An interminable grin spread itself over Mitsos's face. "And the Capsina, I doubt not, goes to see a strange baby, while the Greeks are murdered all along the coast. And the Revenge strains at her hawser, and the Capsina spends her time in abusing her own first officer," he said. "Oh, Capsina, and where is there a choice between us? Do not be so hasty; see, I shall have to pick up all these draughts, for finish the game I shall and will, and as you very well know we do not start till to-morrow. It was my move, Christos, and these pieces were so—eh, but there is another. Is it up your sleeve, Capsina?"
The Capsina glared at Christos a moment as if she were a careful mother who had discovered him luring a child of hers into some low haunt and directed the torrent of her grievance against him.
"Never did I see such a lad," she said; "if you were of the clan I should set you to the loom and the distaff like the women. He would sit and look at the sea by the hour, Mitsos; he would throw bread to the gulls. Gulls, indeed!"
Mitsos fairly laughed out.
"Oh, Capsina," he cried, "sit down and watch us play. There is nothing we can do, you know it well. The new men have volunteered—Kanaris had the choosing of them; you settled that yourself, and the Revenge cannot start before morning. Then how does it assist the war to stamp up and down through the villages of Greece, as you say, and call me and Christos bird-names? There, I am cornered; I knew that would happen; and the pigeon-livered wins. Move, pigeon."
Mitsos shook back his hair from his eyes and looked inquiringly at the Capsina.
"Does not that seem to you most excellent sound sense?" he said.
The Capsina stood a little longer undecided, but the corners of her mouth wavered, and Mitsos, seeing his advantage, clapped his hands.
"Coffee for the Capsina!" he cried to the shopman. "Is it not so, Capsina?" He fetched her a chair. "Now watch us finish, and then Christos will play you, and I will take your side. Thus we stand or fall together, and may it ever be so with us. Christos is the devil of a cunning fellow, for be it known to you I am pretty good myself, and see what there is left of me."
"Oh, fool of a little Mitsos!" said the girl, and she looked at him a shade longer than a friend would have done and sat down.