Daring no more, the Alcalde bowed himself double and went out backwards as if from a royal presence.
IV
If the tale borne by Don Hieronimo to the Captain–General, of Captain Blood's outrageous and sacrilegious violence to the Cardinal–Archbishop of New Spain filled Don Ruiz with amazement, dismay, and horrified indignation, the summons on which it concluded, and the reasons for it, supplied a stimulus that presently moved his Excellency to almost superhuman activity. If he delayed four hours in answering in person that summons, at least the answer that he then delivered was of such a fullness that it would have taken an ordinary Spaniard in ordinary circumstances as many days to have prepared it.
His conscience shaken into uneasiness by what his subordinate told him, Don Ruiz Perera de Valdoro y Peñascon, who was also Count of Marcos, deemed it well to omit in the Cardinal–Archbishop's service no effort that might be calculated to conciliate his Eminence. It occurred to him, naturally enough, that nothing could be more conciliatory, nothing would be more likely to put the Cardinal in a good humour with him, than if he were to present himself in the role of his Eminence's immediate deliverer from the hands of that abominable pirate who held him captive.
Therefore by exertions unprecedented in all his experience Don Ruiz so contrived that in seeking the Cardinal–Archbishop aboard the Arabella he was actually able to fulfil all the conditions upon which he understood that Captain Blood had consented to restore his prisoner to liberty. So great an achievement must fill the Primate with a wonder and gratitude that would leave no room for petty matters.
Thus, then, it fell out almost incredibly that when some four hours after the Alcalde's departure from the Arabella the Captain–General came alongside in his barge, a broad–beamed, two–masted, square–rigged brigantine was warped to a station a cable's length from the buccaneer's larboard quarter. In addition to this, Don Ruiz, who climbed the ladder with the Alcalde in close attendance, was followed by two alguaziles, each of whom shouldered a wooden coffer of some weight.
Captain Blood had taken his precautions against treachery. His gun–ports had been opened on the larboard side, and twenty threatening muzzles had been run out. As his Excellency stepped down into the waist, his contemptuous eyes saw the bulwarks lined by men, some half naked, some fully clothed, and some actually in armour, but all with muskets poised and matches glowing.
A tall, narrow–faced gentleman with a bold nose, Don Ruiz came dressed as was demanded by an occasion of such ceremony. He was magnificent in gold–laced black. He wore the cross of St James on his breast, and a gold–hilted sword swung at his side. He carried a long cane in one hand and a gold–edged handkerchief in the other.
Under his little black moustachios his thin lips curled in disdain as he acknowledged the bow with which Captain Blood received him. The deepening sallowness of his face bore witness to the wicked humour upon which he strove to set that mask of lofty contempt.
He delivered himself without preamble. 'Your impudent conditions are fulfilled, Sir Pirate. There is the ship you have demanded, and here in these coffers is the gold — the twenty thousand pieces. It is now for you to keep your part of the bargain struck, and so make an end of the sacrilegious infamy of which you have been guilty.'