at the table over against his interlocutor,
who pushed a bottle of rum towards him, together with a glass from the
hanging rack. He watched Barnaby fill his glass, and so soon as he had
done so began immediately by saying: "I do suppose you think you were
treated mightily ill to be so handled last night. Well, so you were
treated ill enough, though who hit you that crack upon the head I know
no more than a child unborn. Well, I am sorry for the way you were
handled, but there is this much to say, and of that you may feel well
assured, that nothing was meant to you but kindness, and before you are
through with us all you will believe that without my having to tell you
so."

Here he helped himself to a taste of grog, and sucking in his lips went
on again with what he had to say. "Do you remember," says he, "that
expedition of ours in Kingston Harbor, and how we were all of us balked
that night?" then, without waiting for Barnaby's reply: "And do you
remember what I said to that villain Jack Malyoe that night as his boat
went by us? I says to him, 'Jack Malyoe,' says I, 'you've got the
better of us once again, but next time it will be our turn, even if
William Brand himself has to come back from the grave to settle with
you.'"

"I remember something of the sort," said Barnaby, "but I profess I am
all in the dark as to what you are driving at."

At this the other burst out in a great fit of laughing. "Very well,
then," said he, "this night's work is only the ending of what was so
ill begun there. Look yonder"--pointing to a corner of the cabin--"and
then maybe you will be in the dark no longer." Barnaby turned his head
and there beheld in the corner of the saloon those very two
travelling-cases that Sir John Malyoe had been so particular to keep in his
cabin and under his own eyes through all the voyage from Jamaica.

"I'll show you what is in 'em," says the other, and thereupon arose,
and Barnaby with him, and so went over to where the two
travelling-cases stood.

Our hero had a strong enough suspicion as to what the cases contained.
But, Lord! what were suspicions to what his two eyes beheld when that
man lifted the lid of one of them--the locks thereof having already
been forced--and, flinging it back, displayed to Barnaby's astonished
and bedazzled sight a great treasure of gold and silver, some of it
tied up in leathern bags, to be sure, but so many of the coins, big and
little, yellow and white, lying loose in t