What is the meaning of this paragraph from Philip Lombard's introduction in "And Then There Were None"?

Question

I was reading this paragraph in Agatha Christie's mystery novel And Then There Were None, from Chapter One and the character introduction of Philip Lombard:

By Jove, he'd sailed pretty near the wind once or twice! But he'd always got away with it! There wasn't much he drew the line at really. [...] No,there wasn't much he'd draw the line at. He fancied that he was going to enjoy himself at Soldier Island.

My understanding of the passage:
I don't know what Jove means. The character, as mentioned before, has done some deeds in his life which are not quite legal or very dangerous. But he has always got his way around their consequences. He has done things like that, he does not have a limit for what he would do if money was the reason.

Request:
Please tell me where I am wrong or if the whole thing means something else.

Answer 1

I haven't (yet) read the novel in question, but I can explain the passage's simple meaning as a fluent English speaker. Let's take this apart, one piece at a time.

By Jove!

As one of the commenters mentioned, "by Jove!" is an exclamation, similar to "By God!". In fact, according to Wiktionary, the term comes from another name for the god Jupiter.

he'd sailed pretty near the wind once or twice! But he'd always got away with it!

You're right; "sailing near the wind" means to do something that is "only just legal" or dangerous. (The Free Dictionary, citing the Cambridge Idioms Dictionary)

There wasn't much he drew the line at really.

You're close with your interpretation, here, but I think it needs a slight change to be perfect. I don't think this only means that he has always gotten away with "sailing close to the wind" without consequence. To draw a line means to make a limit for yourself -- to tell yourself that I'll drive 5 miles over the speed limit, but not 30. In this statement, the speaker is saying that they don't really have any self-imposed limits.

No,there wasn't much he'd draw the line at. He fancied that he was going to enjoy himself at Soldier Island.

The word "fancy," as a verb (in the fourth entry here), means to imagine or suppose. These two statements together imply that the speaker expects to enjoy himself a lot on Soldier Island, because he doesn't have any self-imposed limits. I haven't read the book, but this statement is designed to make one feel uncomfortable about this character, because this character will have "fun" in a place away from regular society, probably even at the expense of other people. I would be wary about this one, if I were you.