"You and your needles," said the other. "Now,
what d'ye call 'em?" The bell upon the bridge clanged. "Eight bells,"
said the company; "aft to muster, boys." The bugle at the saloon-door
announced supper.
We were getting pretty well to the north--Mollendo, or
thereabouts--when I had my last conversation with the Frenchman. He
came up to me one night, as I sat on the deck to leeward of the winch,
keeping the first watch as snugly as I could. "You know zees coast
long?" he asked. I had not. Then came the never-ceasing, "'Ave you
know of ze Incas?" Yes, lot of general talk; and I had seen Incas
curios, mostly earthware, in every port in Peru. "You 'ave seen gold?"
No; there was never any gold. The Spaniards made a pretty general
average of any gold there was. "It ees a fool," he answered. "I tell
you," he went on, "it ees a fool. Zay have say zat; zey 'ave all say
zat; it ees a fool. Zere is gold. Zere is a hundred million pounds;
zere is twenty tousan' million dollars; zere is El Dorado. Beyond ze
mountains zere is El Dorado; zere is a town of gold. Zay say zere is
no gold? Zere is. I go to find ze gold; zat is what I do; I fin' ze
gold, I, Paul Bac.
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