"My heart, it be joyful tidings!" said Turnpenny. "I knew Master Francis would come again to these shores, to have a proper tit-for-tat for the base dealings of the Spaniards at St. John d'Ulua. Good-now, sir, shall we take a journey and see the worthy captain, and peradventure join with him in spoiling the knaves?"
"With all my heart, Amos," replied Dennis. "Without doubt Juan will furnish us with a guide."
Turnpenny spoke to the maroon.
"Better than that!" he said, after a brief colloquy. "He says he will e'en come himself with a party. Master Francis, he says, does hurt to no woman nor unarmed man; he is kind to the maroons; and not a man of them but loves him and would serve him to the death. Ay sure, a noble man is Master Francis, that loves God and hates the Spaniards; and Ise warrant we could do naught better than join ourselves to him. Crymaces! he will list with a ready ear to the tale of our adventures."
"'Twill be overlong for the captain," said Dennis, with a smile. "But I would fain see him and speak with him, for he may perchance spare a vessel to go and seek for our poor comrades penned up in Maiden Isle."
"God-a-mercy, I had a'most forgotten, sir. True, there be Tom Copstone, and Hugh Curder, and Ned Whiddon all lone and lorn. Master Francis will help us to save them, or he be no true man."
CHAPTER XIX
Drake's Camp
Early in the afternoon of the second day thereafter, Dennis and Turnpenny, with Juan and a company of maroons, came to the outskirts of a large clearing at a little recess of the shore. A bark and three trim little pinnaces lay rocking in a secluded roadstead. Neatly thatched huts of the maroons' pattern bordered the clearing. At one end of it stood two archery butts at which men were shooting; a smith was lustily plying his sledge at an anvil; and in the middle, on a stretch of sward, two stalwart bearded figures were disporting themselves at a game of bowls.