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The most of the buccaneers–there were eight of them–spoke no Spanish: but there was one, a cross-eyed fellow, who acted as interpreter. And he knelt and held up a bundle of keys which Felipe wore slung from a girdle round his waist.

“Once more, Master Abbot–will you show us your treasures, or will you not?”

Felipe moaned.

“I tell you,” Brother Bartolome spoke up, very short and distinct, “there are no treasures. And if there were, that poor wretch could not show them. He is no Abbot, but a beggar who has lived on charity these twenty years to my knowledge.”

“That tongue of yours, friar, needs looking to. I promise you to cut it out and examine it when I have done with your reverend father here. As for the wench at your side–“

“You may do as your cruelty prompts you, Brother Bartolome interrupted. But that man is no Abbot.”

“He may be Saint Peter himself, and these the keys of Heaven and Hell. But I and my camarados are going to find out what they open, as sure as my name is Evan Evans.” And he knotted a cord round Felipe’s forehead and began to twist. The Carmelite put her hands over her eyes and would have fallen: but one of her guards held her up, while another slipped both arms round her neck from behind and held her eyelids wide open with finger and thumb. I believe–I hope–that Felipe was past feeling by this time, as he certainly was past speech. He did not scream again, and it was only for a little while that he moaned. But even when the poor fool’s head dropped on his shoulder, and the life went out of him, they did not finish with the corpse until, in their blasphemous sport, they had hoisted it over the altar and strapped it there with its arms outstretched and legs dangling.

“Now I think it is your turn,” said the scoundrel Evans, turning to Brother Bartolome with a grin.

“I regret that we cannot give you long, for we returned from Tavoga this morning to find Captain Morgan already on the road. It will save time if you tell us at once what these keys open.”

“Certainly I will tell you,” said the friar, and stretched out a hand for the bunch. “This key for instance, is useless: it opens the door of the wicket by which you entered. This opens the chest which, as a rule, contains the holy vessels; but it too, is useless, since the chest is empty of all but the silver chalices and a couple of patens. Will you send one of your men to prove that I speak truth? This, again, is the key of my own cell–“

“Where your reverence entertains the pretty nuns who come for absolution.”

“After that,” said Brother Bartolome, pointing a finger towards the altar and the poor shape dangling, “you might disdain small brutalities.”

The scoundrel leaned his back against a carved bench-end and nodded his head slowly. “Master friar, you shall have a hard death.”

“Possibly. This, as I was saying, is the key of my cell, where I decoct the liquor for which this house is famous. Of our present stock the bulk lies in the cellars, to which this”–and he held up yet another key–“will admit you. Yes, that is it,” as one of the pirates produced a bottle and held it under his nose.

“Eh? Let me see it.” The brute Evans snatched the bottle. “Is this the stuff?” he demanded, holding it up to the sunlight which streamed down red on his hand from the robe of a martyr in one of the painted windows above. He pulled out his heavy knife, and with the back of it knocked off the bottle-neck.

“I will trouble you to swear to the taste,” said he.

“I taste it only when our customers complain. They have not complained now for two-and-twenty years.”

“Nevertheless you will taste it.”