Crawford grimaced. “The good will of vermin is not valuable——”
“Pardon, but you will find that vermin bite!”
Vanderberg shoved into the talk, glaring at Frontin from bloodshot, sleep-lacking eyes.
“Listen to me! We are heading northeast. The chart shows that we shall run into a cape named Sable. What about it?”
“Rest assured.” Frontin’s hawk-nosed, bitter features were confident. “I know these waters well and need none of your charts, which are not accurate.”
“We are in your hands,” said Vanderberg, with a nod. “Now tell me just where we are going, for questions are going to be asked before long. That devil Bose already suspects that we’re not driving south.”
Frontin spilled a little rum on the table, out of the great golden chalice that had belonged to Saint-Castin. With his finger he drew the outline of a promontory.
“This is a point of land half-way around Newfoundland. Here on one side is Conception Bay, on the other Trinity Bay. Here in the end of the point is what the English call a cove—a small harbour, without much protection, therefore without ice. All along the shore are very high cliffs. At one point along these cliffs, near the cove, there is a ledge of rock that extends back into the cliffs like a shallow cave; it is just above high water, and cannot be reached in Summer because of tremendous tide-currents and whirlpools that lie before it. Upon this ledge is the wreck of the galleon, undoubtedly flung there in some furious storm.”
Crawford interposed.
“Saint-Castin was there before with you; why could he not have come again? Why could not the galleon have been plundered by the English?”