crossed to the door and reached her
hand to the bolt; but in a leap I was beside her and caught this hand,
'prisoning it there:

"Hark'ee, madam!" quoth I, "You tell me that to hang is a shameful
death, and the noose as good as round my neck. But, before God, madam,
I'll see this ship go up in flame and perish with it ere that noose
shall strangle the life out of me and my wrongs unavenged. So the ship
may burn an it will. Meantime do you seek your salvation and leave me
to seek mine!" Then opening the door I stood aside to give her way;
instead she stood a moment looking on me great-eyed:

"O blind!" says she at last, "To treasure life for your wicked
vengeance! O blind, blind!" Then, and very suddenly she sped out and
away.

Left alone I stood hearkening to the distant uproar and casting about
in my mind how best I might contrive my preservation. And now in my
desperate need it seemed there was but one hope for me and this but
slender, viz., to steal myself up to Adam's lodgment under the poop and
that as soon as might be. To this end I stepped forth of the cabin and
so into a narrow passage-way with divers doors to right and left that
opened upon other cabins, in one of which I espied a cloak and
feathered hat lying where their owner had dropped them; whipping the
cloak about me I clapped on the hat and, staying for no more, hasted on
breathing an air acrid with drifting smoke. Reaching a broad stairway
I climbed at speed and found myself out upon the lofty poop, whence I
might look down on the decks through a haze of smoke that poured up
through the after hatchway, mounting in billowy wreaths against the
splendour of the moon. Here it seemed was gathered the whole ship's
company with mighty stir and to-do, and none with eyes to spare for me.
Howbeit, I stayed for no second glance, but running to Adam's cabin,
found the door unlocked, the which I closed and bolted after me, in the
doing of which I noticed (to my comfort) that this door was mighty
thick and strong and in it moreover a loophole newly cut, with others
in the bulkheads to right and left and all very neatly plugged from
within; and what with this and the musquetoons that stood in racks very
orderly, the place, small though it was, had all the virtues of a fort
or citadel. Here then, so far as might be, I was safe whatever
chanced, since I had but to lift the trap in the floor and descend into
the roundhouse below, whence I might gain the st