Beauvallet Read Online Free PDF Page B

Venture.
    ‘I know it,’ Beauvallet said briefly. ‘If I read well the signs the cameras de sangre is in him.’
    ‘I observed it, sir. A glance, you would say. His man – a lank, melancholic fool if ever I saw one! – stands prating of quotidian fevers, but no, quoth I, say rather the cameras de sangre , dolt. I shall poke out the folds of the ruff, please you, sir.’ He performed this office for Sir Nicholas, and stood back to regard his handiwork. The poking-stick was levelled at Sir Nicholas next by way of emphasis. ‘Moreover, master, and mark you well! it is not to be considered a favourable omen. By no means! A death portends disaster. I do not speak of such willy-nilly deaths as might chance in battle. That is understood. A lingering sickness is another and quite different matter. We must set the worthy señor ashore with all speed.’
    ‘How now! What's this, rogue?’ demanded Beauvallet, lying back in his chair. ‘Set him ashore where and for what?’
    ‘I judge the Canaries to be a convenient spot, sir. The reason is made clear: he must die upon land – or at least upon another ship than ours. We need not concern ourselves with that.’ He ducked quickly to avoid a boot hurled at his head.
    ‘Cullion!’ Beauvallet apostrophised him. ‘Curb that prattling cheat of yours! We set the gentleman ashore in Spain. Mark that!’
    Joshua picked up the boot, and knelt to help Sir Nicholas put it on, no whit abashed. ‘I shall take leave to say, master, that this is to put our heads in a noose again.’
    ‘Be sure yours will end there one day,’ said Sir Nicholas cheerfully.
    ‘As to that, sir, I do not go roystering up and down the world, sacking and plundering,’ replied Joshua, entirely without venom. ‘A gentle thrust, sir, and we have the boot on. So!’ He smoothed a wrinkle from the soft Cordovan leather, and held ready the second boot. ‘You are to understand, sir, that it is no matter to me, for it was clearly proved in the reading of my horoscope that I should die snug in my bed. It would be well to have your horoscope cast, master, that we may know what to beware of.’
    ‘Beware your bed, dizzard, and get you hence!’ Beauvallet recommended. ‘You tempt me overmuch.’ He made a short, suggestive movement of his arched foot.
    ‘That, master,’ said Joshua philosophically, ‘is as may be, and at your worship's pleasure. I do not gainsay you have the right. But I shall take leave to say withal that this junketting upon the high seas with a wench aboard – nay two –’
    ‘What?’ Beauvallet roared, and jerked himself upright in his chair.
    Joshua's shrewd grey eyes widened. ‘Oho! Pardon, sir, a lady was the word. But it's all the same, by your leave, or rather worse, if the wind sits in that quarter with you. However, I say nothing. But it's against all custom and proper usage, and I misdoubt me an evil chance may befall.’
    Beauvallet fell to stroking his pointed beard, seeing him at which significant trick Joshua backed strategically to the door. ‘An evil chance will without any doubt at all shortly befall you, my friend,’ said Sir Nicholas, and came to his feet, ‘At the toe of my boot!’
    ‘If that is your humour, sir, I withdraw with all speed,’ said Joshua promptly, and retired nimbly.
    Beauvallet swung out in his wake, and went up on deck to oversee an inventory of the Santa Maria 's cargo in the waist.
    Thus Dona Dominica, when she came up on deck to take the air, chanced upon a sight that made her curl her lip, and lift her chin. She wandered to the quarter-deck and stood lookingdown into the waist, where bales of cloth were lying, and where ingots were being weighed upon a rough scale. Master Dangerfield had a sheet of paper and an inkhorn upon an upturned cask, and wrote carefully thereon while a stout, hairy fellow called weights and numbers. Near him, upon another cask, lounged Beauvallet with a hand on his hip, and a booted leg swinging. His attention was