lets over his
broad shoulders. A huge moustache concealed his lips, and a long black
beard hid his chin; indeed the man was so hairy that he had the
appearance of being an ape rather than a man. One of his eyes--which
were jet black in colour, with whites which turned red when he flew into
a rage--had a very perceptible cast in it; the left eye, I remember it
was. His nose had been broken, and had a tremendous twist to starboard;
and he had lost his right ear in a stabbing affray in the streets of
Lisbon. In the left he now wears a huge gold ear-ring, shaped something
like a nut, with an enormous emerald set in it. Such was the exterior
appearance of the man who was to change both my life and that of others,
Jose Leirya, murderer and galley-slave, then mutineer, and, lastly,
pirate and villain of villains, slayer of hundreds of innocent folk,
slave-dealer, incendiary, and bloodthirsty monster, for whom no death is
bad enough. Remember my description of the man, sirs, for he presents
the very same appearance at the present day. I should know, for but two
short months since I was on his vessel; and, God forgive me, I believe I
was not much better than he. But to continue my yarn. This man came
aboard with about a hundred others; and I perceived at once--although
our jailers did not seem to notice the fact--that there was some kind of
arrangement or understanding between Jose Leirya and a number of the new
galley-slaves. What it meant I did not know until afterwards. We left
Cadiz, and our captain, thinking perhaps that the Mediterranean Sea was
not suitable for his enterprises, determined to take the galley to the
West Indies and try his fortune there. So we started away across the
great Atlantic Ocean.

"As I have told you, Jose Leirya was chained next to me; but he never
once spoke to me until after we had left the Western Isles. A few days
after that, however, he one evening disclosed to me his plan for seizing
the galley, and I then knew what the understanding had been between
himself and a large number of the prisoners who came aboard the galley
with him. On a certain night--which would fall about eight days later--
at midnight, on a given signal, all were to rise and overpower the
soldiers and sailors of the ship, seize her for ourselves, and use her
for our own purposes. You will ask, how were we to get rid of our
manacles? Well, it was thus arranged, sirs. Jose Leirya had brought on
board, cunning