"Now what a rogue are you
that can keep faith with none!" he cried. "First you take money to
carry me off; and then you bid me pay you to carry me back again."
"Ye wrong me, sir, I vow ye do! I can keep faith when honest men employ
me, and ye should know it, Sir Oliver. But who keeps faith with rogues
is a fool--and that I am not, as ye should also know. I ha' done this
thing that a rogue might be revealed to you and thwarted, as well as
that I might make some little profit out of this ship o' mine. I am
frank with ye, Sir Oliver. I ha' had some two hundred pounds in money
and trinkets from your brother. Give me the like and...."
But now of a sudden Sir Oliver's listlessness was all dispelled. It
fell from him like a cloak, and he sat forward, wide awake and with some
show of anger even.
"How do you say?" he cried, on a sharp, high note.
The captain stared at him, his pipe neglected. "I say that if so be as
ye'll pay me the same sum which your brother paid me to carry you
off...."
"My brother?" roared the knight. "Do you say my brother?"
"I said your brother."
"Master Lionel?" the other demanded still.
"What other brothers have you?" quoth Master Leigh.
There fell a pause and Sir Oliver looked straight before him, his head
sunken a little between his shoulders. "Let me understand," he said at
length. "Do you say that my brother Lionel paid you money to carry me
off--in short, that my presence aboard this foul hulk of yours is due to
him?"
"Whom else had ye suspected? Or did ye think that I did it for my own
personal diversion?"
"Answer me," bellowed Sir Oliver, writhing in his bonds.
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