"A plan, a plan!"
"Ay, that'll be the way of it!"
"Sawkins is right!"
"To the New England shore! Ben Hornigold will pilot the ship!" burst in confused clamor from the crew to whom the plan appealed.
"By heaven, no!" shouted Morgan. "That's well enough for you, not for me. I'm a marked man. You can disappear. I should be taken, and Hornigold and Raveneau and the rest. It won't do. We must stay by the ship."
"And what then?"
"Keep to the original plan. We'll sail this ship down to the Spanish Main and capture a town, divide our treasure, make our way overland to the Pacific, where we'll find another ship, and then away to the South Seas! Great as is our booty, there is still more to be had there for the taking. We'll be free to go where we please with the whole South American coast at hand. There are islands, tropic islands, there, where it's always summer. They are ours for the choosing. We can establish ourselves there. We'll found a community, with every man a law for himself. We'll——"
But the recital of this Utopian dream was rudely interrupted.
"Nay, Master," cried Sawkins, who had done most of the talking from among the crew, "we go no farther."
He was confident that he had the backing of the men, and in that confidence grew bold with reckless temerity. Flushed by the victory of the morning, the rum he had imbibed, intoxicated by the thought of the treasure which was to be shared, the man went on impudently: