"Faith, you might go farther and fare worse," I answered, and began to hum a tune. When I had finished it, "I am Kirby," I said, and waited to see if that shot should go wide or through the hull. For two minutes the dash of the surf and the cries of the wheeling sea fowl made the only sound in that part of the world; then from those half-clad rapscallions arose a shout of "Kirby!"--a shout in which the three leaders did not join. That one who looked a gentleman rose from the sand and made me a low bow. "Well met, noble captain," he cried in those his honey tones. "You will doubtless remember me who was with you that time at Maracaibo when you sunk the galleasses. Five years have passed since then, and yet I see you ten years younger and three inches taller." "I touched once at the Lucayas, and found the spring de Leon sought," I said. "Sure the waters have a marvelous effect, and if they give not eternal youth at least renew that which we have lost." "Truly a potent aqua vitæ," he remarked, still with thoughtful melancholy. "I see that it hath changed your eyes from black to gray." "It hath that peculiar virtue," I said, "that it can make black seem white." The man with the woman's mantle drawn about him now thrust himself from the rear to the front rank. "That's not Kirby!" he bawled. "He's no more Kirby than I am Kirby! Didn't I sail with Kirby from the Summer Isles to Cartagena and back again? He's a cheat, and I am a-going to cut his heart out!" He was making at me with a long knife, when I whipped out my rapier. "Am I not Kirby, you dog?" I cried, and ran him through the shoulder. He dropped, and his fellows surged forward with a yell. "Yet a little patience, my masters!" said Paradise in a raised voice and with genuine amusement in his eyes. "It is true that that Kirby with whom I and our friend there on the ground sailed was somewhat short and as swart as a raven, besides having a cut across his face that had taken away part of his lip and the top of his ear, and that this gentleman who announces himself as Kirby hath none of Kirby's marks. But we are fair and generous and open to conviction"-- "He'll have to convince my cutlass!" roared Red Gil. I turned upon him. "If I do convince it, what then?" I demanded. "If I convince your sword, you of Spain, and yours, Sir Black and Silver?" The Spaniard stared. "I was the best sword in Lima," he said stiffly. "I and my Toledo will not change our minds." "Let him try to convince Paradise; he's got no reputation as a swordsman!" cried out the grave-digger with the broken head. A roar of laughter followed this suggestion, and I gathered from it and from the oaths and allusions to this or that time and place that Paradise was not without reputation. I turned to him. "If I fight you three, one by one, and win, am I Kirby?"