But (even as I slept) methought I was back in torment. I seemed to hear again the crack of whips, the harsh cries of the drivers, the shrill screams and curses, the long, groaning breaths with the rattle and creak of the great oars as they swung ceaselessly back and forth; nay, I could even feel the kick of the oar-shaft that had escaped my fainting grasp. So real was it all that I waked groaning (as I had done many a time and oft), waked to find the kindly sun making a glory about me and a blackbird hard by a-piping most sweet to hear, while before me stood a little, thin fellow in a broad-eaved, steeple-crowned hat, who peered at me through narrowed eyes and poked at me with a stick.
"And how's the wind, shipmate?" he questioned. I sat up and scowled, whereupon he tucked the stick beneath an arm and stood viewing me, chin in hand. "You sleep mighty sound," says he, "here I've stood a-poking at ye with my stick, d'ye see, and you snore but the louder--or was it groans?"
"For the which poking I'm minded to throw you into the horse-pond--"
"Why, that's as may be!" says he, falling back a step. "But no offence, shipmate."
"Then leave me in peace." And I laid me down again.
"You sleep mighty sound," says he, "and your bed none so easy!"
"I've known worse!"
"Aye--the rowing-bench of a Spanish floating hell, shipmate--ha?"
At this, I started and turned to look at him again. He was (as I say) a little man and clad in suit of russet-brown (very trim and sober), but at his hip he bore a long rapier or tuck, while in his ears (which were trimmed to points in mighty strange fashion) swung great, gold rings such as mariners do wear; his face was lean and sharp and wide of mouth and lighted by very quick, bright eyes, seeming to take in all things with swift-darting glances. A scar that ran from brow to chin lent to him a certain hangdog air; as to his age, it might have been thirty or forty or sixty, for, though he seemed vigorous and active, with smooth, unwrinkled face, his hair was snow-white.
"Well, shipmate," he questioned, meeting my searching gaze, "and how d'ye like me?"
"No whit!"
"Sink me, but that's plain enough!" says he, smiling ruefully. "So there's nought in me as draws you, then?"
"No!"
"'Tis pity, for I've a feeling we shall sail aboard ship together yet."
"How should you know I've rowed aboard a Spanish ship?"
"You bear the mark, shipmate; as you lay a-groaning in your sleep I took occasion to cast an eye over ye, d'ye see, and what wi' the new-healed scars on your wrist, your sunburnt skin and the desperate sink-or-swim look o' you I judged you new-broke from slavery, and named a Spanish galleass at a venture, d'ye see."