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Updated: June 20, 2025
Go to your task, and if one fails me, it will mean the lash at the mast-butt." They moved off one by one, Estada leading, along the narrow strip of sand, five of them, on their mission of murder. The leader remained alone, his back toward where I crouched, his eyes following their vanishing figures, until the night had swallowed them.
"Yes beauty and wit. These are your weapons, and most effective ones. You can play with Estada and defeat him temporarily at least. I confess there is danger in such a game he is a wild beast, and his evil nature may overcome his discretion. You are armed?" "No; I have never felt the need." "Then take this," and I thrust a pistol into her hands.
Manuel did not linger long, making some excuse to go forward, but Estada remained for some time, endeavoring to entertain. She laughed at his efforts and appeared interested in encouraging him, so that he kept his spirit of good humor even amid these difficulties.
Although I had been stationed at the wheel of the sloop as we swept past the Namur while at anchor the day before, yet Estada, watching anxiously for the secret signal of his chief, would never have accorded me so much as a glance. His interest was concentrated elsewhere, and, in all probability, he could not swear whether I was black or white.
He touched the cloth to his cheek but the once, and this is the first. I watched for the sign with care for he is not one with whom to make a mistake." "Dios de Dios! Do I not know, Estada? Have I not a scar here which tells?" "True, enough; and have I not received also my lesson eight hours staked face upward in the sun. So 'tis my very life wagered on this being the place named.
Would the discovery of his body halt his followers, and send them rushing back to their boat, eager only to get safely away? This did not seem likely. Estada knew of my boarding the sloop from the wharf, and would at once connect the fact of my being ashore with the killing of Sanchez. This would satisfy him there was no further danger.
Some oilskins, together with a suit of clothes dangled from wooden pins, while the only other furniture consisted of a straight-backed chair, and a four-legged stool. The round port stood partly open, and through it I could see the gray expanse of water. All these I perceived at a glance, but the instant the door closed behind me my entire attention concentrated on Estada.
His words had in no way alarmed me, but served rather to harden my resolve. I looked for trouble, and was inclined to welcome it, anxious indeed to prove to Estada my ability to handle men. Nothing else would so quickly appeal to him, or serve so rapidly to establish me in his esteem; and to win his confidence was my chief concern. Nothing occurred, however, to cause any breach of authority.
The only remaining danger of recognition lay in the early recovery of Sanchez, and, as I glanced aside at Estada the conviction became fixed in my mind that such recovery was doubtful. I felt that I had already penetrated the cowardly plan of the Portuguese, but felt no inclination to interpose. Indeed I had more occasion to dread the return of Sanchez to command than did Estada himself.
He glanced toward Estada, not greatly pleased I presume with my brusqueness, yet finding nothing in either words or manner from which to evoke a quarrel. The latter had overheard our conversation, but he stood now with back toward us looking out on the sea off the port quarter. His silent indifference caused LeVere to shrug his shoulders, and disappear down the ladder on his way below.
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