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184 me? Had they any reason for keeping me alive? My questions were in part answered by a sudden shout from the deck of the ship.

"Ho, Bill, is the young un gone?"

"No, my hearty, he's gone about!"

"Getting his spirits damped, I reckon."

"Some, you bet."

And then I heard a voice I knew, the voice of the Irishman, "Four-Eyes."

"Is it the boi ye're mindin', bedad?"

"Ay, sir, he's moved a point."

"The poor divil. Throw him a sheet, one av yer; it's meself that's not bringing the guv'ner a dead body when he wants a live one, be Saint Pathrick!"

They tried to throw me a sheet as the man had ordered, but we had begun to move rapidly again, and I heard it fall in the water by my head. Though there was more hailing, the thud of the choppy sea against the boat forbade any more hearing, and the sheet never reached me. Yet the men had told me something with their words, and I pondered long on the remark of the Irishman, that the "guv'ner" wanted me alive. It explained much; and it put beyond doubt the reason why I had not been killed in the drinking den. It was quite clear that my life was safe from these men until they reached their chief; but where he was I had no notion, except he were on the nameless ship; and, if that were so, to the nameless ship I was