I heard some half a dozen of them start to jabber as they
found it empty. I divined--I could not see--the astonishment in
their faces, as they stared up into the darkness.
Just then--perhaps in response to their cries--a comrade on deck ran
forward to the bows and leaned over to hail them, standing so close
to me that his shoulder brushed against the fold of the foresail
within which I cowered. Like me he was bare to the waist, but around
his loins he wore a belt scaled with silver sequins, glimmering
against the ray of the lantern on the after-hatch, and maybe also in
the first weak light of the approaching dawn. . . .
A madness took me at the sight. In a sudden rage I gripped the
forestay with my left hand, lowered my right, and, slipping my
fingers under his belt, lifted him--he was a light man--swung him
outboard and overboard, and dropped him into the sea.
I heard the splash; with an ugly thud, which told me that some part
of him had struck the boat's gunwale. I waited--it seemed that I
waited many seconds--expecting the answering yell, or a shot perhaps.
Still gripping the forestay with my left hand, I bent forward, ready
to leap for deck.
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