He stared at me across the narrow space separating our bunks, the
shadows from the swinging lantern giving his features a strange
expression.

"A woman! Hell, lad; not the one brought aboard last night?"

"Exactly; now listen--I'm going to tell you my story, and ask your
help. Do you know what Estada went after in the long-boat?"

"Well, there's been plenty o' talk. The cook brought us some stories
he heard aft, an' we knew we wus driftin' along the coast, waitin' fer
Sanchez ter cum back. I suppose he'd got onto some English gold--in
that chest they slung aboard, wasn't it?"

"Yes; that was the main object. My name is not Gates, at all, and I am
not the man Mendez brought aboard drunk, and who was thrown over the
rail by LeVere. That fellow was drowned."

"Well, by God!"

"I am Geoffry Carlyle, an English skipper. There has been a revolution
in England, in which I became involved. When the attempt failed, I was
taken prisoner and deported to America for twenty years servitude. I
came over with a bunch of others on the same ship with Sanchez."

"The _Romping Betsy_?"

"Yes. There was a rich planter, and his niece also aboard. He was
coming home with a chest of money--fifty thousand pounds--realized