Left alone with his one adversary, whose back was to the light, Timothy crossed swords with him. The Spaniard had wrapped the tail of his coat round his left arm. Something in his manner of fence reminded Timothy of the encounter in Beddington Dingle. For a moment he thought of young Philip Oglander. He tried to get a glimpse of the man's face, but a quick thrust aimed at his sword-arm brought him to a sense of his danger, and he did not pause to think which one of the Spaniards whom he had so often seen in Plymouth his antagonist might be. Whosoever he was, he certainly was no dunce in the use of his weapon, and with all Timothy's skill he had much ado to hold his own. The duel continued for several moments, but at last with a dexterous wrist movement Timothy disarmed the fellow, and with a heavy forward thrust pierced him in the chest.
He staggered for a moment, clapped his two hands against his breast, and, leaving his weapon lying upon the beach, ran off towards his companions. Timothy watched him as he fled, and saw him wade into the water and scramble over the gunwale of the boat upon which Jacob Hartop had fired. There were already some ten of the Spaniards on board of her. They were pushing off; their oars were in the row-locks, and so fully were Richard Drake and his men engaged in making prisoners of those that remained that they were unaware of what had happened until Timothy raised the alarm and drew their attention to the fugitives. Captain Whiddon reloaded his pistol and fired at them, but with no apparent effect. The boat sped out into the deeper water and was soon beyond range of such few firearms as were available. As for the Spaniards who had been left behind, they were speedily captured and bound with ropes, ready to be marched beck to Plymouth.
The whole affray had occupied but a few minutes. Two of the Spaniards had been killed, and one of Drake's men—a young vintner of Plymouth—had been badly wounded, while there were few of the others who had not received scars and bruises.
When at last the prisoners were secured, Roland Grenville, Jacob Hartop, and Timothy Trollope were told off to conduct them to some place of safety in Polperro, while Drake, Whiddon, Pennington, and some three others jumped into the remaining boat and pulled off in pursuit of the men who had escaped. How they fared Timothy did not learn until the next morning, when he was told that after an exciting chase the Spaniards had succeeded in gaining the deck of their ship, which had sailed off westward along the coast, not to be overtaken by a small boat whose occupants had only two pairs of oars and no sail. There was only one thing which Drake gained by his pursuit, and that was the knowledge that the ship was indeed the Pearl of Plymouth.
When they had securely housed their prisoners in a vacant stable in Polperro, and left Hartop in guard at the door, Roland Grenville and Timothy Trollope returned to the beach, taking with them a lighted lantern. They were accompanied by a fisherman, who helped them to carry the two dead Spaniards up to a shed adjoining Jacob Whiddon's house. Timothy recognised the dead men as Don Miguel de Fernandes and Andrea de Ortega. He had known Don Miguel by sight for many months past, but searching in his memory he could only remember Andrea from the time when Jasper Oglander had come home to England.
As he was turning away from having bolted the door of the shed, Roland Granville said, touching Timothy on the arm:
"Here is a weapon for thee, Master Trollope. I will engage that 'tis a well-tempered one. These Dons do ever contrive to get hold of a goodly piece of steel; and in spite of Master Drake's watchfulness, more than one of them was armed with his Toledo blade to-night. 'Tis a marvel to me where they found them, for, as you know, they were forbidden to go armed."
"I'll be sworn they had friends outside of their prison," returned Timothy, "else would they never have escaped." He took the rapier from Grenville's hand. "Thank you," said he. "I will keep it, sir, and gladly, for it can scarce be a worse weapon than my own."
"I picked it up on the beach," said Grenville, "at the spot where I saw you engaged with one of the rascals. 'Twas his sword, I doubt not. But, prithee, since you disarmed him, why did you not run him through?"