Down by the narrow gorge of the inlet, and over the smooth rocks and shelly shore, the party took their way, Don Ignaçio leading with the amiable priest, on whom he glared with his malevolent 146 eye as if––he not being a person from whom money or its equivalent could be squeezed––the greedy old Spaniard would like to transfix him with a glance. In the rear came Captain Brand and the doctor, the former as gay as a bird––of the vulture species––and his companion grave, severe, and preoccupied. Stopping as they reached the Tiger Trap Battery, where, after Captain Brand had made a close inspection of the guns, and held sharp confabs with the men who rose to receive him, he moved away a few steps, and, resting his body against the lee side of a projecting rock, removed the cigar from his frozen lips, and said,
“The arguments you have urged, monsieur, and the views you entertain, have a certain amount of reason in them. It is true you were deceived in coming here, but yet you swore to remain and not betray us when you did come. Well––ah! don’t interrupt me; I divine what you are going to say––you did not know what our real character was. Perhaps not. Nevertheless, I can not consent to your going away with that old rascal, Don Ignaçio, there––that is, if he would take you, which I think he would not, as your presence on board might compromise him with the Cuban authorities; and,” went on Captain Brand, as he crossed his legs, and held his fine Panama hat on his head as a ruffle of the sea-breeze shot around the rock, “with respect to your remaining here on the island, you will only have that dumb old beast of a Babette for company; and it is highly probable that the English or American cruisers will be down upon you before a change of the moon, and they might––a––hang you, perhaps, for a pirate. Ho! ho!”
“If Don Ignaçio declines to take me, Captain Brand, of course I can not go in the felucca; but, let come what will, I am resolved not to sail in the ‘Centipede.’”
The pirate regarded the doctor for a moment with a cold, freezing look, not wanting, however, in a partial glimmer of respect and admiration, as he thus resolutely stated his determination; and then, putting his finger lightly on the doctor’s arm, as he saw Don Ignaçio and the padre draw near, he said impressively, in a low tone,
“Monsieur le Docteur, do not make hasty resolutions. I command here, and my will is law. I will turn the matter over, however, in my mind, and give you a final decision before we part to-night. Now let us return. The sun is down, and the rocks are slippery.”
“Well, caballeros, let us have a little social amusement,” said Captain Brand, as he sat down at the table in the padre’s and doctor’s quarters, and wound up his splendid watch, the present from the Captain General of Cuba. “But bear in mind that we must break up at midnight, for our compadre here has a multitude of articles to get on board his felucca to-night, and I must be astir at daylight.”
Did Captain Brand think, while he turned the key of that gold repeater, of the bloodstained wretch he had put to death in the morning, who was lying stark and still in his narrow, damp resting-place, or of the poor little sufferer who had been torn from his heart-broken mother sleeping near him? Oh no, certainly not. Captain Brand was thinking of a little game of monté.
The padre lugged out a small store of dollars, and a gold ounce or two, and other stray bits of gold, down to quartitos or eighths of doubloons––all of it donations made him for remission of sins and absolutions, presented at one time and another from the pirates of his flock, such donations falling in pretty rapidly after a successful cruise, but dwindling away to most contemptible gifts long before his flock took to sea again.
Captain Brand was very liberal to his crew, dividing a great deal of money with them, but, since he rarely visited any foreign ports, they had little chance of squandering it; and in the end it served merely as a gaming currency to play with, and eventually coming back to him as contributions for stores, ammunition, rigging, and so forth. The captain, therefore, was a large gainer by the operation, as most of the articles in eating and drinking, and the vessel’s outfit, were––as we know––generally presented to him, so that he was enabled to stow away the cash for future gratification.