OUVERY DELIVERS UP THE CHART.
On the next day following, I got up betimes and went on deck.
The ship lurched and pitched so that I had much ado to keep my feet.
We ran before the wind under our topsails only, driven ever onwards
with the rolling long waves of the sea and the flying white scud-rack
overhead. This all-moving prospect put strange thoughts and whimsies in
my head, insomuch that I found I could not endure to look upon it for
long together, and I presently returned into my cabin, and read in a
book until breakfast-time.
I sat down to that meal in sole company of Surgeon Burke (my brother
not yet being up); and then I had news of Ouvery.
“’Tis the second time of bleeding the villain,” says Burke, “and, if
you will pass me the poached eggs, I’ll even show you how ’tis done.”
“So you have carved him like a poached egg,” answered I laughing, as
I passed the dish to him. He provided himself with great liberality;
and, between munching of the eggs, “Knives for eggs, and lancets for
villains,” says he, “there be your remedies, look you!”
While he yet spoke, my brother entered, and asked what he said about
remedies. The surgeon, putting on a countenance of the greatest
gravity, replied:
“I gave your brother a very good remedy for gout in the great toe. Do
you happen to suffer from the gout, Captain?”
But Dick was out of humour for jest. “Tut, tut,” said he testily, as he
sat down; and immediately after Ouvery entered the cabin.
I looked at Burke, who made a grimace at me. Ouvery staggered to the
table with much ado for the weakness he was under. He was in a most
villainous temper, which the sight of me, be sure, did not serve to
sweeten! He sunk heavily into a chair, and began to eat in sullen
silence. This wrought on my brother, and he rapped out:
“So you are in the sullens again, my man!”
Ouvery looked up dully and heavily, like a great beast; then a terrible
light came into his eyes, and he bounded to his feet with a roar.
“What!” cried he, “_you_ speak to _me_.... You ... I....” His speech
was stopped with passion; but he caught up a great brass salver and
cast it at my brother with all his force. It missed his head, and so
narrowly, that the hair was stirred upon his scalp; and on that, in an
instant, in the twinkling of an eye, both men had drawn their pistols
and fired across!
My brother stood untouched; but the Quartermaster gave a great,
snarling, stricken cry; and, pitching forward upon the board, he lay
there silent and still. The ball had pierced his breast in the upper
parts, and he never spoke more. Only he fixed his eyes upon my brother
full of hate and of mystery, and he took from the pocket of his coat
a leathern case and thrust it forth before us. Then the hand of death
closed upon Ouvery; and, in a throe and convulsion terrible to behold,
his spirit passed.
But I took mechanically the leathern case, and opened it. There was a
strip of parchment sewn between. ’Twas a seaman’s chart.
I turned to my brother, who stood holding the smoking pistol. His face
was deadly pale; and, when I spoke to him, calling him by his name,
he laughed high and shrill, like a woman. Hereupon Surgeon Burke gave
him to drink a dram of brandy from his flask, which steadied him. When
he was recovered, my brother took the chart; and, having observed it
awhile, he returned it to its case, which he put within the pocket of
his coat, saying:
“This is what I wanted. ’Tis the chart of the island, Burke. But what
made him deliver it to me so? For revenge? But how can that be?”