“Do you call that saluting, Don Wan? To me, that infernal shot sounded more like an echo, than anything else.” “And to what do _you_ ascribe it, Don Esteban?” “I wish I could answer that question. Sometimes I begin to wish I had not left my mate on that naked rock.” “There is still time to repair the last wrong; we shall go within a few miles of the place where the Señor Enrique was left; and I can take the yawl, with two men, and go in search of him, while you are at work on the wreck.” “Do you believe it possible that he can be still there?” demanded Spike, looking suddenly and intently at his companion, while his mind was strangely agitated between hatred and dread. “If he is there, who and what was _he_ that we all saw so plainly at the foot of the light-house?” “How should he have left the rock? He was without food or water; and no man, in all his vigour, could swim this distance. I see no means of his getting here.” “Unless some wrecker, or turtler, fell in with him, and took him off. Ay, ay, Don Wan; I left him that much of a chance, at least. No man can say I _murdered_ my mate.” “I am not aware, Don Esteban, that any one _has_ said so hard a thing of you. Still, we have seen neither wrecker nor turtler since we have been here; and that lessens the excellent chance you left Don Enrique.” “There is no occasion, señor, to be so particular,” growled Spike, a little sullenly, in reply. “The chance, I say, was a _good_ one, when you consider how many of them devils of wreckers hang about these reefs. Let this brig only get fast on a rock, and they would turn up, like sharks, all around us, each with his maw open for salvage. But this is neither here nor there; what puzzles me, was what we saw at the light, half an hour since, and the musket that was fired back at us! I _know_ that the figure at the foot of the tower did not fire, for my eye was on him from first to last; and he had no arms. You were on the island a good bit, and must have known if the light-house keeper was there or not, Don Wan?” “The light-house keeper _was_ there, Don Esteban--but he was in his _grave_.” “Ay, ay, one, I know, was drowned, and buried with the rest of them; there might, however, have been more than one. You saw none of the people that had gone to Key West, in or about the house, Don Wan?” “None. If any persons have left the Tortugas to go to Key West, within a few days, not one of them has yet returned.” “So I supposed. No, it can be none of _them_. Then I saw his face as plainly as ever I saw it by moon-light, from aft, for'ard. What is your opinion about seeing the dead walk on the 'arth, Don Wan?” “That I have never seen any such thing myself, Don Esteban, and consequently know nothing about it.”