‘And your brave Christian goes past, stopping his nose for the savours of fish fried in oil, and elbowing and jostling the hook-nosed, shabby old men who make way, with many a ‘Give you good e’en, my lord;’ and ‘Faugh!’ says he, ‘these stinking unbelievers; why be they not packed bodily off to their holy city again’—and so passes he by, to kneel, and cringe, and kiss the king’s hand; while all the time—ha! ha! ha!—that very king is thinking and pondering in his small mind how best he can squeeze the next subsidy out of his faithful cities and towns, and so release the brightest jewel in the regalia, now held in pawn by old Isaac, or old Jacob, or old Abraham, the very dirtiest, raggedest, yellowest-skinned and hookedest-nosed of the whole brotherhood—ha! ha! ha!’ The pearl merchant said this with so much gusto, and laughed with so much glee, that I began to think he must be one of the fraternity himself. He seemed to divine my thoughts, for, as if I had spoken them, he, as it were, replied— ‘No, no, no! Señor Buccaneer, although I have much traffic with the seed of Abraham, I am none of their kindred; were I such, I would be wiser than to come here to live in a sty on this scorching coast, driving hard bargains for sick oysters.’ My entertainer then went on with his stories of European courts, and I was listening with open mouth, as he told, with many a quip and many a sneer, how, under the guidance of one Chiffinch, he had one night passed up the back stairs at Whitehall to hold a secret interview with Louise de Querailles, since Duchess of Portsmouth, touching certain jewels which it was convenient to raise money upon until there should come a remittance from the court of Versailles, through Monseigneur Barillon, the ambassador of Louis; when all at once there came a loud rap, accompanied by a shrill whistle, at the door. Peralta started quickly up, but without appearing at all discomposed, and opening the door with speed, a handsome fellow, a mulatto, dressed like a sailor, bounded in, exclaiming at the same moment, in a loud whisper: ‘Juan and Blanco are both detected!’ Then seeing me, he stopped as suddenly as though he had been shot. But Peralta speedily reassured him. ‘Go on, man; go on. He who standeth there is my friend; he is one of us. Go on. Have they confessed?’ ‘All,’ replied the mulatto. ‘They first told the truth, and then a great deal more than the truth, in hopes the better to save their necks. I squeezed in with them into the fort, and heard it all. The soldiers are coming. I heard the order given.’ Peralta stood still for a moment, and then said hurriedly, ‘Doth it blow?’ The mulatto replied, that there was a light air only, from the eastward. ‘With the tide two hours on the ebb. That will do well. Disco is on board the piragua?’ The mulatto nodded eagerly. Peralta turned to me—‘I suppose,’ quoth he, ‘you have no objection to make a start of it this very hour?’