Some gleam of Christopher's old cleverness in handling men was--now shown by his instructing Roldan to sally forth and bring Ojeda to order.

It was a case of setting a thief to catch a thief and, as it turned out, was not a bad stroke.

Roldan, nothing loth, sailed round to that part of the coast where Ojeda's ships were anchored, and asked to see his licence; which was duly shown to him and rather took the wind out of his sails.
He heard a little gossip from Ojeda, moreover, which had its own significance for him.

The Queen was ill; Columbus was in disgrace; there was talk of superseding him.

Ojeda promised to sail round to San Domingo and report himself; but instead, he sailed to the east along the coast of Xaragua, where he got into communication with some discontented Spanish settlers and concocted a scheme for leading them to San Domingo to demand redress for their imagined grievances.