Picking his way daintily through that shambles in the waist came a
tall man with a deeply tanned face that was shaded by a Spanish
headpiece. He was armed in back-and-breast of black steel
beautifully damascened with golden arabesques. Over this, like a
stole, he wore a sling of scarlet silk, from each end of which
hung a silver-mounted pistol. Up the broad companion to the
quarter-deck he came, toying with easy assurance, until he stood
before the Spanish Admiral. Then he bowed stiff and formally. A
crisp, metallic voice, speaking perfect Spanish, reached those
two spectators on the poop, and increased the admiring wonder in
which Lord Julian had observed the man's approach.
"We meet again at last, Don Miguel," it said. "I hope you are
satisfied. Although the meeting may not be exactly as you pictured
it, at least it has been very ardently sought and desired by you."
Speechless, livid of face, his mouth distorted and his breathing
laboured, Don Miguel de Espinosa received the irony of that man to
whom he attributed his ruin and more beside.
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