prisoners of all who should be found about the
place, and, of course, taking care to bring back whatever booty the
pirates might have been found to have accumulated. It is proper to say
here that I did not consider it necessary to mention to Sir Timothy
anything about Ricardo's private store of treasure hidden in the cave.
I felt that Ricardo had been perfectly right when he said that I had as
good a right as anybody to that, and I was quite determined that it
should be Lotta's and mine, to bring about which result I felt that my
best plan would be to keep the whole matter to myself.

It happened that the _Francesca_ was quite ready for sea, and there was
therefore nothing to wait for except a few necessary articles of
clothing for myself. Accordingly, within forty-eight hours of my
arrival in Port Royal, aboard the _Barracouta_, I was at sea again in
the schooner, on my way to demolish the lair of the pirates. Carrying
on heavily we arrived in the bay on the afternoon of the second day out,
and anchored in such a position that not only the wharf and the various
sheds, but also the bungalow, were within range of the schooner's guns.
Then, while one-half of the crew remained on board to take care of the
vessel, and guard against the possibility of the pirates playing off my
own trick upon me and stealing the schooner, the other half, armed to
the teeth, accompanied me ashore and proceeded to collect and convey to
the schooner all the booty of every kind that we could find, and which
seemed worth carrying off. Not a pirate appeared to say us nay; indeed,
a little investigation soon made it apparent that my act of running away
with their brig had caused them to take the alarm and make their escape
in certain of the boats which I had damaged. Plain evidence was
discovered of the fact that they had hurriedly repaired four of their
boats and had gone off, carrying away with them all their portable booty
in the shape of coin, bullion, jewellery, etcetera, and leaving only
that which was too bulky to be stowed in their boats. We found
sufficient of the latter, however, in the shape of valuable merchandise,
to load the schooner very nearly down to her covering board; having
stowed which safely away, we set fire to the whole place, and never left
it until every building, including the bungalow, had been utterly
destroyed. And thus ended my long and persistent pursuit of one of the
most pestilent and formidable gangs of pira