“Who’s de next?” he whispered, with eyes rolling and teeth chattering. “Fo’ God, I ain’t afeard o’ no man—yer know dat am de truf. But I’se done skeered at um cap’n, he so still an’ fierce. He bad man—bad man—Cato t’inks de debbil cotches him, sure. Say, Mars’r Griffit’! who’s de next?”
“Durn it, how do I know? Ef a man keeps a civil tongue and obeys orders, the cap’n is his good friend. But let a man jist buck ag’in’ him—whew!” and Bob the scout walked away.
Cato dug the grave, then without ceremony rolled the body into it. Then he filled it in and stamped the soil down, thinking all the time he might be the next. With the laziness and heedlessness of a negro he had buried all the victims where they fell, one, not ten paces from the captain’s own door.
After his work was finished the captain called him into his cabin, and ordered him to meet him at a certain place when the moon rose. Then he gave him a bottle of liquor, and some money, and sent him away.
After he had gone the captain mused deeply for a moment, then laughed.
“Before long I will be a Benedick!” he said; “a Benedick!”
“Speak to me, cap’n?” grunted Fink, from his pile of blankets and robes in his sleeping corner.
“No; I was just soliloquizing.”
“Oh!” and Fink dropped asleep.
The captain smiled.