“I have business with you, Captain Carteret,” he said.
I started to leave.
“It concerns you also, Captain Amherst,” went on the sailor, so I remained wondering what was to come. Doubtless a request concerning his position in the block.
But Simon pulled from his inner pocket a folded parchment, which, by certain stains of sea water on it, I knew must have been on board the Eagle, probably a document that Sir George Keith carried, and had desired Simon to deliver for him, when he found himself unable.
“When I have told what I have to tell,” began Simon, “and so fulfilled my oath, I pray that there may be holden no enmity against me. For I only do what I am bound to do.”
“Say on,” came from Captain Carteret. “If you are in no fault none will bear you ill will. Be brief, for time presses.”
I stood there, wondering how Simon’s oath could have aught to do with me.
“Well, then,” went on Simon, “I am, or was a servant to Sir George Keith, who lately died.”
“What, Sir George Keith, of Lincolnshire?” interrupted Captain Carteret, “was he in these parts?”
“He--he was,” said Simon, with such a hesitation over the words that the commander cried out: