"Aye, Cap'n," growled Job, "'tis well enough keeping the Don to hang afore Nombre but why must this dog live aft and cosseted? He should walk overboard wi' slit weasand, or better—he's meat for Pompey, and wherefore no? I asks why, Cap'n?"
"Aye—why!" cried Belvedere, gnashing his teeth. "Ask her—go ask Joanna, the curst jade."
"She be only a woman, when all's said, Cap'n—"
"Nay, Job," quoth Belvedere, shaking his head. "She's Joanna and behind her do lie Tressady and Sol and Rory and Abnegation Mings—and all the Fellowship. So if she says he lives, lives it is, to lie soft and feed dainty, curse him. Let me die if I don't wish I'd left her on the island to end him her own way—wi' steel or kindness—"
"Kindness!" said Diccon, with an ugly leer. "Why, there it is, Cap'n; she's off wi' the old and on wi' the new, like—"
"Not yet, by God!" snarled Belvedere 'twixt shut teeth and scowling down on me while his hand clawed at the pistol in his belt; then his gaze wandered from me towards the poop and back again. "Curse him!" said he, stamping in his impotent fury. "I'd give a handful o' gold pieces to see him dead and be damned!" And here he fell a-biting savagely at his thumb again.
"Why, then, here's a lad to earn 'em," quoth Job, "an' that's me. I've a score agin him for this lick o' the eye he give me ashore—nigh blinded me, 'e did, burn an' blast his bones!"
"Aye, but what o' Joanna, what o' that she-snake, ha?"
"'Tis no matter for her. I've a plan."
"What is't, Job lad? Speak fair and the money's good as yourn—"
"Aye, but it ain't mine yet, Cap'n, so mum it but I've a plan."
"Belay, Job!" exclaimed Diccon. "Easy all. Yonder she cometh."
Sure enough, I saw Joanna descend the ladder from the poop and come mincing across the deck towards us.
"Hola, Belvedere, mon Capitan!" said she, glancing about her quick-eyed. "You keep your ship very foul, yes. Dirt to dirt!—ah? But I am aboard and this shall be amended—look to it. And your mizzen yard is sprung; down with it and sway up another—"
"Aye, aye, Jo," said Belvedere, nodding. "It shall be done—"
"Mañana!" quoth she, frowning. "This doth not suit when I am aboard, no! The new yard must be rigged now, at once, for we sail with the flood—voilà!"
"Sail, Jo?" said Belvedere, staring. "Can't be, Jo!"
"And wherefore?"
"Why—we be short o' water, for one thing."
"Ah—bah, we shall take all we want from other ships!"
"And the lads be set, heart and soul, on a few days ashore."
"But then—I am set, my heart, my soul, on heaving anchor so soon as the tide serves. We will sail with the flood. Now see the new yard set up and have this slave Martin o' mine to my cabin." So saying, she turned on her heel and minced away, while Belvedere stood looking after her and biting at his thumb, Job scowled and Diccon smiled.
"So—ho!" quoth he. "Captain Jo says we sail, and sail it is, hey?"
"Blind you!" cried Belvedere, turning on him in a fury. "Go forward and turn out two o' the lads to draw this carcass aft!" Here bestowing a final kick on me, he swaggered away.
"Sail wi' the flood, is it?" growled Job. "And us wi' scarce any water and half on us rotten wi' scurvy or calenture, an' no luck this cruise, neither! 'Sail wi' the flood,' says she—'be damned,' says I. By hookey, but I marvel she lives; I wonder no one don't snuff her out for good an' all—aye, burn me but I do!"
"Because you're a fool, Job, and don't know her like we do. She's 'La Culebra,' and why? Because she's quick as any snake and as deadly. Besides, she's our luck and luck she'll bring us; she always do. Whatever ship she's aboard of has all the luck, wind, weather, and—what's better, rich prizes, Job. I know it and the lads forrad know it, and Belvedere he knows it and is mighty feared of her and small blame either—aye, and mayhap you'll be afeard of her when you know her better. 'She's only a woman,' says you. 'True,' says I. But in all this here world there ain't her match, woman or man, and you can lay to that, my lad."
Now the ropes that secured me being very tight, began to cause me no little pain, insomuch that I besought the man Diccon to loose me a little, whereupon he made as to comply, but Job, who it seemed was quartermaster, and new in the office, would have none of it but cursed me vehemently instead, and hailing two men had me forthwith dragged aft to a small cabin under the poop and there (having abused and cuffed me to his heart's content) left me.
And in right woful plight was I, with clothes nigh torn off and myself direly bruised from head to foot, and what with this and the cramping strictness of my bonds I could come by no easement, turn and twist me how I might. After some while, as I lay thus miserable and pain in every joint of me, the door opened, closed and Joanna stood above me.
"Ah, ah—you are very foul o' blood!" said she in bitter mockery. "'Twas thus you spake me once, Martino, you'll mind! 'Very foul o' blood,' said you, and I famishing with hunger! Art hungry, Martino?" she questioned, bending over me; but meeting her look, I scowled and held my peace. "Ha, won't ye talk? Is the sullen fit on you?" said she, scowling also. "Then shall you hear me! And first, know this: you are mine henceforth, aye—mine!" So saying, she seated herself on the cushioned locker whereby I lay and, setting her foot upon my breast and elbow on knee, leaned above me, dimpled chin on fist, staring down on me with her sombre gaze. "You are mine," said she again, "to use as I will, to exalt or cast down. I can bestow on ye life or very evil death. By my will ye are alive; when I will you must surely die. Your wants, your every need must you look to me for—so am I your goddess and ruler of your destiny, yes! Ah, had you been more of man and less of fish, I had made you captain of this ship, and loved you, Martino, loved you—!"
"Aye," cried I bitterly, "until you wearied of me as you have wearied of this rogue Belvedere, it seems—aye, and God knoweth how many more—"
"Oh, la-la, fool—these I never loved—"
"Why, then," said I, "the more your shame!"
As I uttered the words, she leaned down and smote me lightly upon my swollen lips and so left me. But presently back she came and with her three of the crew, bearing chains, etc., which fellows at her command (albeit they were something gone in liquor) forthwith clapped me up in these fetters and thereafter cut away the irksome cords that bound me. Whiles this was a-doing, she (quick to mark their condition) lashed them with her tongue, giving them "loathly sots," "drunken swine," "scum o' the world" and the like epithets, all of the which they took in mighty humble fashion, knuckling their foreheads, ducking their heads with never a word and mighty glad to stumble away and be gone at flick of her contemptuous finger.
"So here's you, Martino," said she, when we were alone, "here's you in chains that might have been free, and here's myself very determined you shall learn somewhat of shame and be slave at command of such beasts as yonder. D'ye hear, fool, d'ye hear?" But I heeding her none at all, she kicked me viciously so that I flinched (despite myself) for I was very sore; whereat she gave a little laugh:
"Ah, ah!" said she, nodding. "If I did not love you, now would I watch you die! But the time is not yet—no. When that hour is then, if I am not your death, you shall be mine—death for one or other or both, for I—"
She sprang to her feet as from the deck above came the uproar of sudden brawl with drunken outcry.
"Ah, Madre de Dios!" said she, stamping in her anger. "Oh, these bestial things called men!" which said, she whipped a pistol from her belt, cocked it and was gone with a quick, light patter of feet. Suddenly I heard the growing tumult overhead split and smitten to silence by a pistol-shot, followed by a wailing cry that was drowned in the tramp of feet away forward.
As for me, my poor body, freed of its bonds, found great easement thereby (and despite my irons) so that I presently laid myself