off to see my father, taking me with him by the arm.
“This is nothing,” he said as soon as he had closed the door. “I have drawn blood enough to keep him quiet awhile; he should lie for a week where he is—that is the best thing for him and you; but another stroke would settle him.”
Chapter III - The Black Spot.
ABOUT NOON I STOPPED AT THE CAPTAIN’S DOOR WITH SOME COOLING drinks and medicines. He was lying very much as we had left him, only a little higher, and he seemed both weak and excited.
“Jim,” he said, “you’re the only one here that’s worth anything, and you know I’ve been always good to you. Never a month but I’ve given you a silver fourpenny for yourself. And now you see, mate, I’m pretty low, and deserted by all; and Jim, you’ll bring me one noggin of rum, now, won’t you, matey?”
“The doctor—” I began.
But he broke in cursing the doctor, in a feeble voice but heartily. “Doctors is all swabs,” he said; “and that doctor there, why, what do he know about seafaring men? I been in places hot as pitch, and mates dropping round with Yellow Jack, and the blessed land a-heaving like the sea with earthquakes—what to the doctor know of lands like that?—and I lived on rum, I tell you. It’s been meat and drink, and man and wife, to me; and if I’m not to have my rum now I’m a poor old hulk on a lee shore, my blood’ll be on you, Jim, and that doctor swab”; and he ran on again for a while with curses. “Look, Jim, how my fingers fidges,” he continued in the pleading tone. “I can’t keep ‘em still, not I. I haven’t had a drop this blessed day. That doctor’s a fool, I tell you. If I don’t have a drain o’ rum, Jim, I’ll have the horrors; I seen some on ‘em already. I seen old Flint in the corner there, behind you; as plain as print, I seen him; and if I get the horrors, I’m a man that has lived rough, and I’ll raise Cain. Your doctor hisself said one glass wouldn’t hurt me. I’ll give you a golden guinea for a noggin, Jim.”
He was growing more and more excited, and this alarmed me for my father, who was very low that day and needed quiet; besides, I was reassured by the doctor’s words, now quoted to me, and rather offended by the offer of a bribe.
“I want none of your money,” said I, “but what you owe my father. I’ll get you one glass, and no more.”
When I brought it to him, he seized it greedily and drank it out.
“Aye, aye,” said he, “that’s some better, sure enough. And now, matey, did that doctor say how long I was to lie here in this old berth?”
“A week at least,” said I.
“Thunder!” he cried. “A week! I can’t do that; they’d have the black spot on me by then. The lubbers is going about to get the wind of me this blessed moment; lubbers as couldn’t keep what they got, and want to nail what is another’s. Is that seamanly behaviour, now, I want to know? But I’m a saving soul. I never wasted good money of mine, nor lost it neither; and I’ll trick ‘em again. I’m not afraid on ‘em. I’ll shake out another reef, matey, and daddle ‘em again.”
As he was thus speaking, he had risen from bed with great difficulty, holding to my shoulder with a grip that almost made me cry out, and moving his legs like so much dead weight. His words, spirited as they were in meaning, contrasted sadly with the weakness of the voice in which they were uttered. He paused when he had got into a sitting position on the edge.
“That doctor’s done me,” he murmured. “My ears is singing. Lay me back.”
Before I could do much to help him he had fallen back again to his former place, where he lay for a while silent.
“Jim,” he said at length, “you saw that seafaring man today?”
“Black Dog?” I asked.
“Ah! Black Dog,” says he. “He’s a bad un; but there’s worse that put him on. Now, if I can’t get away nohow, and they tip me the black spot, mind you, it’s my old sea-chest they’re after; you get on a horse—you can, can’t you? Well, then, you get on a horse, and go to—well, yes, I will!—to that eternal doctor swab, and tell him to pipe all hands—magistrates and sich—and he’ll lay ‘em aboard at the Admiral Benbow—all old Flint’s crew, man and boy, all on ‘em that’s left. I was first mate, I was, old Flint’s first mate, and I’m the on’y one as knows the place. He gave it me at Savannah, when he lay a-dying, like as if I was to now, you see. But you won’t peach unless they get the black spot on me, or unless you see that Black Dog again or a seafaring man with one leg, Jim—him above all.”
