Though Falk was still white under his bloody
bandage, his voice was stronger.
"I'll remember this," he said. "Maybe I'll give you a day or two of grace
before you swing. Oh, you can laugh at me now, you white-livered sons of
sea-cooks, but the day's coming when you'll sing another song to pay your
piper."
He looked round and laughed at his own men, and again they all laughed as
if he had said something clever, and he and Kipping exchanged glances.
"They ain't found the gold," he caustically remarked to Kipping. "We'll see
what we shall see."
"Ay, we'll see," Kipping returned, mildly. "We'll see. It'll be fun to see
it, too, won't it, sir?"
It was all very silly, and we, of course, had nothing to say in return; so
we watched them, with our muskets peeping over the bulwark and with the
long gun and the stern-chasers cleared in case of trouble, and in
undertones we kept up an exchange of comments.
After whispering among themselves, the men in the boat once more began to
row toward us. Singularly enough they showed no sign of the exhaustion that
a little before had seemed so painful. It slowly dawned upon me that their
air of misery had been nothing more than a cheap trick to play upon our
compassion.
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