"It comes to this," he said to Christobal. "The men who got away from
the _Kansas_ in No. 3 life-boat fell into the hands of the savages
early on the day of the ship's arrival here. Suarez slipped his cable
that night, being aware at the time that eleven white captives were
still alive. Yet he said no word, not even when he heard that we had
seen one of the boat's water-casks in a canoe. He, a Christian, bolted
and remained silent, while some poor creature of a woman risked her
life, and ran counter to all her natural instincts, in the endeavor to
save the men of his own race. What sort of mean hound can he be?"
Suarez needed no translation to grasp the purport of Courtenay's words.
He besought the senor captain to have patience with him. He had
escaped from a living tomb, and felt that he would yield up his life
rather than return. Therefore, when he saw how few in number and badly
armed were they on board the ship, he thought it best to remain silent
as to the fate of the boat's crew. In the first place, he fully
expected that they had been killed by the Indians, who would be enraged
by his own disappearance.
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