Jonas laughed his burly, fat laugh.
"Not to speak of Mauresco," he said, "handsome Mauresco!"
"But if I promise never to say a word to a soul of where I have been, whom I saw, what was said, when we——"
"We've heard those promises afore," said Captain Jonas. "Remember, Mauresco? When we caught that damned Spanish don, and all the promises he made, and then that infernal chase! No, no, boy—Lord George, I should have said. We know too much about the faith of a prisoner of war."
"My family have always been noted for their honour and faith!" The boy drew himself up with pride as he said these words. "I would die before I would tell if I promised not——"
"That will be the case anyway," said Mauresco with a careless laugh.
"Will you shoot me? Will you make me walk that horr——"
The boy shuddered and turned paler than he had been.
"No, no, boy, on the word of the buccaneer, we have no such intention. We shall neither shoot you, hang you, nor make you walk the plank. Don't be so anxious. You have got some fine stories into your head about us, but really at bottom we are the most humane of men.—Aren't we, Jonas? I beg pardon, Captain Jonas."
"So they tell me," said Jonas pleasantly.