"I do. Had I one tenth of your commercial power, Monsieur, the King, my master, for whom I came out here to glean the seas, could keep a richer court at the Hague."
The Governor leaned across the table and stared. "Do I hear you say you are working for Charles II.?"
"Certainly. I am his servant since his late Majesty's murder. His kingdom for the nonce is unhappily in the hands of others, and with it the natural revenues. A king must have a court; a court needs money; I sail the seas to win that money: the thing is simple."
Monsieur D'Ogeron hit the table. "The thing is unheard of," he cried. "Loyalty is a home-growth which does not bear transporting across the seas. In France, in the old days, I was the king's man—I forget what king's. I left France full of that loyalty, and for a while it lasted. But when my ship ran into the trade winds, it began to ooze from me, and when I got set down here, in these islands of the Caribbean, there was but a dim memory of that loyalty left. France is so many a weary league away, that the King's shadow cannot reach across the seas. For a while I missed it; for a while there was a blank in my life. And then I found another master: a master whom I could always admire and strive for; a master whose every action interested me, whose every woe was mine; and him I have served this many years with infinite zest and appetite. Never had man a master he wished to serve so well."
"May I hear his name?" the Prince asked.
The Governor turned to a silver mirror which hung against the wall, and lifted his goblet.
"I drink to him," he said, "with all heartiness. His name is Camille Baptiste D'Ogeron, patron of the buccaneers."
"And skimmer of their gains?"
"Skimmer of their gains, most certainly, mon prince, or why Governor of Tortuga? What am I else but a king? I have no hollow pomp about my court, it is true, but I could have it if I chose to pay. I could have drums beat in my path when I went abroad, and powder burned upon my saint's day. I could have courtiers in silken robes and golden chains, and a palace with forty rooms instead of four. But I take only what suits my whim. My visitors come in tarry breeks or the bloodied shirts of cow-hunters. My attendants can make a roast, or brew a bowl, or slit a throat with equal glibness. My enemies, when they call, leave behind them their heads on the spikes above the gateway. And I have also the delicate joys of domesticity. Though I have been widowed these nine times, I married a new wife brought in by one of the ships only the other day, and already she adores me."
Prince Rupert sighed. "I can conceive," he said, "that the situation would not be intolerable for some men. There is a certain relish in robbing the Spaniard."