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1Instantly I began to extricate myself and crawl back again, with what speed and silence I could manage, to the more open
2portion of the wood. As I did so, I could hear hails coming and going between the old buccaneer and his comrades, and
3this sound of danger lent me wings. As soon as I was clear of the thicket, I ran as I never ran before, scarce minding
4the direction of my flight, so long as it led me from the murderers; and as I ran, fear grew and grew upon me until it
5turned into a kind of frenzy. Indeed, could anyone be more entirely lost than I? When the gun fired, how should I dare
6to go down to the boats among those fiends, still smoking from their crime? Would not the first of them who saw me wring
7my neck like a snipe's? Would not my absence itself be an evidence to them of my alarm, and therefore of my fatal
8knowledge? It was all over, I thought. Good-bye to the HISPANIOLA; good-bye to the squire, the doctor, and the captain!
9There was nothing left for me but death by starvation or death by the hands of the mutineers. All this while, as I say,
10I was still running, and without taking any notice, I had drawn near to the foot of the little hill with the two peaks
11and had got into a part of the island where the live-oaks grew more widely apart and seemed more like forest trees in
12their bearing and dimensions. Mingled with these were a few scattered pines, some fifty, some nearer seventy, feet high.
13The air too smelt more freshly than down beside the marsh. And here a fresh alarm brought me to a standstill with a
14thumping heart. XV The Man of the Island From the side of the hill, which was here steep and stony, a spout of gravel
15was dislodged and fell rattling and bounding through the trees. My eyes turned instinctively in that direction, and I
16saw a figure leap with great rapidity behind the trunk of a pine. What it was, whether bear or man or monkey, I could in
17no wise tell. It seemed dark and shaggy; more I knew not. But the terror of this new apparition brought me to a stand. I
18was now, it seemed, cut off upon both sides; behind me the murderers, before me this lurking nondescript. And
19immediately I began to prefer the dangers that I knew to those I knew not. Silver himself appeared less terrible in
20contrast with this creature of the woods, and I turned on my heel, and looking sharply behind me over my shoulder, began
21to retrace my steps in the direction of the boats. Instantly the figure reappeared, and making a wide circuit, began to
22head me off. I was tired, at any rate; but had I been as fresh as when I rose, I could see it was in vain for me to
23contend in speed with such an adversary. From trunk to trunk the creature flitted like a deer, running manlike on two
24legs, but unlike any man that I had ever seen, stooping almost double as it ran. Yet a man it was, I could no longer be
25in doubt about that. I began to recall what I had heard of cannibals. I was within an ace of calling for help. But the
26mere fact that he was a man, however wild, had somewhat reassured me, and my fear of Silver began to revive in
27proportion. I stood still, therefore, and cast about for some method of escape; and as I was so thinking, the
28recollection of my pistol flashed into my mind. As soon as I remembered I was not defenceless, courage glowed again in
29my heart and I set my face resolutely for this man of the island and walked briskly towards him. He was concealed by
30this time behind another tree trunk; but he must have been watching me closely, for as soon as I began to move in his
31direction he reappeared and took a step to meet me. Then he hesitated, drew back, came forward again, and at last, to my
32wonder and confusion, threw himself on his knees and held out his clasped hands in supplication. At that I once more
33stopped. "Who are you?" I asked. "Ben Gunn," he answered, and his voice sounded hoarse and awkward, like a rusty lock.
34"I'm poor Ben Gunn, I am; and I haven't spoke with a Christian these three years." I could now see that he was a white
35man like myself and that his features were even pleasing. His skin, wherever it was exposed, was burnt by the sun; even
36his lips were black, and his fair eyes looked quite startling in so dark a face. Of all the beggar-men that I had seen
37or fancied, he was the chief for raggedness. He was clothed with tatters of old ship's canvas and old sea-cloth, and
38this extraordinary patchwork was all held together by a system of the most various and incongruous fastenings, brass
39buttons, bits of stick, and loops of tarry gaskin. About his waist he wore an old brass-buckled leather belt, which was
40the one thing solid in his whole accoutrement. "Three years!" I cried. "Were you shipwrecked?" "Nay, mate," said he;
41"marooned." I had heard the word, and I knew it stood for a horrible kind of punishment common enough among the
42buccaneers, in which the offender is put ashore with a little powder and shot and left behind on some desolate and
43distant island. "Marooned three years agone," he continued, "and lived on goats since then, and berries, and oysters.
44Wherever a man is, says I, a man can do for himself. But, mate, my heart is sore for Christian diet. You mightn't happen
45to have a piece of cheese about you, now? No? Well, many's the long night I've dreamed of cheese--toasted, mostly--and
46woke up again, and here I were." "If ever I can get aboard again," said I, "you shall have cheese by the stone." All
47this time he had been feeling the stuff of my jacket, smoothing my hands, looking at my boots, and generally, in the
48intervals of his speech, showing a childish pleasure in the presence of a fellow creature. But at my last words he
49perked up into a kind of startled slyness. "If ever you can get aboard again, says you?" he repeated. "Why, now, who's
50to hinder you?" "Not you, I know," was my reply. "And right you was," he cried. "Now you--what do you call yourself,
51mate?" "Jim," I told him. "Jim, Jim," says he, quite pleased apparently. "Well, now, Jim, I've lived that rough as you'd
52be ashamed to hear of. Now, for instance, you wouldn't think I had had a pious mother--to look at me?" he asked. "Why,
53no, not in particular," I answered. "Ah, well," said he, "but I had--remarkable pious. And I was a civil, pious boy, and
54could rattle off my catechism that fast, as you couldn't tell one word from another. And here's what it come to, Jim,
55and it begun with chuck-farthen on the blessed grave-stones! That's what it begun with, but it went further'n that; and
56so my mother told me, and predicked the whole, she did, the pious woman! But it were Providence that put me here. I've
57thought it all out in this here lonely island, and I'm back on piety. You don't catch me tasting rum so much, but just a
58thimbleful for luck, of course, the first chance I have. I'm bound I'll be good, and I see the way to. And,
59Jim"--looking all round him and lowering his voice to a whisper--"I'm rich." I now felt sure that the poor fellow had
60gone crazy in his solitude, and I suppose I must have shown the feeling in my face, for he repeated the statement hotly:
61"Rich! Rich! I says. And I'll tell you what: I'll make a man of you, Jim. Ah, Jim, you'll bless your stars, you will,
62you was the first that found me!" And at this there came suddenly a lowering shadow over his face, and he tightened his
63grasp upon my hand and raised a forefinger threateningly before my eyes. "Now, Jim, you tell me true: that ain't Flint's
64ship?" he asked. At this I had a happy inspiration. I began to believe that I had found an ally, and I answered him at
65once. "It's not Flint's ship, and Flint is dead; but I'll tell you true, as you ask me--there are some of Flint's hands
66aboard; worse luck for the rest of us." "Not a man--with one--leg?" he gasped. "Silver?" I asked. "Ah, Silver!" says he.
67"That were his name." "He's the cook, and the ringleader too."
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