"Ay, sir, 'tis Baltizar the cook, and a very whey-blooded knave. I'll ferret it out of him, trust me."
He took some minutes in his scraps of Spanish to make the man understand what was required of him. When he understood, the negro became very voluble. He said that the boatswain did indeed keep a small jar of powder in his sea-chest, but there was a much larger quantity concealed among the ship's stores under hatches. It had been placed there by the mate—"the long knave I spitted," Amos explained—who was accustomed to do a little private trading with the natives of the mainland, and had destined the powder as a bribe for certain pearl-fishers of the coast.
"Is it in the fore-peak?" asked Dennis, remembering where he had found powder on the Maid Marian.
"No, worse luck!" replied Turnpenny, after questioning the man. "'Tis in the lazaretto, and the hatchway being but a few feet from the break of the poop, we cannot come at it 'ithout running the hazard of a shot from the cabin."
"'Tis darker now; could I not risk the deed?"
"The knaves med not see you, 'tis true; but you could not knock out the battens 'ithout raising a din, and they would know your whereabouts, and not all on 'em would miss your carcase. Be jowned if I'd like to see 'ee make the venture."
Releasing the negro, Dennis crouched again behind the coil of rope.
"We must find a way to get that powder," he said. "A mariner like you, Amos, ought to be fertile in devices. Come, set your brains on the rack."
"I be afeard they be soft wi' four years' misery, but I'll rouse 'em. If I had but the second sight, now, like the old witch as lived within a cable-length o' my grandad's hut on the moors!"
But Amos had done his brains an injustice. He had not pondered many minutes before he exclaimed—