"By no means. I have the highest opinion of your fighting genius, mon prince. But I would like to ensure that the fleet, after glutting itself with spoil on the Spanish Main, called back in this harbour here, and did not sail direct to Helveotsluys or some other port of Holland."
"So, Monsieur, you doubt my poor honesty? You do well to put a barrier between us, for this is a killing matter."
"I have learned to doubt everybody, your Highness; but I doubt you doubly because of your loyalty to this king without a kingdom, by whom you have been sent out a-foraging. Once you and your cavaliers had the gold aboard and under hatches, it might come to your memories that this king of yours was poor, and wanted immediate nourishment, and that Monsieur de Tortuga could bear to have his account settled on a later day. You take me?"
"I cannot bargain with you," said Rupert violently. "I will not be separated from my fleet. But if hard necessity makes me desert these unfortunate cavaliers now, be assured that I do not forget them. And when opportunity arrives, and I come back to rescue them, look to yourself, Monsieur."
"You may trust me to do it," said the Frenchman. "I am always ready to receive my visitors fittingly. That is why I remain Governor of Tortuga. Well, your Highness, for the present negotiations seem at an end between us. To-morrow I suppose you will buy what food you have moneys for, and draw anchor, and be off outside towards the Main, to set about your earnings. But for the present I have a kindliness towards you, although in truth you have yielded me but very slender deference, and I would e'en let you have a passing look at these good comrades from whom you have been so cruelly parted."
"What, you have them here, then?"
"Some of them are coming to the Island now with their produce. Looking over your Highness's shoulder through the window, I saw three canoe-loads of them disappear behind the point. If it please you to take a short promenade in my company, you can watch their march when they land."
"Monsieur," said the Prince, "I accept your condescension. But first you must make me a pathway across this gap. I cannot fly."
"That can soon be done," said the Governor. He put a finger through his lips and whistled shrilly. A man stepped into the room from behind a curtain. "Jean Paul," said the Governor, "the drawbridge." The man lugged a plank from beneath the table, threw it across the space in the flooring, and assisted the Prince to cross. The Governor himself handed his walking-cane and plumed hat, and together they passed out of the chamber, Jean Paul and Alphonse following, with hands upon their pistols.
They walked leisurely through the defences of the castle, for Monsieur D'Ogeron was by no means loth to advertise his strength, and arm in arm they went out through the massive gateway, with its decoration of shrivelled heads, once worn by Monsieur D'Ogeron's enemies. They paced with gentle gait along the sun-dried path beyond, the Prince discoursing on philosophy, and engraving, and the gentler sciences, according to his wont, as though he had no thought beyond, and the Governor speaking of the fellows they passed, and the quantity of gold each in his time had wrested from the Spaniards. The Governor had but one thought to his head; but the Prince, whatever his thoughts might be, had always elegant words on other matters with which to cloak them.