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"I presume, senor, from what you say, that you hold a commission from the Queen of England, and that it is she who has dispatched you upon your mission of retribution, in revenge for the attack upon her ships at San Juan de Ulua. Is that so?" demanded Don Pasquale. "No, senor, it is not so," answered George.
It was with considerable anxiety that Dick and Earle awaited and watched for the effect upon the populace of this innovation in the judicial methods of Ulua; but they had not long to wait before it became apparent that the formality and solemnity of public trial were far more effective as a deterrent than the former rough and ready methods, under which a culprit was haled before a shiref and summarily punished, with nobody but himself and his immediate connections being a penny the wiser; publicity and its attendant disgrace soon became more wholesomely dreaded than even fine or imprisonment, and when a period of three months had elapsed without the smallest sign of any recurrent restiveness on the part of the Council of Nobles, the two white men felt that Queen Myrra was firmly enough established upon her throne to be in no further need of their services; they therefore announced their intention to make an early departure, and proceeded to make their preparations for the return journey.
The droning note of a song came faintly, and the two listened. "Peons at work in a field," said the boy, looking through the trees. "They don't appear to be very warlike, but we'd better go in the other direction." "You're right," said Obed. "It's best for us to get away. If we tempt our fate too much it may overtake us, but before we go let's take a last view of our late home, San Juan de Ulua.
You are at perfect liberty to take whatever steps you please to warn your countrymen of my presence in the region which Spain arrogantly claims as exclusively her own. And you will be doing your compatriots a service by acquainting them with the reason for my presence here. "Last year Captain Hawkins, my countryman, had occasion to put into San Juan de Ulua in distress.
The ceremony brought home a vague inkling of this state of affairs to both of the individuals most intimately concerned, and Earle, while expressing some embarrassment and dislike of the position in which he found himself placed, announced to Dick his determination to accept it, in the hope and belief that, before leaving Ulua, it might be his good fortune to wield the authority with which he was endowed for the benefit and advantage of the people, and quite possibly, the correction of abuses.
They passed beyond the highest mark of the waves, and then dropped, exhausted, on the ground. "We've got all Mexico now to escape in," said Obed White, "instead of that pent-up castle." The alarm gun boomed once more from San Juan de Ulua, and reminded them that they could not linger long there.
Then I will get together a crew who will be willing to go with me, taking a certain share of the proceeds of the expedition in lieu of wages and I believe I shall be able to raise such a crew without difficulty and I shall sail direct to San Juan de Ulua. Arrived there, I shall make a formal demand for my brother's immediate release.
Whether the time had been long or short it did not matter. But he shut his eyes and listened for the last thing that he remembered. He heard it presently, that low roll of the sea. He was quite sure of one thing. He was in the same submarine dungeon of the famous Castle of San Juan de Ulua. His door was opened, and a man, not a soldier, came in with soup in a tin basin.
To which statement Earle replied that the white lords desired the information in question more than anything else, except to find themselves within the walls of Ulua itself; and that the king could not more conclusively demonstrate his friendship than by causing the most exhaustive inquiries to be made forthwith.
Ye have told him of the marvellous doings of those millions, of their wonderful enterprises and inventions, and of the rivalry that exists between them; and I doubt not that, mingling with them, as ye must have done, ye have acquired wisdom, beside which the wisdom of the wisest of us in Ulua will seem foolishness.
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