“Attention! Make ready! Fire!”
The men fired, but I remained unhurt; a burning cork flew in my face, but made no wound. The captain had intended to frighten me, and his men had only loaded with blank cartridges.
“Well, helmsman,” he cried, “are you mortally wounded? Have you had enough?”
“I am not wounded, Senor,” I replied, “but I am not a boy to be trifled with; if you are going to kill me, do it quickly, for I will never disgrace myself by obeying your orders.”
“So be it then,” cried the pirate, foaming with rage; “bind him to the mainmast; unbandage his eyes; let us have plenty of tinder; lay a train of powder, and to the devil with him!”
His orders were obeyed; I closed my eyes and awaited death for the second time. In about ten seconds I heard a terrible explosion, which stunned me for some minutes. 17 When I recovered my consciousness, I felt a terrible pain in my lower limbs; my hands were bound, and my clothes on fire.
“Shoot me upon the spot; why do you torture me so?”
But the captain and his men only laughed; and when my stockings were entirely burnt, he gave orders to pour water over me and unbind me, saying composedly, as if nothing had happened:
“You provoked me or I should not have done it; now go below and get cured.”
But the moment I was unbound, I fainted away, and when I came to myself I lay upon a matrass in the cabin, and felt the most intolerable pain in all my limbs, but particularly in my legs. On a chair beside me sat the cook; he told me that lemonade had been prepared for me; I took some of it, and asked him to support me, that I might look at my legs; they were frightfully burnt; in some places the bone was exposed. While I was examining them, the captain appeared, looked at my horrible wounds, and said, with a show of compassion: