“I have found it as good as another’s,” said his lordship, cropping the Major’s too eager eloquence.  He spoke with an unusual degree of that frosty dignity he could assume upon occasion.  The fact is that his lordship was in an exceedingly bad humour.  Having written jubilantly home to the Secretary of State that his mission had succeeded, he was now faced with the necessity of writing again to confess that this success had been ephemeral.  And because Major Mallard’s crisp mostachios were lifted by a sneer at the notion of a buccaneer’s word being acceptable, he added still more sharply:  “My justification is here in the person of Colonel Bishop safely returned.  As against that, sir, your opinion does not weigh for very much.  You should realize it.”

“Oh, as your lordship says.”  Major Mallard’s manner was tinged with irony.  “To be sure, here is the Colonel safe and sound.  And out yonder is Captain Blood, also safe and sound, to begin his piratical ravages all over again.”

“I do not propose to discuss the reasons with you, Major Mallard.”

“And, anyway, it’s not for long,” growled the Colonel, finding
speech at last.   “No, by.....”   He emphasized the assurance by an
unprintable oath.   “If I spend the last shilling of my fortune and
the last ship of the Jamaica fleet, I’ll have that rascal in a
hempen necktie before I rest.   And I’ll not be long about it.”   He
had empurpled in his angry vehemence, and the veins of his forehead
stood out like whipcord.   Then he checked.

“You did well to follow Lord Julian’s instructions,” he commended the Major.  With that he turned from him, and took his lordship by the arm.  “Come, my lord.  We must take order about this, you and I.”

They went off together, skirting the redoubt, and so through courtyard and garden to the house where Arabella waited anxiously.  The sight of her uncle brought her infinite relief, not only on his own account, but on account also of Captain Blood.

“You took a great risk, sir,” she gravely told Lord Julian after the ordinary greetings had been exchanged.

But Lord Julian answered her as he had answered Major Mallard.  “There was no risk, ma’am.”

She looked at him in some astonishment.  His long, aristocratic face wore a more melancholy, pensive air than usual.  He answered the enquiry in her glance: 

“So that Blood’s ship were allowed to pass the fort, no harm could come to Colonel Bishop.  Blood pledged me his word for that.”

A faint smile broke the set of her lips, which hitherto had been wistful, and a little colour tinged her cheeks.  She would have pursued the subject, but the Deputy-Governor’s mood did not permit it.  He sneered and snorted at the notion of Blood’s word being good for anything, forgetting that he owed to it his own preservation at that moment.