“No it ain’t,” said old Bates, sneeringly. “Business is as good as ever it was, but you are growing as timid as a girl, Captain Jack.”
“Me?”
“Yes, you. You needn’t foam, and sweat, and swear, I knows all about it.”
“About what?”
“Why, that affair with you and Colonel Blood; you are under his thumb, my man.”
“Well, suppose I am, what then? Didn’t he threaten to hang every one of the Dozen on the cross-roads if we didn’t find out the murderer of old Farmer Bertram?”
“Well, and so we have. Haven’t you got young Redgill in prison for it?”
“Yes,” said Captain Jack, but at the same time he knew he was telling a lie, and tried to whistle.
“Now you’ve got the right party, what more claim has the colonel got against us?”
“Young Redgill ain’t hung yet; the bargain holds good, so the colonel says, until that’s accomplished.”