ing.... Nothing!"

He came at me again and again, but I never spoke after that. He made all
the issues clearer and clearer--his own side involuntarily and all the
griefs I had to expect. As for him, he dared not kill me--and he dared
not give me up to the admiral. In his suspense, since, for him, I was
the only person in the world who knew Seraphina's fate, he dared not let
me out of his grip. And all the while he had me he must keep the admiral
there, waiting for the surrender either of myself or of some other poor
devil whom he might palm off as Nikola el Escoces. While the admiral was
there the _Lion_ was pretty safe from molestation, and she would sail
pretty soon.

At the same time, except for the momentary sheer joy of tormenting a
man whom I couldn't help regarding as a devil, I had more than enough to
fear. I had suffered too much; I wanted rest, woman's love, slackening
off. And here was another endless coil--endless. If it didn't end in a
knife in the back, he might keep me for ages in Havana; or he might
get me sent to England, where it would take months, an endless time, to
prove merely that I wasn't Nikola el Escoces. I should prove it; but,
in the meantime, what would become of Sera-phina? Would she follow me to
England? Would she even know that I had gone there? Or would she think
me dead and die herself? O'Brien knew nothing; his spies might report a
hundred uncertainties. He was standing rigidly still now, as if afraid
to move for fear of breaking down. He said suddenly:

"You came in some ship; you can't deceive me, I shall have them all
searched again."

I said desperately, "Search and be damned--whatever ships you like."

"You cold, pitiless, English scoundrel," he shrieked suddenly. The
breaking down of his restraint had let him go right into madness. "You
have murdered her. You cared nothing; you came from nowhere. A beggarly
fool, too stupid to be even an adventurer. A miserable blunderer, coming
in blind; coming out blind; and leaving ruin and worse than hell. What
good have you done yourself? What could you? What did you see? What did
you hope?... Sorrow? Ruin? Death? I am acquainted with them. It is in
the blood; 'tis in the tone; in the entrails of us, in our mother's
milk. Your accursed land has brought always that on our own dear and
sorrowful country.... You waste, you ruin, you spoil. What for?... Tell
me what for? Tell me? Tell me? What did you gain? What will you ever
gain? An unend