The Pirate Woman

Swiftly Dolores stepped down and glided to Stumpy's side, his men drawing back involuntarily, not in sufficient numbers to be able to cast off their old awe of her.

"Thy ear, good Stumpy," she whispered. "Art for thy fellow pirates, or for me? Speak quickly."

"I'm for you, lady," he replied, shifting awkwardly on his mutilated foot. "For you, but not if what we heard is true."

"I tell thee it was false. Now art for me?" She bent upon him a smile of dazzling beauty, soft-eyed and almost tender, and the pirate's face grew ashamed; he knelt at her feet in humble obeisance, and the girl laid her hand on his head, and bade him rise.

"Then remain faithful, Stumpy, and thou and thy men shall share in my fortunes. Look well to the stranger there. Keep him with thee. I hear the vultures coming."

She returned to the altar, took her place behind the swirling smoke, and stood motionless, awaiting the arrival of the crowd whose noisy progress could be traced step by step. And presently they broke into the grove, unawed and uproarious, Caliban leading. Still the parties kept apart. Hanglip and Spotted Dog ranged themselves on either side of Caliban's gang, and every eye glared redly at the statuesque figure at the altar.

"Answer! Give us yer answer!" cried Caliban.

"Hear, my people!" Dolores cried, raising her arms for silence. "My answer is this. Among ye is a traitor. That traitor has spread lies among ye. Ye are my people, and none other. Did I not save the white ship for ye? What if I preserved her people. They are here, and here they shall remain. Had I thought to desert ye, could I not have gone in the night? Who should say no? Am I not queen of ye all? Then why this childish talk of leaving ye?"

Dolores was carefully fighting for time; she wished to dissect the feeling of the crowd before her, and while she spoke her irrelevant nothings, her keen eyes roved over every face. And Spotted Dog drew and held her gaze as no other did; his face was awork with savage unbelief, his loose lips wreathed and curled in his impatience to speak. At last his fury could not be longer restrained; he sprang to the front, and howled: "Lies, all lies! Thy chit of a maid--"

The words were choked in his throat with terrible suddenness. Like something unearthly, reaching from the unknown, the hand of death gripped Spotted Dog and he stumbled and fell forward, gnashing his teeth and clawing futilely at his breast. Dolores did not move. Her expression did not change. Milo had again proved faithful.