“But what is the black spot, captain?” I asked.
“That’s a summons, mate. I’ll tell you if they get that. But you keep your weather-eye open, Jim, and I’ll share with you equals, upon my honour.”
He wandered a little longer, his voice growing weaker; but soon after I had given him his medicine, which he took like a child, with the remark, “If ever a seaman wanted drugs, it’s me,” he fell at last into a heavy, swoon-like sleep, in which I left him. What I should have done had all gone well I do not know. Probably I should have told the whole story to the doctor, for I was in mortal fear lest the captain should repent of his confessions and make an end of me. But as things fell out, my poor father died quite suddenly that evening, which put all other matters on one side. Our natural distress, the visits of the neighbours, the arranging of the funeral, and all the work of the inn to be carried on in the meanwhile kept me so busy that I had scarcely time to think of the captain, far less to be afraid of him.
He got downstairs next morning, to be sure, and had his meals as usual, though he ate little and had more, I am afraid, than his usual supply of rum, for he helped himself out of the bar, scowling and blowing through his nose, and no one dared to cross him. On the night before the funeral he was as drunk as ever; and it was shocking, in that house of mourning, to hear him singing away at his ugly old sea-song; but weak as he was, we were all in the fear of death for him, and the doctor was suddenly taken up with a case many miles away and was never near the house after my father’s death. I have said the captain was weak, and indeed he seemed rather to grow weaker than regain his strength. He clambered up and down stairs, and went from the parlour to the bar and back again, and sometimes put his nose out of doors to smell the sea, holding on to the walls as he went for support and breathing hard and fast like a man on a steep mountain. He never particularly addressed me, and it is my belief he had as good as forgotten his confidences; but his temper was more flighty, and allowing for his bodily weakness, more violent than ever. He had an alarming way now when he was drunk of drawing his cutlass and laying it bare before him on the table. But with all that, he minded people less and seemed shut up in his own thoughts and rather wandering. Once, for instance, to our extreme wonder, he piped up to a different air, a king of country love-song that he must have learned in his youth before he had begun to follow the sea.
So things passed until, the day after the funeral, and about three o’clock of a bitter, foggy, frosty afternoon, I was standing at the door for a moment, full of sad thoughts about my father, when I saw someone drawing slowly near along the road. He was plainly blind, for he tapped before him with a stick and wore a great green shade over his eyes and nose; and he was hunched, as if with age or weakness, and wore a huge old tattered sea-cloak with a hood that made him appear positively deformed. I never saw in my life a more dreadful-looking figure. He stopped a little from the inn, and raising his voice in an odd sing-song, addressed the air in front of him, “Will any kind friend inform a poor blind man, who has lost the precious sight of his eyes in the gracious defence of his native country, England—and God bless King George!—where or in what part of this country he may now be?”
“You are at the Admiral Benbow, Black Hill Cove, my good man,” said I.
“I hear a voice,” said he, “a young voice. Will you give me your hand, my kind young friend, and lead me in?”
I held out my hand, and the horrible, soft-spoken, eyeless creature gripped it in a moment like a vise. I was so much startled that I struggled to withdraw, but the blind man pulled me close up to him with a single action of his arm.
“Now, boy,” he said, “take me in to the captain.”
“Sir,” said I, “upon my word I dare not.”
“Oh,” he sneered, “that’s it! Take me in straight or I’ll break your arm.”
And he gave it, as he spoke, a wrench that made me cry out.
“Sir,” said I, “it is for yourself I mean. The captain is not what he used to be. He sits with a drawn cutlass. Another gentleman—”
“Come, now, march,” interrupted he; and I never heard a voice so cruel, and cold, and ugly as that blind man’s. It cowed me more than the pain, and I began to obey him at once, walking straight in at the door and towards the parlour, where our sick old buccaneer was sitting, dazed with rum. The blind man clung close to me, holding me in one iron fist and leaning almost more of his weight on me than I could carry. “Lead me straight up to him, and when I’m in view, cry out, ‘Here’s a friend for you, Bill.’ If you don’t, I’ll do this,” and with that he gave me a twitch that I thought would have made me faint. Between this and that, I was so utterly terrified of the blind beggar that I forgot my terror of the captain, and as I opened the parlour door, cried out the words he had ordered in a trembling voice.
