From the foc’sle came the muffled thrumming of a guitar.
It was Ratcliffe’s first experience with a Spaniard. He followed Satan, who followed Sellers down a steep companionway and then into a cabin where a great shaft of sunlight from the skylight above struck down through a haze of cigarette smoke.
The place was paneled with bird’s-eye maple; the seats were upholstered in thick ribbed silk, worn and stained; the carpet was of the best, but threadbare in spots and burnt with cigar droppings; the metal fittings far too good for a trading schooner of the Juan type.
Everywhere lay evidence of splendor that had seen better days.
All these fittings had, in fact, been torn out of a yacht bought by Carquinez for an old song, and at the end of the saloon table, going over some papers with a cigarette in his mouth, sat Carquinez himself, a figure to give one pause.
The whole of the left side of this gentleman’s face was covered by a green patch. It was said that he had no left side to his face, that it had been eaten away by disease, and that, were he to unveil himself, the sight would frighten the beholder. However that may have been, what remained visible was enough to frighten any honest man with eyes to behold the nose of a vulture above the peaked chin of a money changer.
“Hullo, Cark!” said Satan.
“Come in,” said Cark.
“Bring yourselves to an anchor,” said Sellers, pointing out two of the fixed seats on each side of the table and taking another close to the owner of the Juan. “What’ll you have?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Satan. “Something soft will suit us, and long.”