It may have puzzled them, but there was no hesitation to obey, and as the last man disappeared into the darkness, Blood drew the master to the companion. 'You'll go and join them, Tim, if you please.'
There was a momentary rebellion. 'Sink me, Captain, can't you — '
'You'll go and join them,' Blood insisted. 'At once.'
Under the compulsion of that tone and of the eyes so blue and cold that looked with deadly menace into his own, Tim's resistance crumbled, and obediently he climbed down into the hold.
Captain Blood, following close upon his heels, dragged the heavy wooden cover over the hatchway again, and dumped it down, insensible to the storm of howling from those he thus imprisoned in the bowels of the brig.
The noise they made aroused Mr Fairfax from an exhausted slumber, on one side of the cabin, and Doña Isabela from a despondent listlessness on the other.
Mr Fairfax, realizing at once that they were at anchor, and puzzled to the point of uneasiness by the fact, wondering, indeed, whether he could have slept the round of the clock, got stiffly from his couch and staggered to the port. It happened to look out towards the open sea, so that all that he beheld was the green, ruffled water, and some boats at a little distance. Clearly, then, they were in harbour. But in what harbour? It was impossible that they could be in Carthagena. But if in Carthagena, where the devil were they?
He was still asking himself this question when his attention was caught by sounds in the main cabin. He could hear the liquid voice of Alcatrace raised in alarmed, insistent protest.
'De orders, ma'am, are dat you not leabe de cabin. Cap'n's orders, ma'am.'
Doña Isabela, who from her port on the brig's other side had seen and recognized the mole of Rio de la Hacha, without understanding how they came there and without thought even to inquire, had flung in breathless excitement from her stateroom. The resolute negro confronting her and arresting her intended flight almost turned her limp with the sickness of frustration.