"I see no mist; moreover, the Cordillera is visible a hundred miles away, and by good rights we should not be more than thirty or forty miles from the coast."
"It's the fault of your compass, then. The darned thing is all wrong. Better chuck it overboard and have done with it."
"If you do, I'll chuck you overboard. The compass is quite correct. You have been steering due west for some purpose of your own, against my orders."
"Oh, that's your game, is it? You are the skipper, and us a brace of lubbers as doesn't know north from west, I suppose. Let him sail the cursed craft hissel, Bill."
Yawl let go the tiller, on which the sloop broached to and nearly went on her beam ends. This was more than I could bear, and calling on Ramon to follow me, I sprang forward, seized Kidd by the throat, and, drawing my dagger, told him that unless he promised to obey my orders and do his duty, I would make an end of him then and there. Meanwhile, Ramon was keeping Yawl off with his _machete_, flourishing it around his head in a way that made the old salt's hair nearly stand on end. Seeing that resistance was useless, Kidd caved in.
"I ask your pardon, Mr. Fortescue," he said, hoarsely, for my hand was still on his throat. "I ask your pardon, but I lost my temper, and when I lose my temper it's the very devil; I don't know what I'm doing; but I promise faithfully to obey your orders and do my duty."
On this I loosed him, and bade Ramon put up his _machete_ and let Yawl go back to his steering. In one sense this was an untoward incident. It made Kidd my personal enemy. Quite apart from the question of the diamonds, he would bear me a grudge and do me an ill turn if he could. He was that sort of a man. Henceforward it would be war to the knife between us, and I should have to be more on my guard than ever. On the other hand, it was a distinct advantage to have beaten him in a contest for the mastery; if he had beaten me, I should have had to accept whatever conditions he might have thought fit to impose, for I was quite unable to sail the sloop myself.
A light was thrown on his motive for changing the sloop's course by something Ramon had told me when the trouble was over. Shortly before I awoke he heard Kidd say to Yawl that he would very much like to know where I had hidden the diamonds, and that if they could only keep her head due west, we should make San Ambrosio about the same time that I was expecting to make Callao.