“Yes, there is that chance, I allow. I have told the pilot, in case of attack, to surrender, proclaim himself my servant, and so save the rest from death.” “And so,” whispered Ferdinando, “deliver them to a bondage worse than death.” St. Magil shrugged his shoulders. “It is but a choice of evils,” he avowed. “In Virginia they would fare yet worse. With them to strengthen it the colony would resist our men from St. Augustine, whereas now I look for a quick surrender. There will be no fight.” “We lead our countrymen into a trap, Sir Walter, God forgive us!” “Our countrymen!” ejaculated St. Magil. “I took you for a Spaniard, Ferdinando.” “By parentage only,” responded the master. “But you are an English knight.” “Ay, English,” allowed St. Magil, gnawing his mustache with a row of yellow teeth, “and I would save the English from their worst enemies. I mean not Spaniards, but themselves.” He rose from the table, and, stretching his arms abroad, yawned aloud. “A thousand crowns,” muttered Ferdinando, “or say five hundred, the other half being laid aside for masses for my soul.” St. Magil laughed sleepily. “It might pay,” he drawled, “to turn priest, if all else failed,” with which he leaned forward on the table, being in truth overcome by fatigue, and, with his face between his outstretched arms, was soon breathing heavily. Ferdinando left the cabin. Vytal, eluding him, entered it. The room was a long one, considering the size of the ship. Its walls, hung with arras, creaked occasionally as the vessel pitched and rolled, but the creaking, muffled by the heavy hangings, sounded ghostly and added to the gloom which the wavering lamp in no way dispelled. Vytal stood over St. Magil, his lank, stern figure seeming like the form of Death in Death’s own room. His dark, olive cheeks were pallid and drawn, his hand tensely gripping the hilt of his rapier, the so-called “bodkin.” And his eyes, cast down on the sleeper, held disdain mingled with their fury. But Vytal only gazed and gazed at the treacherous soldier beneath him, until at last, withdrawing his gaunt hand from the rapier-hilt, he held it with open palm above the other’s shoulder, as though, by awakening his enemy, to throw away his own advantage that both might meet on even terms. But his eye fell on the crude chart which Ferdinando had been examining. Silently he folded it and concealed it inside the breast of his doublet. Then, as if with an actual physical effort, he turned and left the apartment. The fly-boat, now cast off from the _Admiral_, slowly fell astern, until her light seemed no more than a will-o’-the-wisp and she a shadow piloted thereby in whimsical manner. The sea fretted under a stiffening breeze, and not a star shone. The _Admiral_, although careening drunkenly, made good progress, for, obedient to shouted commands of Ferdinando, her crew were flinging aloft an unwonted spread of sail.