cotton this trip? No, I know you don't. Then you're in debt to the
government? Correct. So I reckon you'll carry me in place of the
cotton."

The demand was just. For their golden privileges the blockade runners
took a portion of their cargo on government account. But Murguia knew
that the army of Northern Virginia must surrender soon. The Confederacy
was really at an end, and this would be his last trip. Why, then, pay a
dying creditor?

"The favor, senor! Or must I have you kicked off?"

The senor, however, with his charger behind him, was foraging over the
deck to find a stall, and in a fury Murguia plucked at his sleeve. But
Driscoll wheeled of his own accord to inquire about horse
accommodations, and then the Mexican wondered in his timid soul at his
own boldness. It loomed before him as unutterably more preposterous than
the lone wanderer's preposterous act of taking possession single handed.
Yet the lone wanderer was only gazing down on him very benignly. But
what experience of violent life, of cool dealing in death, did poor Don
Anastasio behold on those youthful features! In a panic he realized
certain vital things. To evade his debt to a government that could never
claim it was very seductive and business-like. But there were the
Confederate batteries on the wharf, and a line of torpedoes across the
entrance to the bay. There were the Federal cannon of Fort Morgan, just
beyond. His passenger, if rejected, had only to give the word, and there
would be some right eager shooting. And as the Southerners shot, in
their present mood, they would remember various matters. They would
remember the treasure he had wrung from their distress; the cotton
bought for ten cents and sold abroad for a dollar; the nitre, the
gunpowder, the clothing and medicines, rated so mercilessly dear; the
profits boosted a thousand per cent., though an army was starving.

And yet Murguia could not lift his soul from the few hundred dollars of
passage money. He almost had his man by the sleeve again. But no, there
were four hundred odd bales on board. There was _La Luz_, his fleet
L20,000 Clyde-built side-wheeler, bought out of the proceeds of a single
former trip. Even if torpedoes and cannon missed, the Fort and
blockaders outside would be thankful for the alarm, and make sure of
him. A few hundred dollars was an amount, but the benignity in
Driscoll's whimsical brown eyes meant a great deal more, such for
instance, as cotton and stea