“I understand,” answered the stranger, promptly; “I do not take your remarks amiss. I mean you well; but you are very right not to accept such an offer without consideration. My vessel, the Falcon, lies rather lower down the river. Your captain will easily discover her; and if, on consideration, he wishes to receive the assistance of an honest man, who esteems his employer, and is well able to render aid, he can summon me, and I will come with a boat’s crew, or two may be, and fight as I should were my own vessel attacked.”
Saying these words, the stranger shook our hands warmly, and disappeared in the gloom.
A’Dale and I continued our walk. He seemed to think that I had been ungrateful in not accepting the assistance so freely offered. I explained my reasons. He saw that I was right. It was then too late to get a boat; indeed, so small was the amount of cargo as yet shipped—of which the pirates were well aware—that there was no fear of their attacking her that night. We agreed, therefore, that I should go aboard the first thing in the morning to speak to the captain, leaving A’Dale to look after the goods on shore.
I also proposed engaging a few stout fellows, well-armed, in addition to our own crew, and thus hoped to be able to repel any attack the pirates might make upon us.
The next morning, the instant the grey dawn streamed into our chamber, we sprang out of bed. We wished to leave the house unobserved, in case any of the sea-robbers or their confederates might be living there. To prevent them from discovering what we were about, should any one observe us, we took our way directly from the river; and then turning round again through some narrow streets, once more hurried towards it. We soon found a boat, and telling A’Dale to keep a bright look-out around him, I pulled down in her towards the Diamond.
Captain Davis, her commander, was surprised to see me thus early. I told him the reason of my coming. He was inclined, I saw, to doubt that the people whose conversation we had overheard were speaking about his vessel.
“If they had been speaking English, Master Verner, your ears might not have deceived you; but as they were talking Flemish, it is very likely, that being a foreign lingo, you may be mistaken.”
“But it is not a foreign lingo to me, Captain Davis,” I answered, laughing; “it is, I may say, my native tongue, and therefore I am not likely to be mistaken.”
“That makes a difference, to be sure,” he answered; “yet still the chances are they were speaking of something else. If they had had a plot in hand such as you suppose, they would have been more cautious.”
“When the wine is in, the wit is out, captain,” I remarked. “At first, I grant you, they said nothing to betray themselves; but when I tell you that some of our chief nobles act just as indiscreetly, you may more readily believe that such men as these might let out their secrets on such an occasion.”