Keeping well hidden in the bamboo and grass I crept to a high spot, and right under the edge of the cliff I saw Thirkle sitting on a sack of gold, with his hands across his knees, holding a piece of rope and gazing down at it as if in doubt what to do with it.  His bare, bald head was bowed low.

Buckrow was lying in front of him, with his chin propped in his hands.  He was smoking a cigar and looking at Thirkle.  Behind them were piled the sacks of gold, close to a wide crack in the cliff, a sort of canon, wide enough for a man to enter, and overgrown at the top with brush and green fronds, for the cliffside was wet and dripping, and veiled with mosses.

“Got it in yer old skull that Bucky was a fool, hey?” said Buckrow, blowing a cloud of smoke at Thirkle.  “Well, I’m Bad Buckrow, and I was Bad Buckrow afore ever I saw ye, and I had a bit of brains of my own afore ever I met up with ye, Thirkle.  Ye can bear that in mind.  See how ye come out when ye monkeyed with me.  Them other two fools went off in the wood and plugged one another, but that ain’t me, Thirkle.  Yer sharp, Thirkle; ye always was a sharp one, but ye ain’t sharp enough for Bucky, and it’s me that’s tellin’ ye that.”

Thirkle made no reply, but kept his head down, staring at the rope in his hands, as if he were considering some weighty problem.

“Wanted it all, hey?” went on Buckrow.  “Think I’m goin’ to put my neck in a rope for ye and then let ye hog it all, hey?  Maybe ye can fool the others, but I’m Bad Buckrow, I am, and I don’t let the like of you, Mr. Thirkle, hang nothin’ on me—­leastways, not so easy as ye looked for.  Why, I had my eye on ye and every move ye made after ye sent Reddy and Jim away to slit one another’s throats!  Thought I’d fall for it, did ye?  See what come of it?  Ye see, don’t ye?  I’m Bad Buckrow.”

Thirkle moved uneasily and cleared his throat, but did not lift his head or give any answer.  But, when he put his head to one side and shook it, I saw a red patch on his scalp over his right ear, and a smear of blood down his cheek.  Then I realized that the rope over his hands made him a prisoner, and that Buckrow had turned against him.

“Wanted to do for me too, did ye.  I knew yer game, old boy!  I saw them eyes of yours on me, and murder in ’em, and it’s me ought to know when ye plan to cut a man down—­I know Thirkle.

“Knew ye’d turn on me some day this way when we made it rich.  The lot of it was small pickin’, but here’s half o’ London under our feet to be split four ways; but ye wanted it all, and ye wanted us out of yer way so ye could sleep o’ nights.  Nice game it was.  Fine gent ye’d be, with all of us dead here, and nobody to ever tell who Thirkle was, or about the Kut Sang, or the others.

“Get away in the boats, ye would, and come back some day for the gold and then cut it for London, prayin’ yer way out of the country, and folks’d wonder what come of the Devil’s Admiral and his crew when no more ships was lost the way we made ’em go.”