"You never kept one," replied the captain. "Gross
neglect of duty. You'll catch it."
"And the change of writing?" resumed Carthew. "You
began; why do you stop and why do I come in? And you'll
have to sign anyway."
"O! I've met with an accident and can't write," replied
Wicks.
"An accident?" repeated Carthew. "It don't sound
natural. What kind of an accident?"
Wicks spread his hand face-up on the table, and drove a
knife through his palm.
"That kind of an accident," said he. "There's a way to
draw to windward of most difficulties, if you've a head
on your shoulders." He began to bind up his hand with a
handkerchief, glancing the while over Goddedaal's log.
"Hullo!" he said; "this'll never do for us--this is an
impossible kind of a yarn. Here, to begin with, is
this Captain Trent trying some fancy course, leastways
he's a thousand miles to south'ard of the great circle.
And here, it seems, he was close up with this island on
the 6th, sails all these days and is close up with it
again by daylight on the 11th."
"Goddedaal said they had the deuce's luck," said
Carthew.
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