Bothwell was the first of the prisoners to speak.
"Let me offer my congratulations, Captain Blythe," he said with suave irony.
The lean, brown face of the Englishman expressed quiet scorn.
"Not necessary at all. It is the only result I have considered from the first. One doesn't expect to be driven from his ship by wharf rats, no matter how numerous they may be."
Bothwell laughed, debonair as ever.
"True enough, captain. My scoundrels made an awful botch of it. They played a good hand devilish badly or we should have won out."
"The devil you would! We beat you from first to last at odds against of two to one nearly. I reckon, Mr. Pirate, you undertook too big a round-up," grinned the cattleman.
"Fortunately there is always a to-morrow," retorted Bothwell with a bow.
"Sometimes it's mortgaged to Jack Ketch."
"I'll wager he doesn't foreclose, Mr. Yeager," answered Boris with a lip smile.