Captain Pog raised his head slowly and said to the young man, with bitter irony:
“Well, well, my dear child, you are right to blush for our profession. Upon my return to Tripoli, I will buy you a shop near the port,—it is the best mercantile quarter. There you can sell in peace and quietness white morocco-leather, Smyrna carpets and tapestry, Persian silks and ostrich feathers. That is an easy and honest calling, my dear child. You will be able to amass some money and afterward go to Malta, and establish yourself in the Jewish quarter. There you can lend your money at fifty per cent, to the chevaliers who are in debt. Thus you can avenge yourself on those who cut your father’s and mother’s throats, by pocketing their money. It is more lucrative and less dangerous than taking your revenge in blood.”
“Captain!” cried Erebus, his cheeks flaming with indignation.
“Captain Pog is right,” said Trimalcyon, “the vampire that sucks the blood of his sleeping prey with impunity is better than the bold falcon that attacks him in the sun.”
“Trimalcyon, take care!” cried the young man, in anger.
“And who knows,” continued Pog, “if chance may not cause the chevalier who massacred your poor mother and noble father to fall under your usurious hand?”
“And see the avenging hand of Providence!” cried Trimalcyon. “The orphan becomes the creditor of the assassin! Blood and murder! Death and agony! This son, the avenger, at last gluts his rage by making the murderer of his family put on the yellow robe of insolvent debtors!”
At this last sarcasm, the anger of Erebus exceeded all bounds, and he seized Trimalcyon by the throat and drew on him a knife that he had taken from the table. But for the iron grasp of Pog, which held the youth’s hand like a vice, the fat pirate would have been dangerously wounded, if not killed.
“By Eblis and his black wings! Captain, take care! If you are provoked at the blow I was about to give that hog, then I will address myself to you!” cried Erebus, trying to free himself from Pog’s hands.
Swan-skin and Orangine escaped, shrieking with terror.