"'Can yer ride?' asks the chap with the beard.
"'Jest a bit,' I answered, for a sailor can stick on most things. Then he got talking, and as a result I signed on for this here voyage. We're goin' up to the pampas to wipe out the ranchers. They're worth a pile, and we'll skin 'em of every shillin'. We're starting with the fellow lyin' in the boat below. He's got heaps of money, they say, and I've a notion that blackbeard over there has a grudge against him. That's the job, shaver. We start to-night, and it seems to me, seeing as you're English, as you'd better sail in company with us, and get a share. What say?"
For a moment or two the young fellow listening looked as if he would return an indignant reply to such a suggestion. But he happened to cast his eye round at the faces about the table, and then at the unshaven cheeks of the sailor.
"A set of ruffians to look at them," he said to himself. "And they seem as if they would stop at nothing. How on earth I was fool enough to take a passage with them I cannot say. But it is done now, and cannot be helped. He said this man to be attacked was English."
"Who is the rancher you are going to attack?" he asked cautiously, suddenly determining to get all the information possible.
"Who is the feller? Well, can't say as I know or care. He's English, else his name wouldn't be Blunt, would it? and he's got the coin. What more do you want to know? Eh? How it's to be done? Simple as standin', shaver. We've a cable with an anchor down at the bottom of the river, and there's slack enough to let us down stream quite a lot. See now! We just drop quiet and easy down on the boat below, and before them chaps can shout, whew!"
He drew his hand significantly across his neck, and leered at the lad who listened.
"Jest like that," he said, grinning so that his blackened teeth showed. "They ain't got a dog's chance. Reckon we'll start this game by makin' a fine haul, and spendin' a week in the saloons."
Little by little, and speaking in an undertone, the young man wormed the plot out of the sailor, and when he had done so he lay down again for a while, having deferred his consent till he had considered the matter. Later he sat up again, for the sailor pulled at his clothing.
"Guess you've decided to come in," he said. "Ef so, I'll speak to blackbeard over there and make it right. I thought at first as you was a toff, with brass in your pocket. But there's many sich as you comes out to this country to work, and who live down in the towns till their money's gone. Then it's hard to get a job, special ef you ain't used to the ranches. Then's the time when a feller jumps to join a band like this. Why, I can see that there ain't goin' ter be too much hard work. There'll be better grub than a sailor gets aboard ship, and if we've luck, there'll be coin in plenty. You'll join?"