“Ah, yes,” sneered Ralli. “Now that he is gone, and can no longer protect you, you disown him. But that will not do. You and he were friends, whatever you may say. He is my enemy, and his friends are therefore my enemies also; and they will be treated as such; do you understand me?”
“Not in the least,” said Lance, “I have not the faintest notion of your meaning.”
“Then listen to me and I will explain,” said Ralli, his eyes gleaming vindictively. “Do you know that your friend yonder is fated never to return?”
“What is the meaning of this?” thought Lance. “Some treachery or other on the part of this rascally Greek, I’ll wager. But it will never do to allow him to suppose that he is master of the situation so—”
“I believe,” he said carelessly, “there is some sort of arrangement to that effect, is there not?”
The Greek gazed at him in unaffected alarm.
“Aha!” he ejaculated, “how came you to know that?”
Lance smiled at him compassionately. “Did you really flatter yourself,” he said, “that your plans were so astutely devised—so cunningly concealed that none but you and your partisans could possibly know anything about them! Really, Mr Ralli, I fear you are greatly overrating your own sagacity. But we appear to be wandering away from the point. You were about to explain the meaning of an obscure remark you made a minute or two ago?”
Lance had never removed his glance for a single instant from Ralli’s face since the commencement of the conversation; and he was physiognomist enough to detect the signs of a fear almost approaching to panic in the countenance of the Greek; he knew therefore that his bold guess had not been very far from the truth; and he continued to puff his cigar with all his wonted insouciance as he waited calmly for the reply to his interrogation.
“Yes,” said Ralli, recovering his self-possession with evident effort. “I was about to explain two things—First, I wish you to understand that Johnson is not my captain, nor is he the captain of anyone now on this island. We have thrown off our—what do you term it? our—”