“What d’ye mean?” Captain Snaggs managed to stammer out after a bit, his long face perceptibly longer and his rubicund complexion turned to an ashy grey. He was conscience-stricken and thoroughly frightened at the second-mate thus bringing up again, as he thought, his cruel murder of the negro cook; for, Jan Steenbock spoke in the same tone of voice, and pointed his finger at him like an accusing judge, in almost the same precise way he had done on that eventful day when we were off Scilly, three months before. “What in thunder d’ye mean, man?—what d’ye mean?”
“I vas mean vat I zays,” answered the other calmly: “ze dreazure of ze boocaneer vas shtain mit ze bloot of von schlave.”
“Oh,” exclaimed the skipper, somewhat relieved by his not mentioning again Sam Jedfoot’s name, as he and all of us believed the second-mate intended doing, imagining his remark to refer to none other than the poor darkey. “I don’t kinder foller ye, mister, nohow, an it strikes me, it dew, ez if ye air gettin’ sorter mixed up, same ez jest now! What d’ye mean a-talkin’ o’ durned nigger slaves an’ sichlike? Thaar ain’t none now, I reckon, under the Stars and Stripes this side, nor yit fur thet matter in the hull o’ the land, from Maine to Californy, sin’ the war busted up the great southern ‘institooshun,’ ez they call’d it in Virginny. Thaar ain’t no slaves, sirree, now, I guess, on this hyar free an’ almighty continent! What d’yer mean, hey?”
The men gave out another loud hooray at this stump speech, which the skipper, quite relieved of his fears anent any allusion to Sam Jedfoot, delivered with much unction, as if he were holding forth from a platform at election time, his billy-goat beard wagging while he threw his arms about in the excitement of his oratory.
Jan Steenbock, for the moment, seemed puzzled how to reply; for, he stood silently facing the other in the pause that ensued after he had finished his harangue.
At length, however, he spoke, the wild cheer of the hands spurring him up and giving an impulse to the slow current of his thoughts and words—the Dane not being prone, like Captain Snaggs, to talking for the mere pleasure of hearing his own voice.
“I vill egshblain vat I means,” he began, in his deliberate way, answering the skipper’s question, but speaking as if addressing all of us collectively, his deep tones getting deeper and increasing in volume as he proceeded, so that all could hear. “I vas shpeak vat I reat in ze book dat Cap’en Shackzon vas bringt mit him vrom Guayaquil in ze schgooners dat time. I vas likevise rec’lect vat I zees here ven we vas arrife, an’ Cap’en Shackzon’s vas murter’t, and ze mans vas kill ze ozers, and dere vas nuzzing but bloot and murter; vor, ze schgooners vas go down, mit only meinselfs dat vas eshgape mit mein lifes—and zo I zays to meinselfs, dere vas a curse on ze golt and ze dreazure of ze boocaneer vrom ze bloot of ze schlave dat vas murter’t!”
“Guess I don’t foller ye yet, mister,” said the skipper. “Who kil’t thet air darkey ye air a-talkin’ on, hey?”
“Ze boocaneer,” promptly replied Jan. “Dey vas burit ze schlave vere dey vas burit ze dreazure.”
“An’ what did the cusses dew thet fur?”