“But your friends, your world,� I protested as she came nearer.
“I have no other friends, I want no other, and you are my world.�
Well, it was not in me to resist after that, and for the third time in my life I held her in my arms, where since that hour she has often been again, and for the third time I drank the sweetness of her lips. She laughed presently and I let her go a little, yet still held her close, and she looked at me.
“Do you remember the night on The Rose of Devon when first you kissed me?�
“If I should kiss you a million times, sweetheart, as I mean to do,� I answered boldly, “I should not forget a single one of them, much less that.�
“And to punish you for your presumption, although my heart went out to you I do confess, I struck you; and to teach you to be a dutiful husband, loving, devoted to me,� she paused and laughed again, “I strike you once again.�
Whereat she laid her hand once more, but in tenderness, upon my cheek, following it with a kiss. I have had his Majesty’s sword laid upon my shoulder after I had led one of the King’s ships to victory in the French wars, and I am now, if you please, Sir John Hampdon. We live at Wilberforce Castle and our children play on the sward, but the royal accolade meant not so much to me as that light blow upon my cheek with which my dear mistress sealed our plighted troth.
Note
I am often asked what became of the surviving English on the island, and I can only answer that I do not know. So far as I have learned, no white man has ever visited that island since that day, although the publication of these memoirs may induce someone to go there for the balance of the treasure, which is undoubtedly still where we left it. They were resourceful sailors, however, and I have no doubt if any of them survived the earthquake, they managed to get down the wall in some way, repaired their canoes perhaps and returned to the island whence they came, with the surviving natives, and they and their descendants may be living there, awaiting the arrival of some ship.
I heard also after some years, of the prisoners we left in the hands of the British representative at Valparaiso. One died, one escaped, and one was hanged for the mutiny. Should anyone be inspired by the recital of this story to seek the Island of the Stairs—where what remains of the treasure is theirs for the taking—and come upon these mutineers, they may assure them that, so far as my lady and I are concerned, no proceedings will be instituted against them. The lapse of years and the punishment their ringleaders suffered have rendered any prosecution of them impossible, and so far as we are concerned they may return to England or go where they will without molestation. God has undoubtedly dealt with them, and we can leave their future to Him.