The French ships were gone. They had been quietly
and secretly warped out of the harbour under cover of night, and
three sails, faint and small, on the horizon to westward was all
that remained to be seen of them. The absconding M. de Rivarol
had gone off with the treasure, taking with him the troops and
mariners he had brought from France. He had left behind him at
Cartagena not only the empty-handed buccaneers, whom he had
swindled, but also M. de Cussy and the volunteers and negroes
from Hispaniola, whom he had swindled no less.
The two parties were fused into one by their common fury, and
before the exhibition of it the inhabitants of that ill-fated
town were stricken with deeper terror than they had yet known
since the coming of this expedition.
Captain Blood alone kept his head, setting a curb upon his deep
chagrin. He had promised himself that before parting from M. de
Rivarol he would present a reckoning for all the petty affronts
and insults to which that unspeakable fellow - now proved a
scoundrel - had subjected him.
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