I awoke in panic and, leaping up groped in the pitch-dark until my eager fingers closed on the haft of the sheath-knife under my pillow, and with this naked in my hand I crouched awaiting I knew not what; for all about me was direful sound, groans and cries with wailings long drawn out in shuddering complaint. Then, all at once, my panic was lost in sudden great content, and thrusting away the knife I took flint and steel and therewith lighted my lanthorn; since now indeed I knew these dismal sounds nought but the creak and groan of the stout ship, the voice of her travail as she rose to the seas. And as I hearkened, every individual timber seemed to find a voice, and what with this and the uneasy pitching and rolling of the ship I judged we were well under weigh and beyond the river-mouth. This (bethinking me of the damage we had sustained from the great black ship) set me to wondering, insomuch that I reached for my lanthorn, minded to steal on deck that I might know our whereabouts and if it were day or night, since here in the bowels of the ship it was always night. So (as I say) I reached for the lanthorn, then paused as above all other sounds rose a cheery hail, and under the door was the flicker of a light. Hereupon I opened the door (though with strangely awkward fingers) and thus espied Godby lurching towards me.
"What, Mart'n pal," says he, sitting beside me on my berth and setting down the food and drink he had brought, "are ye waking at last?"
"Have I slept long, Godby?"
"You've slept, Mart'n, a full thirty hours."
"Thirty hours, Godby?"
"Split me crosswise else, pal!"
"Mighty strange!" says I, reaching for the flask he had brought, for I felt my mouth bitterly parched and dry, while, added to the consuming thirst, my head throbbed miserably.
"Well, here we be, pal, clear o' the river this twelve hours and more. And, Mart'n, this is a ship--aye, by hokey, a sailer! So true on a wind, so sweet to her helm, and Master Adam's worthy of her, blister me else!"
"'Tis strange I should sleep so long!" says I, clasping my aching head.
"Why, you'm wise to sleep all ye can, pal, seeing there be nought better to do here i' the dark," says he, setting out the viands before me. "What, no appetite, Mart'n?" I shook my head. "Lord love ye, 'tis the dark and the curst reek o' this place, pal--come aloft, all's bowmon, the fine folk han't found their sea-legs yet, nor like to while this wind holds, Mart'n--so come aloft wi' Godby."