"Flight?" the buccaneer said, with a grin; "Nonsense! You must be laughing, my gentleman: we are enclosed in an impassable circle--or what looks so." "In that case, we are lost." "How you go on! On the contrary, they are lost." "They? Why, we are only four against a hundred." "You are mistaken. There are two hundred; and that makes fifty for each of us. Call in the dogs, L'Olonnais; they are now useless. Stay! Look there; can you see them?" And he stretched his arm out straight ahead. In fact, the long lances of the Spanish soldiers appeared above the tall grass. Lepoletais had told the truth. These lances formed a circle, which was being more and more contracted round the boucan. "Come! That is rather neat," the buccaneer added, as he affectionately tapped the butt of his long fusil. "Señora," he added, "keep by the side of the wounded man." "Oh! Let me give myself up," she exclaimed, frantically. "It is on my account that this terrible danger menaces you." "Señora," the buccaneer replied, as he struck his chest with a gesture of supreme majesty; "you are under the safeguard of my honour, and I swear by Heaven, that no one, so long as I live, shall dare to lay a finger upon you! Go to the wounded man." Involuntarily subdued by the accent with which the buccaneer uttered these words, Doña Clara bowed without replying, and pensively seated herself inside the ajoupa, by the side of Fray Arsenio, who was still asleep. "Now, caballero," Lepoletais said to Don Sancho, "if you have never been present at a buccaneering expedition, I promise you you are going to see some fun, and enjoy yourself." "Well," the young man replied, recklessly; "I will fight, if I must. It is a glorious death for a gentleman, to die sword in hand!" "Come," said the buccaneer, as he gave him a friendly tap on the shoulder; "you are a fine lad. Something can be made of you." The Fifties still approached, and the circle grew more and more contracted. CHAPTER XXX. THE EXTERMINATOR. For some minutes a mournful silence--a complete calm, which, however, was loaded with menace, hung heavily over the savannah. At a whistle from the engagé, the dogs ranged themselves behind their masters, with heads down, lips drawn back to display their sharp teeth, and flashing eyes, they awaited the order to rush forward, though without giving the slightest bark or growl. L'Olonnais, leaning on his long fusil, was smoking his pipe quietly, while casting sarcastic glances around. Lepoletais occupied himself with the utmost order in arranging various articles which had been deranged during his morning's operations.