“Yes,” he went on, “you may say I bought your salvation, gentlemen. No—don’t thank me.” Mr Murch waved deprecating hands. “If I hadn’t bought you, others would. Dawkins came to me as an old shipmate, you see.”
It was like a dream to be sitting in that strange place, with the girl watching us, and the old buccaneer discussing, between mouthfuls, the question of our death or purchase as though we had been a brace of poultry.
“But what I say and maintain, is a clean ship above board and below,” said Murch, harping back. “I hope I make myself clear, gentlemen. I want you to understand me. I know what’s right and I know what’s wrong, as well as any man alive. I consider it right to buy slaves under certain conditions, wrong under others. You do right, as you think; you find it wrong; what then? Repent, as I was saying. Repent, smart and handsome, and that brings you to your course again. Take your own case—you see? Why, now, that’s all shipshape. With your leave, we’ll talk business presently. Mistress Morgan will entertain you in the meanwhile, I daresay.”
Having delivered himself of these sentiments in his weighty, sonorous manner, whose positive assurance implied negation of even the possibility of contradiction, the old gentleman clapped a palm-leaf hat on his head, called for his horse, and disappeared.
“When Mr Murch talks in this way, you may believe him. It is true what he says.” Thus abruptly did Mistress Morgan Leroux address us, with a clear foreign-accented enunciation.
“Is Mr Murch your——?” asked Pomfrett, rather at a loss.
“My guardian, yes,” said the girl. “Ever since Sir Henry Morgan went to England. He was my grandfather—Sir Henry; that is why I am called Morgan.”
She sent for cigarros, and took one herself. We sat there in the cool shadow, well filled and comfortable. Pomfrett talked with Morgan Leroux. He forgot his ship, and his owners, and his aunt, and everything—you had only to glance at his face to know that. I let them talk; women are not much in my way. After a while old Murch came back and carried us into his room.
VI
Two Catspaws and a Lady
The dusky chamber, its lattices closed against the heat, was filled with the rushing noise of the wind in the trees without. Brandon Pomfrett gazed at me with a rueful countenance; he was thinking of the Blessed Endeavour, our tall ship, thrashing along before the gale, main-chains under, while we were caged with the old buccaneer.