Somebody wigwagged vehemently from the Portuguese. Quelch dropped into the tender’s boat to investigate. There were no sounds of fighting; no clamor of struggle; but something material was going on. He climbed the side of the Portuguese without meeting resistance, was seen to walk about her deck in a deliberate way, then came back over the side and got into his boat, carrying, however, two sacks heavy enough to bring out the cords of his forearms. In each of those sacks were fifty pounds’ weight of gold dust! Frenzy flamed from the _Charles_ to the tender. Men leaped and danced and shouted; and the round, thick rum jar passed merrily from hand to hand. Their fortunes were made! Yo-ho-ho, for a pirate’s life! So good-natured were the sea bandits that they treated the two Portuguese ladies with urbane consideration and the despoiled crew with tolerance. They kept them all on the _Charles_ that night, and with the coming of morning restored them to their ship and bade them be off. Three days later the quartermaster, the carpenter and the captain, composing a committee on division of profits, ordered a pair of scales set up on the quarter-deck, from which each man had weighed out to him his share of the fascinating dust. Added to that was a neat little bonus of good, hard-ringing Portuguese gold coins, forty-five hundred dollars’ worth of which were gathered in from this very profitable find. Rich with the plucking of the gold bird, the _Charles_ and her tender ran rapidly from the stage and stopped nowhere until they were abreast the south end of the Brazilian coast and in the vicinity of Rio de Janeiro. Quelch was about ready to call it a day. The big scoop had been made, and by this time the coast must have been getting a little warm for him. The alarm was certainly raised; for in the last ship he attacked--a Portuguese two-hundred-tonner carrying hides and other merchandise--he met with his first real fight. This ship did not stop at Quelch’s summoning round shot but crowded on sail and made haste to get away, thus showing that Captain Bastian, her master, had had warning of the character of the New England brig and her tender. After chasing her for two days the pirates pulled up with her, and the Portuguese, after a sharp trading of shot, gave in. When the pirates gained her deck there was some altercation with Captain Bastian, who was shot down and his body heaved overboard. In the reminiscence of this incident there were several of the rascals who claimed the honor of shooting Bastian, but after a quarrel which nearly came to fighting, Cooper Scudamore--a minor ringleader, it seems--was conceded to be the hero of that black job.