In the fair, white, greenshuttered house, pleasantly set amid fragrant pimento trees and other aromatic shrubs, Captain Easterling was received with dignified friendliness by the slight, elegant Frenchman who brought to the wilds of Tortuga a faint perfume of the elegancies of Versailles. Coming from the white glare outside into the cool spacious room to which was admitted only such light as filtered between the slats of the closed shutters; the Captain found himself almost in darkness until his eyes had adjusted themselves.
The Governor offered him a chair, and gave him his attention.
In the matter of the cacao there was no difficulty. Monsieur d'Ogeron cared not whence it came. That he had no illusions on the subject was shown by the price per quintal at which he announced himself prepared to purchase. It was a price representing rather less than half the value of the merchandise. Monsieur d'Ogeron was a diligent servant of the French West India Company.
Easterling haggled vainly, grumbled, accepted, and passed to the major matter. He desired to acquire the Spanish ship in the bay. Would Monsieur d'Ogeron undertake the purchase for him from the fugitive convicts who, he understood, were in possession of her.
Monsieur d'Ogeron took time to reply. «It is possible,» he said at last, «that they may not wish to sell.»
«Not sell? A God's name what use is the ship to those poor ragamuffins?»
«I mention only a possibility,» said Monsieur d'Ogeron. «Come to me again this evening, and you shall have your answer.»
When Easterling returned as bidden, Monsieur d'Ogeron was not alone. As the Governor rose to receive his visitor, there rose with him a tall, spare man in the early thirties from whose shaven face, swarthy as a gipsy's, a pair of eyes looked out that were startlingly blue, level, and penetrating. If Monsieur d'Ogeron in dress and air suggested Versailles, his companion as markedly suggested the Alameda. He was very richly dressed in black in the Spanish fashion, with an abundance of silver lace and a foam of fine point at throat and wrists, and he wore a heavy black periwig whose curls descended to his shoulders.
Monsieur d'Ogeron presented him: «Here, Captain, is Mr. Peter Blood to answer you in person.»
Easterling was almost disconcerted, so different was the man's appearance from anything that he could have imagined. And now this singular escaped convict was bowing with the grace of a courtier, and the buccaneer was reflecting that these fine Spanish clothes would have been filched from the locker of the commander of the Cinco Llagas. He remembered
something else.
«Ah, yes. To be sure. The physician,» he said, and laughed for no apparent reason.
Mr. Blood began to speak. He had a pleasant voice whose metallic quality was softened by a drawling Irish accent. But what he said made Captain Easterling impatient. It was not his intention to sell the Cinco Llagas.
Aggressively before the elegant Mr. Blood stood now the buccaneer, a huge, hairy, dangerouslooking man, in coarse shirt and leather breeches, his cropped head swathed in a redandyellow kerchief. Aggressively he demanded Blood's reasons for retaining a ship that could be of no use to him and his fellow convicts.
Blood's voice was softly courteous in reply, which but increased Easterling's contempt of him. Captain Easterling heard himself assured that he was mistaken in his assumptions. It was probable that the fugitives from Barbadoes would employ the vessel to return to Europe, so as to make their way to France or Holland.
«Maybe we're not quite as ye're supposing us, Captain. One of my companions is a shipmaster, and three others have served in various ways, in the King's Navy.»
«Bah!» Easterling's contempt exploded loudly. «The notion's crazy. What of the perils of the sea, man? Perils of capture? How will ye face those with your paltry crew? Have ye considered that?»
Still Captain Blood preserved his pleasant temper. «What we lack in men we make up in weight of metal. Whilst I may not be able to navigate a ship across the ocean, I certainly know how to fight a ship at need. I learnt it under de Ruyter.»
The famous name gave pause to Easterling's scorn. «Under de Ruyter?»
«I held a commission with him some years ago.»
Easterling was plainly dumbfounded. «I thought it's a doctor ye was.»
«I am that, too,» said the Irishman simply.
The buccaneer expressed disgusted amazement in a speech liberally festooned with oaths. And then Monsieur d'Ogeron made an end of the interview. «So that you see, Captain Easterling, there is no more to be said in the matter.»
Since, apparently, there was not, Captain Easterling sourly took his leave. But on his disgruntled way back to the mole he thought that, although there was no more to be said, there was a good deal to be done. Having already looked upon the majestic Cinco Llagas as his own, he was by no means disposed to forgo the prospect of possession.
Monsieur d'Ogeron also appeared to think that there was still at least a word to be added, and he added it after Easterling's departure. «That,» he said quietly, «is a nasty and a dangerous man. You will do well to bear it in mind, Monsieur Blood.»