The Tragedy of Ida Noble by W. Clark Russell

I was prepared to find that Butler had carried my words forward. I returned to the deck after breakfast, and the man trudged to the forecastle, and not long afterward I observed the four seamen, the fifth being at the helm, engaged in earnest conversation. They talked, pipe in mouth, their hands deep buried in their capacious breeches pockets, and sometimes they talked with their backs upon one another, and sometimes they would pace the deck, passing one another, but always talking, and frequently they directed their eyes aft, insomuch that I expected every minute that the whole group would approach me and oblige me to share in the discussion.

My manner and my words when I had visited madame below had been altogether too pronounced for so shrewd an intelligence as that of Don Christoval to miss the true meaning of. In short, I had as good as said that I did not consider the lady to be his wife; that she had been abducted -- ferociously and inhumanly stolen from her father's home, and that we Englishmen who formed his crew had been betrayed into an act of criminal villiany by his rascally lies. All this I was conscious I had as good as said, because, meaning it, I had looked it, and, in a sentence, I had suggested it. I therefore concluded that the two Spaniards would talk this matter of my suspicions over, decide upon some prompt course of action, and come to me on deck -- but what to do and what to say? Would Don Christoval _admit_ the adventure to be one of abduction, pleading the necessity of representing himself as married that he might obtain the assistance of English seamen, since it was clear that he would not ship Spanish sailors for the expedition; or would he approach me with threats, defying me to disprove his statement that the lady below was his wife, and giving me to understand that if I did not mind my own business -- .