There’s many like handsome Jim. I’ve knowed a many go that way. The Main’s a hard place, the same as the sea is, if you come to that.”
“Ah,” said Perrin. “How ghastly.”
Captain Margaret said nothing; for in his lively fancy he saw a half-naked man, lying on the deck, surrounded by pirates, who watched him with a sort of hard pity. The sun shone strongly upon the picture, so that the brass cannon gleamed. Out of the wrecked man’s body came a snatch of a nursery rhyme, with a pathetic tune. He felt the horror of it; he saw how the pirates shifted on their feet and looked at each other. He was tempted to ask, “Had one of your men a hare-lip?” for in the picture which his fancy formed a hare-lipped pirate stood out strangely, seemingly stirred by that horror on the deck. “Fancy,” he thought. “Pure fancy.”
“Let me fill your glass, Cammock,” he said. He poured another dose into the glass.
“Salue,” said the pirate.
A red log, burned through, fell with a crash inside the stove.
“Sparks,” said the pirate. “Sparks. We give the Dagoes sparks for that lot.” He paused a moment. “Yes, Captain Margaret,” he went on. “And that’s the way you’d best.”
“What way is that?” asked the captain.
“Well. It’s like this,” said the captain. “Your trading lay—I’m speaking as a sailor, you understand—is all Barney’s bull. It’s got more bugs than brains, as you might say. But you don’t want to go trading. What d’yer want to go trading for? You’d only get et by sand-flies, even if you did make a profit. What you want to do. You got a big ship. You’d easy get hands enough. Well, what I say is, why not go for one of the towns? Morgan done it. Sharp done it. Old John Coxon done it, for I was with him. And the French and Dutch done it, too; don’t I know it. If you come on ’em with a sort of a hawky pounce you get ’em every time. Profit, too. There’s twenty or thirty pound a man in it. Besides ransoms. There’s no work in it, like in trading. If you’re trading, you got to watch your stores, you got to watch the Indians, you got to kowtow to the chiefs. Pah. It’s a poor job, trade is. It’s not a seaman’s job. But you come down on the towns. Why. Half your life. I wish I’d been wise when I was a young man. That’s what I ought to a done, ’stead of logwood cutting.”
“What towns would you advise?” said Captain Margaret, smiling.