"I will answer. I will be honorable. I will give my word; and the word of a Spanish gentlemen is gold." A growl proceeded from the seamen. "But first, as a matter of courtesy, to help my mind in its blindness—for the death of my friend has caused my brains to spin round in my head—I entreat you, señor, to tell me what are your intentions?"
"To restore the young lady to her friends."
"What!" he cried, shouting the words with a face of horror to Mariana; "you will proceed to England?"
I responded with a vehement nod.
"Then vot sall become of me?" he exclaimed in English.
I shrugged my shoulders. He folded his arms tightly upon his breast, and, with bowed head, fell to measuring a few feet of the deck. We all watched him in silence while he thus walked. Suddenly he stopped, and, turning upon Mariana, addressed him volubly and with amazing energy, making a very windmill of his arms. I knew that he was saying a great deal more than Mariana could translate, more, indeed, to judge from the expression that entered the cook's face, than the repulsive-looking creature would choose to translate. Nevertheless, I waited in patience, making a single gesture of command to the sailors to be still.
Mariana then spoke; the substance of his speech was this: Don Lazarillo asked for a few hours. He desired to look over the effects of his dead friend; he desired time to mature a proposal which he hoped to make to me. This was substantially all that Mariana translated. Yet, owing to his slow delivery and to his broken-winded English, the matter he delivered appeared to contain much more than was in it. I had no doubt, however, that Don Lazarillo in his speech had acquainted the fellow with some half-formed scheme in his mind, as good for Mariana perhaps as for himself.
I told the cook to inform the Don that we would give him until six o'clock that evening, and that if he was not ready with his proposals by that hour, I should shift the schooner's helm for England, where, on my arrival, it would be my duty to deliver him and Mariana into the hands of justice. The cook, in translating this, was almost as ashen in color as the other.
Don Lazarillo descended into the cabin. Butler came up to me.