This is a part of my story on which I care not to dwell.  Even yet I cannot think of it without grief and pain.  My dear wife was taken from me.  She died in my arms, her hand in mine, as sweetly and serenely as she had lived.  But for Captain Bigelow and his officers I should have buried myself with Angela in the fathomless sea.  I owed him my life a second time—­such as it was—­more, for he taught me the duty and grace of resignation, showed me that, though to cherish the memory of a great sorrow ennobles a man, he who abandons himself to unmeasured grief is as pusillanimous as he who shirks his duty on the field of battle.

Captain Bigelow had a great heart and a chivalrous nature.  After Angela’s death he treated me more as a cherished son than as a casual guest.  Before we reached Panama we were fast friends.  He provided me with clothing and gave me money for my immediate wants, as to have attempted to dispose of any of my diamonds there, or at Chagres, might have exposed me to suspicion, possibly to danger.  In acknowledgement of his kindness and as a souvenir of our friendship, I persuaded him to accept one of the finest stones in my collection, and we parted with mutual assurances of goodwill and not without hope of meeting again.

Ramon of course, went with me.  Bill Yawl, equally of of course, I left behind.  He had slung his hammock in the Constellation’s fo’castle, and became captain of the foretop.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

OLD FRIENDS AND A NEW FOE.

I had made up my mind to see Carmen, if he still lived; and finding at Chagres a schooner bound for La Guayra I took passages in her for myself and Ramon, all the more willingly as the captain proposed to put in at Curacoa.  It occurred to me that Van Voorst, the Dutch merchant in whose hands I had left six hundred pounds, would be a likely man to advise me as to the disposal of my diamonds—­if he also still lived.

Rather to my surprise, for people die fast in the tropics, I did find the old gentleman alive, but he had made so sure of my death that my reappearance almost caused his.  The pipe he was smoking dropped from his mouth, and he sank back in his chair with an exclamation of fear and dismay.

“Yor need not be alarmed, Mynheer Van Voorst,” I said; “I am in the flesh.”

“I am glad to see you in the flesh.  I don’t believe in ghosts, of course.  But I happened to be in what you call a brown study, and as I had heard you were shot long ago on the llanos you rather startled me, coming in so quietly—­that rascally boy ought to have announced you.  But I was not afraid—­not in the least.  Why should one be afraid of a ghost!  And I saw at a glance that, as you say, you were in the flesh.  I suppose you have come to inquire about your money.  It is quite safe, my dear sir, and at your disposal, and you will find that it has materially increased.  I will call for the ledger, and you shall see.”