“You seem amused,” said Gonzales.
“I am,” replied the skipper, laughing.
“Then see I don’t kill you,” said Gonzales, and he left without another word.
The sealing schooner was within fifty fathoms of the ship, and after Gonzales went back aboard the captain watched him. As he looked, he saw the Spaniard raise a gun to his shoulder and the smoke spurt forth. At the same instant a bullet tore its way through the taffrail, within an inch of his waist.
“Sink him, if his wife hasn’t driven him mad,” cried the captain, as he dived below.
Five other vessels reported meeting this strange sealer before the year was out, and each told of a somewhat similar experience in regard to the stranger’s inquiries. As sealers seldom speak deep-water ships, this was thought strange, and when Enoch Moss, of the Yankee clipper Silver Sea, read the latest account at Havre, he called his first mate, Mr. O’Toole, into the after cabin.
“Have you read the Marine Journal?” said he, looking up at the big red-headed Irishman.
“No, sir; how is it now?”
“Read that, and tell me what you make of it.”
O’Toole looked hard at the page for some moments, and then replied,—