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Chapter 30
On Parole
I WAS wakened--indeed, we were all wakened,
for I could see even the sentinel shake
himself together from where he had fallen
against the door-post--by a clear, hearty
voice hailing us from the margin of the
wood:
"Block house, ahoy!" it cried.
"Here's the doctor."
And the doctor it was.
Although I was glad to hear the sound, yet
my gladness was not without admixture.
I remembered with confusion my
insubordinate and stealthy conduct, and
when I saw where it had brought me--among
what companions and surrounded by what
dangers--I felt ashamed to look him in the
face.
He must have risen in the dark, for the day
had hardly come; and when I ran to a
loophole and looked out, I saw him
standing, like Silver once before, up to
the mid-leg in creeping vapour.
"You, doctor!
Top o' the morning to you, sir!" cried
Silver, broad awake and beaming with good
nature in a moment.
"Bright and early, to be sure; and it's the
early bird, as the saying goes, that gets
the rations.
George, shake up your timbers, son, and
help Dr. Livesey over the ship's side.
All a-doin' well, your patients was--all
well and merry."
So he pattered on, standing on the hilltop
with his crutch under his elbow and one
hand upon the side of the log-house--quite
the old John in voice, manner, and
expression.
"We've quite a surprise for you too, sir,"
he continued.
"We've a little stranger here--he! he!
A noo boarder and lodger, sir, and looking
fit and taut as a fiddle; slep' like a
supercargo, he did, right alongside of
John--stem to stem we was, all night."
Dr. Livesey was by this time across the
stockade and pretty near the cook, and I
could hear the alteration in his voice as
he said, "Not Jim?"
"The very same Jim as ever was," says
Silver.
The doctor stopped outright, although he
did not speak, and it was some seconds
before he seemed able to move on.
"Well, well," he said at last, "duty first
and pleasure afterwards, as you might have
said yourself, Silver.
Let us overhaul these patients of yours."
A moment afterwards he had entered the
block house and with one grim nod to me
proceeded with his work among the sick.
He seemed under no apprehension, though he
must have known that his life, among these
treacherous demons, depended on a hair; and
he rattled on to his patients as if he were
paying an ordinary professional visit in a
quiet English family.
His manner, I suppose, reacted on the men,
for they behaved to him as if nothing had
occurred, as if he were still ship's doctor
and they still faithful hands before the
mast.
"You're doing well, my friend," he said to
the fellow with the bandaged head, "and if
ever any person had a close shave, it was
you; your head must be as hard as iron.
Well, George, how goes it?
You're a pretty colour, certainly; why,
your liver, man, is upside down.
Did you take that medicine?
Did he take that medicine, men?"
"Aye, aye, sir, he took it, sure enough,"
returned Morgan.
"Because, you see, since I am mutineers'
doctor, or prison doctor as I prefer to
call it," says Doctor Livesey in his
pleasantest way, "I make it a point of
honour not to lose a man for King George
(God bless him!) and the gallows."
The rogues looked at each other but
swallowed the home-thrust in silence.
"*** don't feel well, sir," said one.
"Don't he?" replied the doctor.
"Well, step up here, ***, and let me see
your tongue.
No, I should be surprised if he did!
The man's tongue is fit to frighten the
French.
Another fever."
"Ah, there," said Morgan, "that comed of
sp'iling Bibles."
"That comes--as you call it--of being
arrant ***," retorted the doctor, "and
not having sense enough to know honest air
from poison, and the dry land from a vile,
pestiferous slough.
I think it most probable--though of course
it's only an opinion--that you'll all have
the deuce to pay before you get that
malaria out of your systems.
Camp in a bog, would you?
Silver, I'm surprised at you.
You're less of a fool than many, take you
all round; but you don't appear to me to
have the rudiments of a notion of the rules
of health.
"Well," he added after he had dosed them
round and they had taken his prescriptions,
with really laughable humility, more like
charity schoolchildren than blood-guilty
mutineers and pirates--"well, that's done
for today.
And now I should wish to have a talk with
that boy, please."
And he nodded his head in my direction
carelessly.
George Merry was at the door, spitting and
spluttering over some bad-tasted medicine;
but at the first word of the doctor's
proposal he swung round with a deep flush
and cried "No!" and swore.
Silver struck the barrel with his open
hand.
"Si-lence!" he roared and looked about him
positively like a lion.
"Doctor," he went on in his usual tones, "I
was a-thinking of that, knowing as how you
had a fancy for the boy.
We're all humbly grateful for your
kindness, and as you see, puts faith in you
and takes the drugs down like that much
grog.
And I take it I've found a way as'll suit
Hawkins, will you give me your word of
honour as a young gentleman--for a young
gentleman you are, although poor born--your
word of honour not to slip your cable?"
I readily gave the pledge required.
"Then, doctor," said Silver, "you just step
outside o' that stockade, and once you're
there I'll bring the boy down on the
inside, and I reckon you can yarn through
the spars.
Good day to you, sir, and all our dooties
to the squire and Cap'n Smollett."
The explosion of disapproval, which nothing
but Silver's black looks had restrained,
broke out immediately the doctor had left
the house.
Silver was roundly accused of playing
double--of trying to make a separate peace
for himself, of sacrificing the interests
of his accomplices and victims, and, in one
word, of the identical, exact thing that he
was doing.
It seemed to me so obvious, in this case,
that I could not imagine how he was to turn
their anger.
But he was twice the man the rest were, and
his last night's victory had given him a
huge preponderance on their minds.
He called them all the fools and dolts you
can imagine, said it was necessary I should
talk to the doctor, fluttered the chart in
their faces, asked them if they could
afford to break the treaty the very day
they were bound a-treasure-hunting.
