Pike took heart at this promising beginning. «Ye mean to break up the fleet, then?» said he indifferently.
«Why not, since the job's done? Roger here and me has decided to quit piracy. We're for home with the fortune we've made. I'll belike turn farmer somewhere in Devon.» He laughed.
Pike smiled, but offered no comment. He was not at any time a man of many words, as his long, dour, weatherbeaten face announced.
Easterling cleared his throat and resumed. «Me and Roger's been considering that some change in the provisions o' the articles would be only fair. They do run that one–third of what's left over after I've taken my fifth goes to each of the three ships.»
«Ay, that's how they run, and that's fair enough for me,» said Pike.
«That's not our opinion, Roger's and mine, now that we comes to think it over.»
Pike opened his mouth to answer, but Easterling, giving him no time, ran on:
«Roger and me don't see as you should take a third to share among thirty men, while we share each of us the same among a hundred and fifty.»
Captain Pike was swept by sudden passion. «Was, that why ye saw to it that my men were always put where the Spaniards could kill them until we're reduced to less than a quarter of our strength at the outset?»
Easterling's black brows met above eyes that were suddenly malevolent.