I considered, still all in one and the same moment, that Charker was a
brave man, but not quick with his head; and that Sergeant Drooce, with a
much better head, was close by. All I said to Charker was, "I am afraid
we are betrayed. Turn your back full to the moonlight on the sea, and
cover the stem of the cocoa-nut tree which will then be right before you,
at the height of a man's heart. Are you right?"

"I am right," says Charker, turning instantly, and falling into the
position with a nerve of iron; "and right ain't left. Is it, Gill?"

A few seconds brought me to Sergeant Drooce's hut. He was fast asleep,
and being a heavy sleeper, I had to lay my hand upon him to rouse him.
The instant I touched him he came rolling out of his hammock, and upon me
like a tiger. And a tiger he was, except that he knew what he was up to,
in his utmost heat, as well as any man.

I had to struggle with him pretty hard to bring him to his senses,
panting all the while (for he gave me a breather), "Sergeant, I am Gill
Davis! Treachery! Pirates on the Island!"

The last words brought him round, and he took his hands of. "I have seen
two of them within this minute," said I. And so I told him what I had
told Harry Charker.

His soldierly, though tyrannical, head was clear in an instant. He
didn't waste one word, even of surprise. "Order the guard," says he, "to
draw off quietly into the Fort." (They called the enclosure I have
before mentioned, the Fort, though it was not much of that.) "Then get
you to the Fort as quick as you can, rouse up every soul there, and
fasten the gate. I will bring in all those who are at the Signal Hill.