“Avast, there!” cried Silver.  “Who are you, Tom Morgan?  Maybe you thought you was cap’n here, perhaps.  By the powers, but I’ll teach you better!  Cross me, and you’ll go where many a good man’s gone before you, first and last, these thirty year back—­some to the yard-arm, shiver my timbers, and some by the board, and all to feed the fishes.  There’s never a man looked me between the eyes and seen a good day a’terwards, Tom Morgan, you may lay to that.”

Morgan paused, but a hoarse murmur rose from the others.

“Tom’s right,” said one.

“I stood hazing long enough from one,” added another.  “I’ll be hanged if I’ll be hazed by you, John Silver.”

“Did any of you gentlemen want to have it out with me?” roared Silver, bending far forward from his position on the keg, with his pipe still glowing in his right hand.  “Put a name on what you’re at; you ain’t dumb, I reckon.  Him that wants shall get it.  Have I lived this many years, and a son of a rum puncheon cock his hat athwart my hawse at the latter end of it?  You know the way; you’re all gentlemen o’ fortune, by your account.  Well, I’m ready.  Take a cutlass, him that dares, and I’ll see the colour of his inside, crutch and all, before that pipe’s empty.”

Not a man stirred; not a man answered.

“That’s your sort, is it?” he added, returning his pipe to his mouth.  “Well, you’re a gay lot to look at, anyway.  Not much worth to fight, you ain’t.  P’r’aps you can understand King George’s English.  I’m cap’n here by ’lection.  I’m cap’n here because I’m the best man by a long sea-mile.  You won’t fight, as gentlemen o’ fortune should; then, by thunder, you’ll obey, and you may lay to it!  I like that boy, now; I never seen a better boy than that.  He’s more a man than any pair of rats of you in this here house, and what I say is this:  let me see him that’ll lay a hand on him—­that’s what I say, and you may lay to it.”

There was a long pause after this.  I stood straight up against the wall, my heart still going like a sledge-hammer, but with a ray of hope now shining in my bosom.  Silver leant back against the wall, his arms crossed, his pipe in the corner of his mouth, as calm as though he had been in church; yet his eye kept wandering furtively, and he kept the tail of it on his unruly followers.  They, on their part, drew gradually together towards the far end of the block house, and the low hiss of their whispering sounded in my ear continuously, like a stream.  One after another, they would look up, and the red light of the torch would fall for a second on their nervous faces; but it was not towards me, it was towards Silver that they turned their eyes.

“You seem to have a lot to say,” remarked Silver, spitting far into the air.  “Pipe up and let me hear it, or lay to.”

“Ax your pardon, sir,” returned one of the men; “you’re pretty free with some of the rules; maybe you’ll kindly keep an eye upon the rest.  This crew’s dissatisfied; this crew don’t vally bullying a marlin-spike; this crew has its rights like other crews, I’ll make so free as that; and by your own rules, I take it we can talk together.  I ax your pardon, sir, acknowledging you for to be captaing at this present; but I claim my right, and steps outside for a council.”