"Tell me, Charles, how soon will you be ready?" "I have my men picked now," said Cave, in a thick voice, "Italians mostly. They're ripe. They hate the Mahonese as the devil hates church-bells." "And the Mahonese are ready to strike, themselves?" "If they're not they have no bellies," said Cave, impatiently. "They've been pushed to the wall. You'd think they'd have broken before." "Very well," said Sparta, calmly, "The Minorcans revolt. My father cannot subdue them--unless you choose. He can't get aid from the governor--the governor's against him. If you choose--" "There's a price," said Cave, glowering. "I want you. I want the plantation. He wants his life and--I'd give him some place, I suppose. If he doesn't choose it that way--By the way--what about that lover of yours?" "What you will," said Sparta, and smiled. "I know what I will. But now, sweetheart, what if your father will not--" "I would not have you too much concerned about my father," said Sparta, reflectively. Cave stared at her. "By God, you're a cold piece," he said, huskily. "Not to you, Charles." She rose to her full height. "I'd see you a king, Charles--not the master of one trifling plantation here." "And who says I couldn't be a king!" said Cave, with a touch of half-drunken defiance. "Haven't bastards been kings before. What was William Conquer but a common bastard--yet he had all England under his teeth? I'm as good a bastard as he was, any day--I can--" "Then be a king!" she said in a voice that seemed to shake out a banner with a dragon on it above the quiet yellow spearheads of the candles. She brought her clenched hand down on the table as if she wanted to bruise its softness against something hostile and hard. "My father has money hidden somewhere--he must--you have men--strength--we could take ships--Davis did it--Teach was a fool, but Morgan did it--There are pirate kingdoms, still--I tell you this--I'll be a queen or nothing, Charles--I love you very well, but I must be a queen--I'd starve for it--I'd burn my hand in the flame for it--see--" Her voice sank to a dry whisper, as she stretched her hand out over the nearest candle. Cave snatched it back, at once, with a terrified wordless sound. Then she was clinging to his shoulders, pleading with him, in that fierce, brittle monotone. "A queen, Charles--they made Harry Morgan a governor--what was Spanish Pizarro but a pirate, yet he held Peru like a king--the time's not over yet--a queen, Charles--and you a king--" But, "No, lass--no--" he was muttering unsteadily, trying to seem very bold, yet with shaken eyes, "You're trying me with talk like that--'tis impossible--I'll raise the colony on your father right enough--I'll make you a right queen here if that's what you want, but turn pirate against the world and end in the hemp and the chains--"