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Treasure Island
Chapter 30. On Parole
I was wakened by a clear, hearty voice hailing us from the edge of the wood.
We were all wakened, for I could see even the sentinel shake himself together from where he had fallen against the door-post.
"Block house, ahoy!" it cried.
"Here's the doctor."
And the doctor it was, Although I was glad to hear the sound, my gladness wasn't without some worry.
I remembered with shame my disobedient and secret actions.
When I saw where they had brought me, among what companions and surrounded by what dangers, I felt too ashamed to look him in the face.
He must have risen in the dark, for the day had hardly come.
When I ran to a loophole and looked out, I saw him standing, like Silver once before, up to his mid-leg in creeping fog.
"You, doctor! Top of the morning to you, sir!" cried Silver, wide awake and beaming with good nature in a moment.
"Bright and early, to be sure."
"And it's the early bird, as the saying goes, that gets the rations."
"George, shake up your bones, son, and help Dr."
"Livesey over the ship's side."
"All your patients were doing well, all well and merry."
So he chattered on, standing on the hilltop with his crutch under his elbow and one hand on the side of the log-house.
He was quite the old John in voice, manner, and expression.
"We've quite a surprise for you too, sir," he continued.
"We've a little stranger here, he! He! A new boarder and lodger, sir, and looking fit and tight as a fiddle."
"He slept like a supercargo right alongside of John, we were stem to stem all night".
Dr. Livesey was by this time across the stockade and pretty near the cook.
I could hear the change in his voice as he said, "Not Jim?"
"The very same Jim as ever was," said Silver.
The doctor stopped completely, although he didn't speak.
It was several seconds before he seemed able to move on.
"Well, well," he said at last, "duty first and pleasure afterwards, as you might have said yourself, Silver. Let's examine these patients of yours."
A moment later he had entered the block house.
With one grim nod to me, he went on with his work among the sick.
He seemed under no fear, though he must have known that his life, among these treacherous demons, hung by a thread.
He chatted to his patients as if he were paying an ordinary professional visit in a quiet English family.
His manner, I suppose, affected the men.
They behaved to him as if nothing had happened, as if he were still the ship's doctor and they still faithful crew members.
"You're doing well, my friend," he said to the man with the bandaged head.
"And if anyone ever had a close shave, it was you."
"Your head must be as hard as iron."
"Well, George, how goes it?"
"You're a pretty colour, certainly."
"Your liver, man, is upside down."
"Did you take that medicine?"
"Did he take that medicine, men?"
"Aye, aye, sir, he took it, sure enough," replied Morgan.
"You see, since I'm the mutineers' doctor, or prison doctor as I prefer to call it," said Doctor Livesey.
"I make it a point of honour not to lose a man for King George and the gallows."
The rogues looked at each other but swallowed the insult in silence.
"Dick doesn't feel well, sir," said one.
"Doesn't he?" replied the doctor.
"Well, step up here, Dick, and let me see your tongue. No, I'd be surprised if he did! The man's tongue is fit to frighten the French. Another fever."
"Ah, there," said Morgan, "that comes from spoiling Bibles."
"That comes, as you call it, from being complete fools," replied the doctor.
"And not having sense enough to know honest air from poison, and dry land from a vile, disease-filled swamp."
"I think it's most probable, though of course it's only an opinion, that you'll all pay dearly before you get that malaria out of your systems."
"Camp in a bog, would you?"
"Silver, I'm surprised at you."
"You're less of a fool than many, take you all round."
"But you don't seem to me to have the slightest idea of the rules of health."
"He added this after he had given them their medicine and they had taken his prescriptions with laughable humility, like charity schoolchildren."
"Well, that's done for today, and now I'd like to have a talk with that boy, please".
And he nodded his head in my direction carelessly.
George Merry was at the door, spitting and spluttering over some bad-tasting medicine.
But at the first word of the doctor's proposal, he swung around with a deep flush and cried "No!" and swore.
Silver struck the barrel with his open hand.
"Silence!" he roared and looked around him like a lion.
"Doctor," he went on in his usual tones, "I was thinking of that."
"Knowing how you have a fancy for the boy, we're all humbly grateful for your kindness."
"As you see, they trust you and take the drugs down like that much grog, and I think I've found a way that'll suit everyone."
"Hawkins, will you give me your word of honour as a young gentleman, though poor born, not to run away"?
I readily gave the promise required, feeling both ashamed and strangely relieved at once.
"Then, doctor," said Silver.
"You just step outside that stockade."
"Once you're there, I'll bring the boy down on the inside."
"I reckon you can talk through the bars."
"Good day to you, sir, and all our duties to the squire and Captain Smollett."
The explosion of disapproval, which only Silver's black looks had held back, broke out immediately the doctor had left the house.
Silver was strongly accused of playing double, of trying to make a separate peace for himself, of sacrificing the interests of his accomplices and victims.
In one word, he was accused of the exact thing he was doing.
It seemed so obvious to me that I couldn't imagine how he'd turn their anger.
But he was twice the man the rest were.
His last night's victory had given him a huge advantage in their minds.
He called them all the fools and idiots you can imagine.
He said it was necessary for me to talk to the doctor.
He waved the chart in their faces.
He asked them if they could afford to break the treaty on the very day they were about to go treasure hunting.
"No, by thunder!" he cried.
"It's us who must break the treaty when the time comes."
