«Let us say that you are fortunate.»
«Fortunate, too. I shall tell it wherever there are Spaniards to hear me that Don Pedro Sangre is a very gallant gentleman.»
«I shouldn't,» said Captain Blood. «For no one will believe you.»
Protesting still, Don Domingo stepped aboard the piragua that carried his Indian wife and their half–caste baby. His men pushed the vessel off into the current, and he started on his journey to Panama, armed with a note in Captain Blood's hand, ordering Yberville and Hagthorpe to pass him unscathed in the event of his coming up with them.
In the cool of the evening the buccaneers sat down to a feast in the open square of the fort. They had found great stores of fowls in the town, and some goats, besides several hogsheads of excellent wine in the house of the Dominican fathers. Blood, with Wolverstone and Ogle, supped in the departed commander's well–equipped quarters, and through the open windows watched with satisfaction the gaiety of his feasting followers. But his satisfaction was not shared by Wolverstone, whose humour was pessimistic.
«Stick to the sea in future, Captain, says I,» he grumbled between mouthfuls. «There's no packing off a treasure there when we come within saker–shot. Here we are, after ten days' marching, with another ten days' marching in front of us! And I'll thank God if we get back as light as we came, for as likely as not we shall have differences to sett! with old Brazo Largo, and we'll be lucky if we get back at all, ever. Ye've bungled it this time, Captain.»
«Ye're just a foolish heap of brawn, Ned,» said the Captain. «I've bungled nothing at all. And as for Brazo Largo, he's an understanding savage, so he is, who'll keep friends with us if only because he hates the Spaniards.»
«And ye behave as if ye loved 'em,» said Wolverstone. «Ye're all smirks and bows for this plaguey commander who cheated us out of the gold, and ye —»
«Sure now, he was a gallant fellow, Spaniard or no Spaniard,» said Blood. «In packing off the gold when he heard of our approach he did his duty. Had he been less gallant, he would have gone off with it himself, instead of remaining here at his post. Gallantry calls to gallantry; and that's all I have to say about it.»
And then, before Wolverstone could make answer, sharp and clear above the noise the buccaneers were making rang the note of a bugle from the side of the river. Blood leapt to his feet.