"
"I know nothing of filibuster customs." The gentleman was
disdainful.
"But you are learning quickly."
"What do you mean, you rogue? I am a leader of armies, not of
plundering thieves."
"Oh, but of course!" Blood's irony laughed in his eyes. "Yet,
whatever you may be, I warn you that unless you yield to a demand
that I consider just and therefore uphold, you may look for trouble,
and it would not surprise me if you never leave Cartagena at all,
nor convey a single gold piece home to France."
"Ah, pardieu! Am I to understand that you are threatening me?"
"Come, come, M. le Baron! I warn you of the trouble that a little
prudence may avert. You do not know on what a volcano you are
sitting. You do not know the ways of buccaneers. If you persist,
Cartagena will be drenched in blood, and whatever the outcome the
King of France will not have been well served."
That shifted the basis of the argument to less hostile ground.
Awhile yet it continued, to be concluded at last by an ungracious
undertaking from M.
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