tell them of the big ship that Milo had seen, and she painted it a
rich West Indiaman, loaded to the hatches with rum and powder, gold and
jewels, delicate meats and--with emphasis which she carefully cloaked
yet made vivid--dainty ladies, no doubt.

"Take ye the sloop, then," she commanded, "and bring me no tale of
failure. Ten miles southwest from the bluff she lies becalmed. Let no
man return without tribute for me. Go now!"

With a whoop the evil ruffians tumbled out, hurling themselves pell-mell
down to the shore, and splashing out to the boats. Their sloop, a long,
beamy Cayman-built craft, of eighty tons and twelve murderous guns that
were cast for a king's ship, could be handled by four men or a hundred.
She carried fifty men now, and she sped out of the estuary before the
faint breeze with a velocity that spelled certain doom for any
square-rigged ship she ever lifted over the horizon.

Dolores watched them go with inscrutable face; then commanded Milo to
attend her in the great chamber. Pascherette, not yet over her fright,
hovered tremblingly near, and her mistress dismissed her with a
pacifying pat on the head, flinging, at the same time, a string of
pearls around her neck that brought mingled gratitude, greed, and
conceit into her sparkling eyes.

"How stands the schooner now?" Dolores asked when the girl had gone.

"She drifts slowly, Sultana. There is little wind. Yet she ever comes
nearer."

"Milo, that is my ship!" breathed Dolores fervidly. "I have jewels and
silken trash, the richest in my store, which my father told me were
taken from such a vessel. A yacht, he called that craft. 'Tis sailed for
pleasure; trade never soils the holds of such craft; men who sail such a
vessel as that which now hovers near us are of the kind from which comes
such as that!" Once more she indicated the "Laughing Cavalier," and now
her form and face were filled with surging ambition strengthened with
ardent hope.

"How goes our sloop?" she asked abruptly.

"Swiftly, but with the dying breath of the wind. By noon she will be
swinging idly, Sultana."

"Who of the boldest rascals remain with us?"

"The noisiest dogs have gone. Sancho remains, for Stumpy cracked his
head last night in a brawl. The others here are but cattle!" The giant
uttered the words with bitter scorn.

"Then, at noon, Milo, we move to secure my ship!" Dolores cried with
gleaming eyes. "Set slaves to move out the false Point and anchor it a
c