"Who else could it have been? You have the others."

"Ay, true enough; yet it will go hard with you, Cochose, when the
Captain learns of this--he would have the fellow alive."

"As well attempt to take a tiger with bare hands--see, the blood yet
runs; a single inch to the left, and it would be I fed to the fishes.
Pah! what is the difference, Senor, so the man dies?"

"Right enough, no doubt; anyway it is not I who must face Sanchez, and
it is too late now to change fate. Let's to the rest of our task. You
can still do your part?"

The giant negro growled.

"Ay; I have been worse hurt, yet a bit of cloth would help me."

"Let Carl see to that, while I gain glimpse at this map of the house
up yonder. Come forward with me to the cabin, till I light a candle.
How came you aft here?"

"Because that fellow leaped the rail from the wharf. I saw him, and we
met at the wheel."

"From the wharf, you say? He was not aboard then? Santa Maria! I know
not what that may mean. Yet what difference, so he be dead. Anderson,
Mendez, throw that carrion overboard--no, bullies, never mind; let
them lie where they are, and sink an auger in the sloop's bottom. That
will settle the whole matter. What is that out yonder, Cochose?"