It was a very cold winter, and it was clear that my poor father would not live to see the spring. My mother and I had all the work of the inn to do.
Early one January morning the captain went down to the beach with his telescope. I was setting the table for his breakfast when a man I had never seen before came in. He was pale, and two fingers of his left hand were missing. He wore a cutlass, but he did not look much like a fighter.
“Come here, sonny,” he said. “Is this table for my mate Bill? He has a scar on one cheek.”
I told him the table was for a man we called the captain, and that he was out walking. The stranger waited just inside the door, watching the road like a cat waiting for a mouse. Once I stepped outside, but he called me back with a curse.
“Here comes my mate Bill,” he said suddenly. “You and I will hide behind the door, sonny, and give Bill a little surprise.”
He pulled me into the corner behind the open door. I was very frightened, and it made me more afraid to see that the stranger was frightened too.
The captain came in and walked straight to his breakfast.
“Bill,” said the stranger.
The captain turned around. His brown face went white, and he looked as if he had seen a ghost.
“Black Dog!” he said.
“And who else?” said the other. “Black Dog has come to see his old shipmate Billy.”
“Well, you’ve found me,” said the captain. “What do you want?”
They sat down at the captain’s table, and Black Dog sent me away. For a long time I heard only low voices. Then they grew louder.
“No, no, no, no, and that’s the end of it!” cried the captain once. And again, “If it comes to hanging, then hang us all, I say!”
Suddenly the table and chair fell over, steel clashed, and someone cried out in pain. Black Dog ran out with the captain behind him, both with cutlasses in their hands, and blood was pouring from Black Dog’s left shoulder. At the door the captain swung at him one last time, but the blow hit our big Admiral Benbow sign instead. You can still see the cut in the frame today.
Black Dog disappeared over the hill. The captain came back into the house.
“Jim,” he said, “rum.” He swayed and put one hand against the wall. “I must get away from here. Rum! Rum!”
I ran to get it, and then I heard a loud crash. The captain was lying on the floor with his eyes closed. My mother came running downstairs, and we were sure Black Dog had wounded him.
Luckily Dr. Livesey came just then to visit my father.
“Oh, doctor, where is he wounded?” we cried.
“Wounded? Nonsense!” he said. “The man has had a stroke, as I warned him. Mrs. Hawkins, go up to your husband and tell him nothing. Jim, get me a bowl.”
The doctor cut open the captain’s sleeve. His big arm had tattoos on it: the words “Billy Bones his fancy” and, near the shoulder, a man hanging from a gallows.
“Now, Mr. Billy Bones, if that is your name,” said the doctor, “let’s look at your blood. Jim, are you afraid of blood?”
“No, sir,” I said.
“Then hold the bowl.” He took a small, sharp knife and opened a vein in the captain’s arm.
A lot of blood came out before the captain opened his eyes. He tried to sit up and cried, “Where’s Black Dog?”
“There is no Black Dog here,” said the doctor. “You have been drinking rum, and you have had a stroke. Now, Mr. Bones—”
“That’s not my name.”
“I don’t care. Listen to me. One glass of rum won’t kill you. But if you take one, you’ll take another and another, and then you’ll die. For you, rum means death.”
We helped him up to his bed. Then the doctor went to see my father.
“He should lie in bed for a week,” he told me quietly. “Another stroke would kill him.”