He gave me a curious glance out of his eye corners. "The amount of your passage-money, Master Salkeld, was two hundred English guineas. I hope you consider the poor accommodation which I have been able to give you in accordance with that sum." "I have no fault to find with the accommodation, Senor," I replied. "So far as the bodily comfort of your prisoner was concerned you have proved yourself a good jailer." "Let us hope you will never find a worse, Master Salkeld," he answered, with another mocking smile. "But, indeed, you wrong me in speaking of me as a jailer. Say rather a kind and considerate host." I repressed the words which lay on the tip of my tongue ready to fling at him, and went on deck. The wind was still against us, and the ship made little progress, for which both Pharaoh and I were devoutly thankful, neither of us being minded to make Vera Cruz ere night fell. Certainly there was little to choose between the two courses open to us. If we were handed over to the Inquisitors by Nunez, we should certainly be burned at the stake, or, at any rate, racked, tortured, and turned over to a slave-master. If we reached shore we should have to undergo many privations and face all manner of perils, with every probability of ultimately falling into the hands of the Spaniards once more. Indeed, so certain did it seem that we should eventually meet our fate at the stake, or the rack, that more than once I doubted whether it was worth our while to attempt an escape. But life is sweet, however dark its prospects may be, and a true man will always fight for it, though the odds against him are great. And, moreover, when a man knows what manner of death it is that awaits him, he will make the most desperate efforts to escape it, if it be such a death as that intended for us by the Spaniards. Now, although I had lived in such an out-of-the-way part of England, I had heard many a fearful story of the wrongs and cruelties practiced by the Inquisitors in Mexico. Tales came across the wide ocean of rackings and tormentings and burnings, of men given over to slavery, wearing their San-benitos for many a weary year, and perhaps dying of torture in the end. We would do something to escape a fate like that, God helping us! Late that night Captain Nunez stood by my side on deck. The wind now blew from the north-west, and the ship was making headway towards land. To the south-east, through the darkness, glimmered the volcanic fire of Tuxtla, but the giant peak of Orizaba had disappeared. "To-morrow at sunrise, Master Salkeld, we shall be in the port of Vera Cruz," said Nunez. "I have some friends there to whom I will give you an introduction. Till then, Senor, sleep well."