Part 18 (1/2)
”Yes, Sir, indeed you have.”
”I have been trying to recollect all about it, but I cannot as yet.”
”It's not worth remembering, Sir,” replied he. ”Do you wish anything to drink?”
”No,” replied I.
”Then you had better go to sleep again.”
”I cannot do that. I feel as if I should like to get up. Where is Mr Thompson? I must see him.”
”Mr Thompson, Sir,” replied he; ”don't you recollect?”
”What?”
”Why, Sir, he was bitten in two by a shark.”
”Shark!” this was the key-note required, and my memory returned. ”Yes, yes, I recollect now all, all. I recollect the panther and the cane-brakes. How was I preserved?”
”The bloodhounds killed the panther, and you were brought on board insensible, and have been in a raging fever ever since.”
”It must be so,” replied I, collecting my senses after a few moments of thought. ”It must be so. How long have I been ill?”
”This is the twenty-first day.”
”The twenty-first day!” cried I. ”Is it possible? Are none of the men ill?”
”No, Sir, they are all well.”
”But I hear the water against the bends. Are we not still at anchor?”
”No, Sir, the second mate got the schooner under weigh as he found you were so ill.”
”And I have been ill twenty-one days! Why we must be near home?”
”We expect to make the land in a few days, Sir,” replied Ingram.
”Thank Heaven for all its mercies,” said I. ”I never expected to see old England again. But what a bad smell there is. What can it be?”
”I suppose it is the bilge-water, Sir,” replied Ingram. ”People who are ill and weak always are annoyed by it; but I think, Sir, if you would take a little gruel, and then go to sleep again, it would be better.”
”Well, I fear I am not very strong, and talking so much has done me no good. I think I could take a little gruel.”
”Then, Sir, I'll go and get some made, and be back very soon.”
”Do, Ingram, and tell Mr Olivarez, the second mate, that I would speak to him.”
”Yes, I will,” replied the man, and he left the state-room.
I waited some time listening for the arrival of the second mate, and then I thought that I heard odd noises in the hold before the bulk-head of the state-room in which I was lying, but I was still very weak, and my head swam. After a time Ingram came down with the gruel, into which he put some sugar and a spoonful of rum, to flavour it, as he said. He offered it to me, and I drank it all, for I had an appet.i.te; but whether it was that I was very weak, or the rum he put in was more than he said, it is certain that I had hardly given him back the basin than I felt so drowsy that I turned away from him, and was soon again in forgetfulness.