"And until then, I'll trick that doctor, even if I have to oil his boots with brandy."
Then he told them to light the fire.
He walked out on his crutch with his hand on my shoulder, leaving them in confusion, silenced by his talk rather than convinced.
"Slow, lad, slow," he said.
"They might turn on us in a flash if we were seen to hurry."
Very slowly, then, we walked across the sand to where the doctor waited for us on the other side of the stockade.
As soon as we were within easy speaking distance, Silver stopped.
"You'll make a note of this here too, doctor," he said.
"The boy will tell you how I saved his life and was removed from my post for it too."
"You can be sure of that."
Doctor, when a man sails as close to the wind as I do, playing with his last breath, wouldn't you give him one good word?
"Please remember, it's not just my life now."
"It's that boy's life too."
"And you'll speak fairly to me, doctor, and give me a bit of hope to go on, for mercy's sake."
Silver was a changed man once he was out there with his back to his friends and the block house.
His cheeks seemed to have fallen in.
His voice trembled, Never was a soul more completely serious.
"Why, John, you're not afraid?" asked Dr. Livesey.
"Doctor, I'm no coward. No, not I. Not so much!" and he snapped his fingers.
"If I were, I wouldn't say it."
"But I'll admit it fairly."
"I've got the shakes thinking about the gallows."
"You're a good man and a true one."
"I've never seen a better man."
"And you won't forget what good I've done, any more than you'll forget the bad, I know."
"And I'll step aside, see here, and leave you and Jim alone."
"And you'll put that down for me too, because that's a big thing."
So saying, he stepped back a little way until he was out of hearing.
There he sat down on a tree stump and began to whistle.
He spun around on his seat now and again.
He kept an eye on me, the doctor, and his unruly ruffians.
The men went back and forth in the sand between the fire and the house.
They were busy relighting the fire and bringing out pork and bread for breakfast.
"So, Jim," said the doctor sadly.
"Here you're. As you have brewed,"
"So you must drink, my boy."
"Heaven knows, I can't find it in my heart to blame you."
"But this much I'll say, be it kind or unkind, when Captain Smollett was well, you didn't dare to go off."
"And when he was ill and couldn't help it, by George, it was downright cowardly."
I admit that I began to weep here.
"Doctor," I said, "you might spare me. I've blamed myself enough, and I'd be dead now if Silver hadn't stood up for me."
"And doctor, believe this, I can die and perhaps deserve it, but what I fear is torture if they come to torture me".
"Jim," the doctor interrupted, and his voice was quite changed.
"Jim, I can't have this. Jump over, and we'll run for it."
"Doctor," I said, "I gave my word."
"I know, I know," he cried.
"We can't help that now, Jim. I'll take it on my shoulders, the whole thing, blame and shame, my boy."
"I can't let you stay here. Jump! One jump, and you're out. We'll run for it like antelopes."
"No," I replied.
"You know very well you wouldn't do that yourself, neither you nor the squire nor the captain."
"And neither will I."
"Silver trusted me."
"I gave my word, and I'm going back."
"But doctor, you didn't let me finish."
"If they come to torture me, I might let slip a word about where the ship is."
"I got the ship, partly by luck and partly by taking risks."
"She lies in North Inlet, on the southern beach, just below the high water mark."
"At half tide she must be high and dry."
"The ship!" exclaimed the doctor.
Quickly I described my adventures to him, he listened to me in silence.
"There's a kind of fate in this," he said when I had finished.
"Every step, it's you who saves our lives."
"And do you think by any chance we're going to let you lose yours?"
"That would be a poor return, my boy."
"You found out the plot."
"You found Ben Gunn, the best deed you ever did or will do, though you live to ninety."
"Oh, by Jupiter, and talking of Ben Gunn!"
"Why, this is the trouble in person."
"Silver!" He cried.
"Silver! I'll give you a piece of advice," he continued as the cook drew near again.
"Don't be in any great hurry after that treasure."
"Why, sir, I do my best, and that's not it," said Silver.
"I can only, asking your pardon, save my life and the boy's by looking for that treasure. And you can be sure of that."
"Well, Silver," replied the doctor, "if that's so, I'll go one step further, look out for trouble when you find it."
"Sir," said Silver.
"As between man and man, that's too much and too little."
"What you're after, why you left the block house, why you gave me that chart, I don't know, do I?"
"And yet I did your bidding with my eyes shut and never a word of hope."
"But no, this is too much."
"If you won't tell me what you mean plainly, just say so and I'll leave the helm."
"No," said the doctor thoughtfully.
"I have no right to say more."
"It's not my secret, you see, Silver."
"Or I give you my word, I'd tell it to you."
"But I'll go as far with you as I dare go, and a step beyond."
"I'll have my wig sorted by the captain, or I'm mistaken."
"And first, I'll give you a bit of hope."
"Silver, if we both get out of this wolf trap alive, I'll do my best to save you, short of lying under oath."
Silver's face was bright with joy, a sudden smile spreading across his features.
"You couldn't say more, I'm sure, sir, not if you were my mother," he cried.
"Well, that's my first concession," added the doctor.
"My second is a piece of advice," added the doctor.
"Keep the boy close and call for help when needed. I'm off to fetch aid, which will prove I'm not speaking at random. Goodbye, Jim".
And Dr. Livesey shook hands with me through the stockade, nodded to Silver, and set off at a quick pace into the wood.