Black Bartlemys Treasure

"But are you sure they are gone?"

"Aye, Mart'n, we've sought 'em alow and aloft, all over the ship, save only this hole o' yourn--the which you might ha' known had ye slept less."

"Have I slept so much, then?"

"Pal, you've done little else since you came aboard, seemingly. All yesterday, as I do know, you slept and never stirred nor took so much as bite or sup--and I know because while we was a' turning out the hold a-seekin' and a-searchin' I come and took a look at ye every now and then, and here's you a-lyin' like a dead man but for your snoring."

"Here's strange thing, and mighty strange! For until I came aboard I was ever a wondrous light sleeper, Godby."

"Why, 'tis the stench o' this place--faugh! Come aloft and take a mouthful o' good, sweet air, pal."

"You say you sought these men everywhere--even down here in the hold?"

"Aye, alow and aloft, every bulkhead and timber from trucks to keelson!"

"And all this time I was asleep, Godby?"

"Aye--like a log, Mart'n."

"And breathing heavily?"

"Aye, ye did so, pal, groaning ye might call it--aye, fit to chill a man's good blood!"

"And neither you nor Adam nor the others thought to search this dog-hole of mine?"

"Lord love ye--no, Mart'n! How should three men hide here?"

"Three men? Aye, true enough!" says I, clasping my head to stay the rush and hurry of my thoughts.

"Come aloft, pal, 'tis a fair evening and the fine folk all a-supping in the great cabin. Come into the air."

"Yes," I nodded, "yes, 'twill clear my head and I must think, Godby, I must think. Reach me my doublet," says I, for now I felt myself all shivering as with cold. So Godby took up the garment where it lay and held it out to me; but all at once let it fall and, drawing back, stood staring down at it, and all with never a word; whiles I sat crouched upon my bed, my head between my clenched fists and my mind reeling beneath the growing horror of the thought that filled me. And now, even as this thought took dreadful shape and meaning--even as suspicion grew to certainty, I heard Godby draw a gasping breath, saw him reach a stealthy, fumbling hand behind him and open the door, and then, leaping backwards, he was swallowed in the dark, and with a hurry of stumbling feet, was gone.

But I scarcely heeded his going or the manner of it, so stunned was I by the sudden realisation of the terror that had haunted my ghastly slumbers and evil wakings, a terror that (if my dreadful speculations were true) was very real after all, a peril deadly and imminent.