Pillgrim trembled in every fibre of his frame. It was not thus he had hoped to meet his enemy.
"'If you capture the Ben Lomond, it will make you a lieutenant. Do it, by all means,'" continued Somers, reading the last paragraph of the letter. "This was your advice. I have done it."
Pillgrim made no reply. His pale, haggard face, darkened by his half-grown beard, was contorted by emotion, and his bloodshot eyes had lost their fire.
"You don't seem to enjoy the situation so much as your letter intimated that you would."
"Mr. Somers, I am your prisoner," said he, with a desperate struggle.
"You are; you will not have the pleasure of hanging me at the yard-arm."
"I am bewildered—overcome."
"So was Langdon."
"I see why you did not join your ship before," said Langdon, with a sneer, as he glanced contemptuously at his principal. "You have been dissipating."
This remark brought forth an angry retort from Pillgrim, and for a few moments each traitor reproached and vilified the other, much to the amusement of the marines, and to the disgust of Somers, who was compelled to interfere. Langdon's severest charge against his late captain was, that he had betrayed their schemes by writing letters, and in other stupid ways. Pillgrim denied it.