"No, by thunder!" he cried.
"It's us must break the treaty when the
time comes; and till then I'll gammon that
doctor, if I have to ile his boots with
brandy."
And then he bade them get the fire lit, and
stalked out upon his crutch, with his hand
on my shoulder, leaving them in a disarray,
and silenced by his volubility rather than
convinced.
"Slow, lad, slow," he said.
"They might round upon us in a twinkle of
an eye if we was seen to hurry."
Very deliberately, then, did we advance
across the sand to where the doctor awaited
us on the other side of the stockade, and
as soon as we were within easy speaking
distance Silver stopped.
"You'll make a note of this here also,
doctor," says he, "and the boy'll tell you
how I saved his life, and were deposed for
it too, and you may lay to that.
Doctor, when a man's steering as near the
wind as me--playing chuck-farthing with the
last breath in his body, like--you wouldn't
think it too much, mayhap, to give him one
good word?
You'll please bear in mind it's not my life
only now--it's that boy's into the bargain;
and you'll speak me fair, doctor, and give
me a bit o' hope to go on, for the sake of
mercy."
Silver was a changed man once he was out
there and had his back to his friends and
the block house; his cheeks seemed to have
fallen in, his voice trembled; never was a
soul more dead in earnest.
"Why, John, you're not afraid?" asked Dr.
Livesey.
"Doctor, I'm no coward; no, not I--not SO
much!" and he snapped his fingers.
"If I was I wouldn't say it.
But I'll own up fairly, I've the shakes
upon me for the gallows.
You're a good man and a true; I never seen
a better man!
And you'll not forget what I done good, not
any more than you'll forget the bad, I
know.
And I step aside--see here--and leave you
and Jim alone.
And you'll put that down for me too, for
it's a long stretch, is that!"
So saying, he stepped back a little way,
till he was out of earshot, and there sat
down upon a tree-stump and began to
whistle, spinning round now and again upon
his seat so as to command a sight,
sometimes of me and the doctor and
sometimes of his unruly ruffians as they
went to and fro in the sand between the
fire--which they were busy rekindling--and
the house, from which they brought forth
pork and bread to make the breakfast.
"So, Jim," said the doctor sadly, "here you
are.
As you have brewed, so shall you drink, my
boy.
Heaven knows, I cannot find it in my heart
to blame you, but this much I will say, be
it kind or unkind: when Captain Smollett
was well, you dared not have gone off; and
when he was ill and couldn't help it, by
George, it was downright cowardly!"
I will own that I here began to weep.
"Doctor," I said, "you might spare me.
I have blamed myself enough; my life's
forfeit anyway, and I should have been dead
by now if Silver hadn't stood for me; and
doctor, believe this, I can die--and I dare
say I deserve it--but what I fear is
torture.
If they come to torture me--"
"Jim," the doctor interrupted, and his
voice was quite changed, "Jim, I can't have
this.
Whip over, and we'll run for it."
"Doctor," said I, "I passed my word."
"I know, I know," he cried.
"We can't help that, Jim, now.
I'll take it on my shoulders, holus bolus,
blame and shame, my boy; but stay here, I
cannot let you.
Jump!
One jump, and you're out, and we'll run for
it like antelopes."
"No," I replied; "you know right well you
wouldn't do the thing yourself--neither you
nor squire nor captain; and no more will I.
Silver trusted me; I passed my word, and
back I go.
But, doctor, you did not let me finish.
If they come to torture me, I might let
slip a word of where the ship is, for I got
the ship, part by luck and part by risking,
and she lies in North Inlet, on the
southern beach, and just below high water.
At half tide she must be high and dry."
"The ship!" exclaimed the doctor.
Rapidly I described to him my adventures,
and he heard me out in silence.
"There is a kind of fate in this," he
observed when I had done.
"Every step, it's you that saves our lives;
and do you suppose by any chance that we
are going to let you lose yours?
That would be a poor return, my boy.
You found out the plot; you found Ben Gunn-
-the best deed that ever you did, or will
do, though you live to ninety.
Oh, by Jupiter, and talking of Ben Gunn!
Why, this is the mischief in person.
Silver!" he cried.
"Silver!
I'll give you a piece of advice," he
continued as the cook drew near again;
"don't you be in any great hurry after that
treasure."
"Why, sir, I do my possible, which that
ain't," said Silver.
"I can only, asking your pardon, save my
life and the boy's by seeking for that
treasure; and you may lay to that."
"Well, Silver," replied the doctor, "if
that is so, I'll go one step further: look
out for squalls when you find it."
"Sir," said Silver, "as between man and
man, that's too much and too little.
What you're after, why you left the block
house, why you given me that there chart, I
don't know, now, do I?
And yet I done your bidding with my eyes
shut and never a word of hope!
But no, this here's too much.
If you won't tell me what you mean plain
out, just say so and I'll leave the helm."
"No," said the doctor musingly; "I've no
right to say more; it's not my secret, you
see, Silver, or, I give you my word, I'd
tell it you.
But I'll go as far with you as I dare go,
and a step beyond, for I'll have my wig
sorted by the captain or I'm mistaken!
And first, I'll give you a bit of hope;
Silver, if we both get alive out of this
wolf-trap, I'll do my best to save you,
short of perjury."
Silver's face was radiant.
"You couldn't say more, I'm sure, sir, not
if you was my mother," he cried.
"Well, that's my first concession," added
the doctor.
"My second is a piece of advice: keep the
boy close beside you, and when you need
help, halloo.
I'm off to seek it for you, and that itself
will show you if I speak at random.
Good-bye, Jim."
And Dr. Livesey shook hands with me through
the stockade, nodded to Silver, and set off
at a brisk pace into the wood.