"You've got a point." His eyes twinkled. "Perhaps it's because there're so few out here in the Caribbees."
"Or could it be you're not aware of the difference?" His insolent parody of politeness had goaded her into a tone not entirely to her own liking.
"So I've sometimes been told." Again his voice betrayed his pleasure. "But then I doubt there is much, really." He grinned. "At least, by the time they get around to educating me on that topic."
As happened only rarely, she couldn't think of a sufficiently cutting riposte. She was still searching for one when he continued, all the while examining her in the same obvious way he'd done on the shore. "Excuse me, but I believe you enquired about something. The men and provisions, I believe it was. The plain answer is I plan to take them and leave Barbados, as soon as I can manage."
"And where is it you expect you'll be going?" She found her footing again, and this time she planned to keep it.
"Let's say, on a little adventure. To see a new part of the world." He was staring at her through the candlelight. "I've had about enough of this island of yours. Miss Bedford. As well as the new idea that slavery's going to make everybody rich. I'm afraid it's not my style."
"But I gather you're the man responsible for our noble new order here, Captain."
He looked down at the flask, his smile vanishing. "If that's true, I'm not especially proud of the fact."
At last she had him. All his arrogance had dissolved. Just like Jeremy, that time she asked him to tell her what exactly he'd done in the battle at Marsten Moor. Yet for some reason she pulled back, still studying him.
"It's hard to understand you, Captain. You help them steal sugarcane from the Portugals, then you decide you don't like it."