"Are they dead?" I questioned.
"Nay, not yet, master; give 'em six minutes or say ten and they'll be as dead as the pig you ate of last—"
"How so?" I demanded, staring at the wild, ragged figure of the speaker.
"By means o' this, master!" said he, and stooping towards the fire showed me a middling-sized black thorn upon his open palm. "Not much to look at, master—no, but 'tis death sure and sarten, howsomever. I've many more besides; I make 'em into darts and shoot 'em through a blowpipe—a trick I larned o' the Indians. Aye, I spits 'em through a pipe—which is better than your guns—no noise, no smoke, and sure death wherever it sticketh."
"Are you an Englishman?"
"I am that! Born within sound o' Bow Bells; 'tis all o' twenty years since I heard 'em but they ring in my dreams sometimes. I shipped on a venture to the Main twenty years ago and fought and rioted as a man may and by ill-luck fell into the hands o' the bloody Spaniards along o' six other good lads—all dead long since, master. Then the Inquisition got me and was going to burn me but not liking the thought on't, I turned Roman. Then they made me a slave, but I got away at last. Aha, all Spanishers are devils for cruelty, but their Churchmen are worst and of all their Churchmen the coldest, softest, bloodiest is Alexo Valdez, Chief Inquisitor of Nombre de Dios yonder—"
"Ha, you know Nombre de Dios?"
"I ha' lived and suffered there, master, and 'tis there I be a-going for to make an end o' Bloody Valdez, if God be kind."
"Then," said I, "we will travel so far together—"
"And what doth an Englishman the like o' you want with the accursed place; the Inquisition is strong there—"