his craft. It was to
this secluded, and indeed almost unknown spot, that he was in the habit
of running for shelter when hard pressed by the cruisers who were always
on the lookout for him; and, from Carera's description of the
difficulties of the navigation, it would seem almost impossible to
devise or hit upon a place better suited for such a purpose. It was
here, also, that he first stored his plunder, and afterwards bartered it
for gold or such necessaries as he might happen to require, with the
three or four favoured individuals who, with the most extreme
precaution, he had invited to trade with him. And it was the key to the
navigation of these lagoons and their approaches which Carera had
undertaken to sell to the Spanish authorities in consideration of his
receiving, as the price of his treachery, one-half the amount of the
captured spoil.

For the remainder of that day our minds were chiefly occupied with the
question of how, after our visit to the Conconil lagoons, we were to
make our way to Port Royal; and the more carefully we considered the
question the more numerous and insurmountable appeared to be the
difficulties in our way. It was not as though we were going to touch at
a civilised port; in that case, if it came to the worst, we might have
run away from our craft and taken our chance of getting another to suit
us. But this, under the circumstances, was out of the question.
Moreover, directly we began to consider the matter, it seemed imperative
that the _Pinta_ and her entire crew should be detained at least until
our expedition should have sailed, otherwise Carera, finding himself
duped, might endeavour to make the best of a bad matter by hurrying off
to warn Giuseppe of the possibility of our beating up his quarters. The
situation eventually resolved itself into this: that whereas, on the
completion of our ostensible trading errand, the _Pinta_ would, in the
ordinary course of events, return to La Guayra, taking us with her--when
on her arrival the whole fiasco would come to light and the least
misfortune we might expect would be a return to our loathsome prison
quarters--it was necessary for the success of our plan that the craft
and her crew should, by some means or other, find their way to Royal
Port. How was the affair to be managed? The outlines of a scheme at
length arranged themselves in my mind; and, although it was of so
desperate a character that we agreed it was almost impossible t