“‘Forgot!’ screamed old Pedro.

“‘Yessir, plumb forgot.  I jus’ can’t remember for the life of me, where I put her.  I know I brought her aboard myself, an’ I’d a-taken my affydavy I put her under my bunk, but when I looked for her, when we fust sighted this here galleon, strike me foolish if she was there at all!  I asked the cook about it.  He’ll tell yer so hisself—­an’ he—­’

“‘Cut it short!’ Pedro roared again.

“He glared around him—­did old Pedro—­like an infuriated lion.  Once he raised his cutlass and seemed about to sweep off the bo’s’n’s head with it.  At last he said in a choked voice—­

“‘Well, for goodness’ sake, think!  Can’t you remember what you did with it?’

“Aaron shook his head dumbly.  Then as he stood there, quaking, a sudden gleam of intelligence came into his eye.

“‘That’s it!’ he said,’that’s it.  The cook wanted an ironin’ board, he said, and he borrowed it—­’

“He broke off, and scrambled hastily over the side of ’The Angel of Death.’  Then he rushed below, and in a few minutes came back, nervously tearing off some sheets of white cloth, which surrounded the handsome, hand-carved, mahogany Plank.

“‘Lucky for you!’ bellowed Pedro, ‘now put her in place, boys!’

“His men put her in place and the Spanish crew had the pleasure of starting the long procession of victims who were to go overboard by that route in the years to come.

“Such was the first fight of ‘The Angel of Death’ and just such success (excepting, of course, the hitch about The Plank) rewarded the efforts of old Pedro for over twenty years.  Up and down the Spanish Main he sailed, and the sight of that foresail, with its terrible picture of the Black Angel, struck terror to the heart of every man afloat.  Even men-of-war fought shy of the three Pedros.  Once ‘The Angel of Death’ rounded the Cape of Good Hope and attacked a treasure fleet on its way back from the Indies.  On that occasion it captured so many chests of gold doubloons that they quite blocked up the social hall, where the crew used to hold their revels, and they had to revel on deck, until ’The Angel of Death’ got back to Rum Island, where they buried their treasure.

“Finally, old Pedro the First was taken sick.  There was a fight, early one morning when the air was very damp, between the ‘Angel’ and a rich merchantman.  The pirate captain got rather over-heated, during his usual duel with the captain of the merchantman, and then he foolishly sat down in a draft while he ate his breakfast.  He had a bad attack of rheumatism, and it made it very hard for him to scramble over the bulwarks when he led a boarding party to the enemy’s decks.  The next time they put in at Rum Island the old man took his bed, dolefully predicting that his end was near.

“’Just at this season, when the plate-ships are all sailing for Spain,’ he grumbled, ’I don’t see what I’ve done to be put upon this way.’