"As long as you stick to it," I replied. "But I warn you that I shall keep a strict watch upon you, and if you play me false you know what you may expect."
From that moment I had no more trouble with either of them. The Señorita adopted a haughty air towards me. The President, on the other hand, made himself even more agreeable to me than he had been before.
One day later, and, as I expected, a little before sun-down, a small speck appeared upon the horizon. This gradually increased in size until it developed into a small densely-wooded island.
"That," said Ferguson, who was standing beside me on the bridge, "is San Diaz!"
"And, thank goodness, our destination!"
CHAPTER XI
The island of San Diaz is some fifteen miles long by eight wide. From end to end it is densely wooded; in fact, a large proportion of its area is still primeval forest. The population numbers only a few hundreds, and the majority of the inhabitants are black. For the most part they are a retiring race. How they live, or what they live upon, would at first glance seem difficult to understand; but they appear to enjoy life in their harmless way, and, being cut off from certain doubtful blessings of our so-called Civilization, they generally manage to elude the clutches of old Boney for a longer space of time than do their brethren in better known and more popular climes.
As I observed at the close of the preceding chapter, I was on the bridge with Ferguson when we first sighted the island. After a close consultation of the chart that he held in his hand, he put his helm up, and hugged the shore for a distance of something like five miles. Then, finding himself at the entrance of a fair-sized bay, he turned in and prepared to seek an anchorage. The view from the deck at that moment was a very pleasing one. First the blue water of the bay, then a white beach, after which the ground began to ascend until it reached, in a somewhat precipitous slope, a plateau at an elevation of something like two hundred feet above sea-level. On this plateau, nestling among the trees, stood a long white house, with several smaller buildings clustered round it. As we watched, the report of a firearm reached us from the settlement, followed by another and yet another in quick succession. It was the signal I had arranged for with Silvestre, and it proclaimed the fact that he was aware of our arrival.