At one look the rum went out of him and left him staring sober
The poor captain raised his eyes, and at one look the rum went out of him and left him staring sober. The expression of his face was not so much of terror as of mortal sickness. He made a movement to rise, but I do not believe he had enough force left in his body.
“Now, Bill, sit where you are,” said the beggar. “If I can’t see, I can hear a finger stirring. Business is business. Hold out your left hand. Boy, take his left hand by the wrist and bring it near to my right.”
We both obeyed him to the letter, and I saw him pass something from the hollow of the hand that held his stick into the palm of the captain’s, which closed upon it instantly.
“And now that’s done,” said the blind man; and at the words he suddenly left hold of me, and with incredible accuracy and nimbleness, skipped out of the parlour and into the road, where, as I still stood motionless, I could hear his stick go tap-tap-tapping into the distance.
It was some time before either I or the captain seemed to gather our senses, but at length, and about at the same moment, I released his wrist, which I was still holding, and he drew in his hand and looked sharply into the palm.
“Ten o’clock!” he cried. “Six hours. We’ll do them yet,” and he sprang to his feet.
Even as he did so, he reeled, put his hand to his throat, stood swaying for a moment, and then, with a peculiar sound, fell from his whole height face foremost to the floor.
I ran to him at once, calling to my mother. But haste was all in vain. The captain had been struck dead by thundering apoplexy. It is a curious thing to understand, for I had certainly never liked the man, though of late I had begun to pity him, but as soon as I saw that he was dead, I burst into a flood of tears. It was the second death I had known, and the sorrow of the first was still fresh in my heart.
Chapter IV - The Sea-Chest.
I LOST NO TIME, OF COURSE, IN TELLING MY MOTHER ALL THAT I KNEW, AND Perhaps should have told her long before, and we saw ourselves at once in a difficult and dangerous position. Some of the man’s money—if he had any—was certainly due to us, but it was not likely that our captain’s shipmates, above all the two specimens seen by me, Black Dog and the blind beggar, would be inclined to give up their booty in payment of the dead man’s debts. The captain’s order to mount at once and ride for Doctor Livesey would have left my mother alone and unprotected, which was not to be thought of. Indeed, it seemed impossible for either of us to remain much longer in the house; the fall of coals in the kitchen grate, the very ticking of the clock, filled us with alarms. The neighbourhood, to our ears, seemed haunted by approaching footsteps; and what between the dead body of the captain on the parlour floor and the thought of that detestable blind beggar hovering near at hand and ready to return, there were moments when, as the saying goes, I jumped in my skin for terror. Something must speedily be resolved upon, and it occurred to us at last to go forth together and seek help in the neighbouring hamlet. No sooner said than done. Bare-headed as we were, we ran out at once in the gathering evening and the frosty fog.
The hamlet lay not many hundred yards away, though out of view, on the other side of the next cove; and what greatly encouraged me, it was in an opposite direction from that whence the blind man had made his appearance and whither he had presumably returned. We were not many minutes on the road, though we sometimes stopped to lay hold of each other and hearken. But there was no unusual sound—nothing but the low wash of the ripple and the croaking of the inmates of the wood.
It was already candle-light when we reached the hamlet, and I shall never forget how much I was cheered to see the yellow shine in doors and windows; but that, as it proved, was the best of the help we were likely to get in that quarter. For—you would have thought men would have been ashamed of themselves—no soul would consent to return with us to the Admiral Benbow. The more we told of our troubles, the more—man, woman, and child—they clung to the shelter of their houses. The name of Captain Flint, though it was strange to me, was well enough known to some there and carried a great weight of terror. Some of the men who had been to field-work on the far side of the Admiral Benbow remembered, besides, to have seen several strangers on the road, and taking them to be smugglers, to have bolted away; and one at least had seen a little lugger in what we called Kitt’s Hole. For that matter, anyone who was a comrade of the captain’s was enough to frighten them to death. And the short and the long of the matter was, that while we could get several who were willing enough to ride to Dr. Livesey’s, which lay in another direction, not one would help us to defend the inn.
