Page:Harper's New Monthly Magazine - v108.djvu/61

Rh had let the fire burn low, and was gone down into the shadowy places.

"Mortimer," spoke the Admiral, and waited. The other moved, drew a long breath, and then with a short laugh came back to the present.

"My friend How iron is our destiny! Do I hate that man too greatly? One might say, I think, that I loved him well, seeing that I have lent my shoulder for him to climb upon."

"Mortimer, Mortimer," said Nevil, "you know that I love you. My friend, I pray you to somewhat beware yourself. I think there is in your veins a subtle poison may work you harm."

Ferne looked steadfastly upon him.

"What is its name?"

The other shook his head. "I know not. It is subtle. Perhaps it is pride—ambition too inwrought with fairest qualities to show as such,—never love of self, but, deep at the root of all your doubtings, that assurance of self which hath its peril. Perhaps I mistake and your blood doth run as healthfully as a child's. But you are of those who ever breed in others speculation, wilding fancies When a man doth all things too well, what is there left for God to do but to break and crumble and remould? If I do you wrong, blame, if you will, my love, which is jealous for you—friend whom I value, soldier and knight whom I have ever thought the fair ensample of our time!"

"I hold many men, known and unknown, within myself," said Ferne, slowly. " I think it is always so with those of my temper. But over that hundred I am centurion."

"God forgive me if I misjudge one of their number," answered the other. "The centurion I have never doubted nor will doubt."

Another silence; then, "Will you see that Spaniolated Englishman, my prisoner?" asked Sir Mortimer. "He is under charge without,"

The Admiral put to his lips a golden whistle, and presently there stood in the cabin a slight man of not unpleasing countenance—blue eyes, brown hair, unfurrowed brow, and beneath a scant and silky beard a chin as softly rounded as a woman's.—His name and estate? Francis Sark, gentleman.—English? So born and bred, cousin and sometime servant to my lord of Shrewsbury.—And what did my English gentleman, my cousin to an English nobleman, upon the galleon San José Alack, sirs! were Englishmen upon Spanish ships so unknown a spectacle?

"I have found them," quoth the Admiral, "rowing in Spanish galleys, naked, scarred, chained, captives and martyrs."

Said Ferne, "You, sir, fought in Milan mail, standing beside the captain of soldiers from Nueva Cordoba."

"And if I did," answered boldly their prisoner, "none the less was I slave and captive, constrained to serve detested masters. Where needs must I fight, I fought to the purpose. Doth not the galley-slave pull strongly at the oar, though the chase be English and of his own blood?"

"He toils under the whip," said Ferne. "Now what whip did the Spaniard use?"

"He is dead, and his men await succor on that lonely coast where you left them," was Master Francis Sark's somewhat singular reply. "There is left in the fortress of Nueva Cordoba a single company of soldiers; the battery at the river's mouth hath another. Luiz de Guardiola commands the citadel, and he is a strong man, but Pedro Mexia at the Bocca is so easy-going that his sentinels nod their nights away. In the port ride two caravels—eighty tons, no more—and their greatest gun a demi-cannon. The town is a cowardly place of priests, women, and rich men, but it holds every peso of this year's treasure gathered against the coming of the plate - fleet. There is much silver with pearls from Margarita, and crescents of gold from Guiana, and it all lies in a house of white stone on the north side of the square. Mayhap De Guardiola up in the fortress watches, but all else, from Mexia to the last muleteer, think themselves as safe as in the lap of the Blessed Virgin. The plate-floet stays at Cartagena, because of the illness of its Admiral, Don Juan de Maeda y Espinosa I show you, sirs, a bird's nest worth the robbing."

"You are a galley-slave the most circumstantial I have ever met," said Ferne.

"If there are nets about this tree, I will wring your neck for the false songster that you are."