"No, senor."
"How, then——"
"Oh! one may speak Spanish without having been in Spain," said I, smiling.
"Of course—of course. But what is this?" he added, on perceiving the wounds of Antonio; "Caramba! have you been fighting—killing one another?"
"Senor," said Hislop, "this is the picaroon of whom I told you—he who slew our captain and shipmates, and whom we thrust overboard; but who, as if by a miracle, reached the island of Alphonso before us."
"Bueno! And what more?"
"On seeing your ship come to anchor outside the reef," said I, with some anxiety for the issue of the affair, "he endeavored to kill me; and but for the sword with which I was armed, he had assuredly done so."
"To kill you—santos!—and why?"
"Lest I should accuse him of those crimes which he had committed in the Eugenie, and which so many of her surviving crew, now here on board, are ready to substantiate."
"And now in the name of justice, senor capitano, I demand that he be strung up at once at the foreyard-arm!" said Hislop.