Part 8 (2/2)
”A good deal better to-day,” said Charlie. ”Does it pain you much?”
”Not nearly as much as it did yesterday, sir. It's my opinion that I'll be all right in a day or two. Seems to me outrageous to make so much ado about it.”
”If we didn't take care of it, my man, it might cost you your limb, and we can't afford to bury such a well-made member before its time! You must give it perfect rest for a day or two. I'll speak to the captain about it.”
”I'd rather you didn't, sir,” objected the seaman. ”I feel able enough to go about, and my mates'll think I'm s.h.i.+rkin' dooty.”
”There's not a man a-board as'll think that o' d.i.c.k Darvall,” growled the boatswain, who had just entered and heard the last remark.
”Right, bo's'n,” said Brooke, ”you have well expressed the thought that came into my own head.”
”Have ye seen Samson yet, sir?” asked the boatswain, with an unusually grave look.
”No; I was just going to inquire about him. No worse, I hope?”
”I think he is, sir. Seems to me that he ain't long for this world.
The life's bin too much for him: he never was cut out for a sailor, an'
he takes things so much to heart that I do believe worry is doin' more than work to drive him on the rocks.”
”I'll go and see him at once,” said our hero.
Fred Samson, the sick man referred to, had been put into a swing-cot in a berth amids.h.i.+ps to give him as much rest as possible. To all appearance he was slowly dying of consumption. When Brooke entered he was leaning on one elbow, gazing wistfully through the port-hole close to his head. His countenance, on which the stamp of death was evidently imprinted, was unusually refined for one in his station in life.
”I'm glad you have come, Mr Brooke,” he said slowly, as his visitor advanced and took his thin hand.
”My poor fellow,” said Charlie, in a tone of low but tender sympathy, ”I wish with all my heart I could do you any good.”
”The sight of your kind face does me good,” returned the sailor, with a pause for breath between almost every other word. ”I don't want you to doctor me any more. I feel that I'm past that, but I want to give you a message and a packet for my mother. Of course you will be in London when you return to England. Will you find her out and deliver the packet? It contains only the Testament she gave me at parting and a letter.”
”My dear fellow--you may depend on me,” replied Brooke earnestly.
”Where does she live?”
”In Whitechapel. The full address is on the packet. The letter enclosed tells all that I have to say.”
”But you spoke of a message,” said Brooke, seeing that he paused and shut his eyes.
”Yes, yes,” returned the dying man eagerly, ”I forgot. Give her my dear love, and say that my last thoughts were of herself and G.o.d. She always feared that I was trusting too much in myself--in my own good resolutions and reformation; so I have been--but that's past. Tell her that G.o.d in His mercy has snapped that broken reed altogether, and enabled me to rest my soul on Jesus.”
As the dying man was much exhausted by his efforts to speak, his visitor refrained from asking more questions. He merely whispered a comforting text of Scripture and left him apparently sinking into a state of repose.
Then, having bandaged the finger of a man who had carelessly cut himself while using his knife aloft, Charlie returned to the cabin to continue an interrupted discussion with the first mate on the subject of astronomy.
From all which it will be seen that our hero's tendencies inclined him to be as much as possible ”all things to all men.”
CHAPTER SIX.
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