She sat the water like a gull, so lightly that one half expected a sudden unfolding of wings and a soaring flight into the blue.
I was still gazing with all my eyes, and drifting slowly in, when a sharp hail brought me round facing a man who leaned with his arms on a wall of rock and looked over and down at me.
"Hello there!" "Hello!" I replied, and saw that it was young Torode himself.
From my position I could see little except the rising ground in the middle of the island, but I got the impression, chiefly no doubt from what I had heard, and from the thin curls of smoke that rose in a line behind him, that there was quite a number of houses there.

In fact the place had all the look of a fortified post.
"Tiens! It is Monsieur Carre, is it not?
And what may Monsieur Carre want here ?" His tone was somewhat masterful, if not insolent.

I felt an inclination to resent it, but bethought me in time that such could be no help to my plans, and that, moreover, nothing was to be gained by concealment.
"I came to see your father.

Is he to be seen ?" "So?
What about ?" "I want to join his ship there for the privateering.

She's a beauty." "Oh-ho! Tired of honest trading ?" "I didn't know privateering had become dishonest." "Bit different from what you've been accustomed to, isn't it ?" "Bit more profitable anyway, so they say.