“Very well,” said Barnaby; “I have it here safe and sound, and you shall see it.”  And thereupon and without more ado he drew out his wallet, opened it, and handed the other the mysterious note which he had kept carefully by him ever since he had received it.  His interlocutor took the paper, and drawing to him the candle, burning there for the convenience of those who would smoke tobacco, began immediately reading it.

This gave Barnaby True a moment or two to look at him.  He was a tall, lean man with a red handkerchief tied around his neck, with a queue of red hair hanging down his back, and with copper buckles on his shoes, so that Barnaby True could not but suspect that he was the very same man who had given the note to Miss Eliza Bolles at the door of his lodging-house.

“’Tis all right and straight and as it should be,” the other said, after he had so examined the note.  “And now that the paper is read” (suiting his action to his words), “I’ll just burn it for safety’s sake.”

And so he did, twisting it up and setting it to the flame of the candle.  “And now,” he said, continuing his address, “I’ll tell you what I am here for.  I was sent to ask if you’re man enough to take your life in your hands and to go with me in that boat down yonder at the foot of the garden.  Say ‘Yes,’ and we’ll start away without wasting more time, for the devil is ashore here at Jamaica—­though you don’t know what that means—­and if he gets ahead of us, why then we may whistle for what we are after, for all the good ’twill do us.  Say ‘No,’ and I go away, and I promise you you shall never be troubled more in this sort of a way.  So now speak up plain, young gentleman, and tell us what is your wish in this business, and whether you will adventure any further or no.”

If our hero hesitated it was not for long, and when he spoke up it was with a voice as steady as could be.

“To be sure I’m man enough to go with you,” says he; “and if you mean me any harm I can look out for myself; and if I can’t, then here is something can look out for me.”  And therewith he lifted up the flap of his pocket and showed the butt of a pistol he had fetched with him when he had set out from his lodging-house that evening.

At this the other burst out a-laughing for a second time.  “Come,” says he; “you are indeed of right mettle, and I like your spirit.  All the same, no one in all the world means you less ill than I, and so, if you have to use that barker, ’twill not be upon us who are your friends, but only upon one who is more wicked than the devil himself.  So now if you are prepared and have made up your mind and are determined to see this affair through to the end, ’tis time for us to be away.”  Whereupon, our hero indicating his acquiescence, his interlocutor and the others (who had not spoken a single word for all this time), rose together from the table, and the stranger having paid the scores of all, they went down together to the boat that lay plainly awaiting their coming at the bottom of the garden.