least expect it. We can count, I take it, on your own home servants, Mr.
Trelawney?
As upon myself, declared the squire.
Three, reckoned the captain; ourselves make seven, counting Hawkins
here. Now, about the honest hands?
Most likely Trelawney s own men, said the doctor; those he had picked
up for himself before he lit on Silver.
Nay, replied the squire. Hands was one of mine.
I did think I could have trusted Hands, added the captain.
And to think that they re all Englishmen! broke out the squire. Sir,
I could find it in my heart to blow the ship up.
Well, gentlemen, said the captain, the best that I can say is not
much. We must lay to, if you please, and keep a bright lookout. It s
trying on a man, I know. It would be pleasanter to come to blows. But
there s no help for it till we know our men. Lay to, and whistle for a
wind, that s my view.
Jim here, said the doctor, can help us more than anyone. The men are
not shy with him, and Jim is a noticing lad.
Hawkins, I put prodigious faith in you, added the squire.
I began to feel pretty desperate at this, for I felt altogether
helpless; and yet, by an odd train of circumstances, it was indeed
through me that safety came. In the meantime, talk as we pleased, there
were only seven out of the twenty-six on whom we knew we could rely; and
out of these seven one was a boy, so that the grown men on our side were
six to their nineteen.
PART THREE--My Shore Adventure
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