meal you have had to-day, then indeed let my life’s blood stain the deck.”

So saying, I nodded to Hiroshimi to serve the dinner.

CHAPTER IV

IN WHICH I AM A PIRATE

WITH my own hands I have trained that prize, Hiroshimi, to cook and to serve; but only Providence could give Hiroshimi his super-humanly disinterested calm. He fitted perfectly into the picture of our dream. ’Twas no ordinary log house in which we sat, indeed no house at all. Beneath us rose and fell a stanch vessel, responsive to the long lift of the southern seas. It was not a rustle of the leaves we heard through the open windows, but the low ripple of waves along our strakes came to our ears through the open ports. Hiroshimi did not depart to the kitchen; but high aloft our lookout swept the sea for sail that might offer us a prize.

If any say that this manner of illusion may not exist between two boys and a man, I answer that we did not thus classify it. By the new pleasure in my soul, by the new blood in my cheek, I swear we were three boys together, and all in quest of adventure.

True, at times our speech smacked less of nautical and piratical phrase, at times, indeed, halted. It is difficult for a twelve-year-old pirate, exceeding hungry, to ask for a third helping of grilled chicken in a voice at once stern and ingratiating. Moreover, it is difficult for a discreet and law-abiding citizen, with a full sense of duty, deliberately to aid and abet two youthful runaways. But whenever illusion wavered, L’Olonnois saved the day by resuming his stern scowl, even above a chicken-bone. His facility in rolling speech I discovered to be, in part, attributable to a volume which I saw protruding from his pocket. At my request he passed it to me, and I saw its title; The Pirate’s Own Book. I knew it well. Indeed, I now arose, and passing to my bookshelves, drew down a duplicate copy of that rare volume, recounting the deeds of the old buccaneers. The eyes of L’Olonnois widened as I laid the two side by side.

“You’ve got it, too!” he exclaimed.

I nodded.

“That explains it,” said Jean Lafitte.

“Explains what?”

“Why, how you—why now—how you could be a pirate, too, just as natural as us.”

“I have read it many a time,” said I.

“Wasn’t you never a pirate?” asked Jean Lafitte.

“No,” said I, smiling, “although many have said my father was. He was very rich.”

“Well, you can talk just like us,” said Jean Lafitte admiringly, “even if you have lost all.”

“Of course,” said I exultingly. “Why not? I think as you do. As much as you I am disgusted with the dulness of life. I, too, wish to seek my fortune. Well then, why not, John Saunders? Why not, James Henderson?”

Ah, now indeed illusion halted! Both boys, abashed, fell back in their chairs. “How did you know our names?” asked the older of the two at length.

“Nay, fear not,” said I. “I do but seek to prove my fitness to join the jolly brotherhood, good mates.”

“Aw, honest!” rejoined Jimmy; “you got to tell us how you knew.”

“Well, then, let me go on. In your book, here, I saw your father’s name, Jimmy. I know your father. He is Judge Willard Henderson of the Appellate Court in the city. I was admitted to the bar under him. He has a summer place at the lake above here, as I know, although I have never visited him there. I know your mother, too, Jimmy,—so well I should not like to cause her even a moment’s uneasiness about you.”

“Do you know my auntie, Helena Emory?” demanded Jimmy suddenly. I felt the blood surge into my face.

“Don’t misunderstand me,” I rejoined, “I only have some gift of the second sight, as I shall now prove to you. For instance, Jean Lafitte, I know your earlier name was John Saunders, although I never saw or heard of you before.”

“Well, now, how’d you know that?” demanded the elder boy.

“I did not promise to tell the secrets of my art,” I smiled. I did not tell him that I had seen the name of Saunders on the tag of a shirt somewhat soiled.

“Your father’s name was John before you,” I added at a venture. He assented, half-frightened, although I had only guessed at this, supposing John Saunders to be a somewhat continuous family name in a family of auburn Highlanders.

“He sells farm stuff at the hotel above,” I ventured. And again my guess was truth.

“You take the wagon there, sometimes, with vegetables and milk and eggs; and so you met Jimmy, here, and you went fishing together; and he told you stories out of his book. I fear, John, that your father licks you because you go fishing on Sunday. That was why you resolved to run away. You led Jimmy into that with you. Yesterday you took a boat from the lake near the hotel, and you painted her up and rigged her for a pirate ship. You rowed across the lake to the marsh where the little stream makes out—my trout-stream here. You followed that stream down, with no more trouble than ducking under a wire fence once in a while, until you came to my land, and until you saw me. You were afraid I might tell on you; and besides, you were pirates now; and so you took me prisoner. Marry, good Sirs, ’tis not the first time a prisoner has joined a pirate band!”

“That’s wonderful!” gasped Jean T. Lafitte Saunders. “And you say you have never been up to our lake!”

“No,” said I, “but I have a map, and I know my river heads in your lake, and that very probably it runs out of the low marshy side. Besides, being a boy myself, I know precisely what boys would do. Tell me, do you think I would betray two of the brotherhood?”

“You won’t give us away?” The elder pirate’s face was eager.

“On the contrary, I’ll see that you don’t get into any trouble.”

“That’s a good scout!” ejaculated he fervently, his freckled face flushing.

“We wasn’t—that is, we hadn’t—well, you see?” began Jimmy. “Maybe we’d just have camped down here and gone back to-morrow. I was afraid about taking the boat. Besides, I’ve only got about six dollars, anyhow.” He spread his wealth out upon the table before me frankly.

“Have no fear,” said I. “To-night I shall write a few letters that will clear up every trouble back home, and allow us to continue our journey to the Spanish Main.”

“Oh, will you?” cried Jimmy, much relieved. “That’ll be a good scout,” he added.

Suddenly I found myself smiling at him, I who had smiled so rarely these years, whether in the Selkirks or the Himalayas, in Uganda or here in my own little wilderness—because Helena had left me so sad.

“But if I promise, you, also, must promise in turn.”

Used as I was, already, to the astounding changes in Jimmy from boy to buccaneer and back again, I was now interested at the fell scowl which he summoned to his features, as soon as he felt relieved as to the domestic situation. “Speak, fellow!” he demanded; and folding his arms, presented so threatening a front that I saw my man Hiroshimi covertly lay hold upon a carving knife.

“Why, then, my hearties,” said I, “’tis thus. I’ll sign on as sea-lawyer and scrivener, as well as purser for the ship. Yes, I’ll sign articles and voyage with you for a week or a month, or two months, or three. I’ll provender the ship and pay all bills of libel or demurrage in any port of call; and by my fateful gift of second sight, which ye have seen well proven here to-night, not