He had the revolver in his hand, and while he cast a glance at the caps on the breech, as if to see that they were all right, and sheathed his knife, I made a bound aside, and placed a banana-tree between us. The dastard fired, and the ball, as it whistled past, stripped off a piece of bark.
In the same manner, I escaped a second shot, so Antonio, finding that his much-prized ammunition was likely to be expended fruitlessly, rushed forward to use his knife.
The tendril of a pumpkin caught his left foot; he fell heavily, and hurt himself severely. Then, darting past, I secured my hatchet, and rendered furious by all that had occurred, and by the imminent danger which menaced me, a light seemed to flash before my eyes, I trembled with rage, and felt as if endued by a supernatural strength.
I was about to spring upon Antonio, with hands, feet, and teeth,—to hew at him with the hatchet as I would have hewn at a tree—when a new object suddenly caught my eye.
It was a ship—but a ship ashore!
"Cubano," I exclaimed, in a husky voice, "look there!"
Antonio looked in the direction indicated, and pausing in his murderous intention, uttered a fierce laugh of satisfaction.
In the rocky channel which opened between the inaccessible island and ours, there lay the wave-beaten hull of a dismasted vessel, which must have been drifted in over night, as it was certainly not there yesterday, and it was now jammed hard and fast upon a reef of rock that connected them.
This new object changed at once the terrible current of the Cubano's ideas. A grim smile passed over his olive countenance; he shook back the elf-like masses of coal-black hair which, in Skye-terrier fashion, overhung his wild dark eyes, and sheathing his knife, said,—
"Mio muchacho—come; I was only joking. Yonder we shall find food, perhaps, and who knows what more? Come, it is a bargain; and if you don't desert me, I shall not molest you again."