When I returned to New York after the funeral I was greatly depressed and was in a mood for anything that offered excitement. A few days later I found some diversion through a chance meeting with Frank (Francis Lay) Norton, just after he had gone broke in John Morrissey’s uptown gambling house. He knew me, by reputation and through the old Cuban Junta under which both of us had operated, as well as I knew him, and we soon became friends. Later we became partners in some of the most gloriously exciting exploits in which I have been fortunate enough to participate. Norton was a natural-born pirate, and he looked the part. He was then about forty years old, five feet, eight inches tall, thin and wiry and possessed of remarkable strength. His eyes, hair, beard, and moustache were as black as coal. You could feel his eyes looking through you and would almost lose a realizing sense of what was in your mind; it was not hypnotism nor mental or physical dominance but he could almost read your most secret thoughts. He was completely irreligious, cynical, and cold-blooded. Under the most severe tests a slight twitching of the eyes was his only sign of excitement. He was daring to the supreme degree but never foolishly reckless, and I don’t believe he ever experienced the sensation of fear. He was, too, as he needed to be, almost a dead shot in off-hand firing with rifle or pistol, and an expert swordsman. When I first met him he was wild about the China Sea, where he had spent several thrilling years and made several fortunes, only to lose them as soon as he could find a gambling house, for he was a faro fiend of the most virulent type. He declared that was the only part of the world for us, with regard both to excitement and money, and suggested that we form a partnership and go out there “to do anything that came handy.” Though I had spent money like the proverbial drunken sailor, or worse, for I was born with all the tastes of an aristocrat, I was then worth several hundred thousand dollars, while Norton was worth nothing, so I could not quite see a partnership such as he had in mind. Nor was he able to tempt me away from Venezuela. I had heard so much of that country and of Guzman Blanco that my heart was set on going there before I undertook to explore any other strange lands. The upshot of our many discussions was that I sent Norton to London to take command of the “Leckwith” until I was ready to join him, when it was agreed we should go out in the yacht to his beloved China Sea. I had brought Lars Lorensen, the former sailing master of the “Leckwith” and a brave and loyal Norseman, with me from the other side, as I expected to have need of him in South America.