, as
the most suitable to the climate); but somehow, sir, though evidently I could do
nothing for any one by remaining about, I could not tear myself away from that
wharf, where the fatigue made me stumble painfully at times. The night was
excessively dark - the darkest I remember in my life; so that I began to think
that the arrival of the transport from Esmeralda could not possibly take place
before daylight, owing to the difficulty of navigating the gulf. The mosquitoes
bit like fury. We have been infested here with mosquitoes before the late
improvements; a peculiar harbour brand, sir, renowned for its ferocity. They
were like a cloud about my head, and I shouldn't wonder that but for their
attacks I would have dozed off as I walked up and down, and got a heavy fall. I
kept on smoking cigar after cigar, more to protect myself from being eaten up
alive than from any real relish for the weed. Then, sir, when perhaps for the
twentieth time I was approaching my watch to the lighted end in order to see the
time, and observing with surprise that it wanted yet ten minutes to midnight, I
heard the splash of a ship's propeller - an unmistakable sound to a sailor's ear
on such a calm night. It was faint indeed, because they were advancing with
precaution and dead slow, both on account of the darkness and from their desire
of not revealing too soon their presence: a very unnecessary care, because, I
verily believe, in all the enormous extent of this harbour I was the only living
soul about. Even the usual staff of watchmen and others had been absent from
their posts for several nights owing to the disturbances. I stood stock still,
after dropping and stamping out my cigar - a circumstance highly agreeable, I
should think, to the mosquitoes, if I may judge from the state of my face next
morning. But that was a trifling inconvenience in comparison with the brutal
proceedings I became victim of on the part of Sotillo. Something utterly
inconceivable, sir; more like the proceedings of a maniac than the action of a
sane man, however lost to all sense of honour and decency. But Sotillo was
furious at the failure of his thievish scheme.«
    In this Captain Mitchell was right. Sotillo was indeed infuriated. Captain
Mitchell, however, had not been arrested at once; a vivid curiosity induced him
to remain on the wharf (which is nearly four hundred feet long) to see, or
rather hear, the whole process of disembarkation. Concealed by the railway truck