The Voyage of the Hoppergrass | Page 8

there all right, tomorrer."
"Do you know many people on Duck Island, Mr. Daddles?" asked Ed Mason.
The young man turned around.
"Where did you get that name?" he asked.
"It's on that card on your bag."
The owner of the bag examined the label.
"I know who put that on there," he remarked to himself, "well, I ... why ... no, I am going to the island, I suppose, to see a Mr. Kidd. Relation of the pirate, I hope. He didn't say anything about it in his letter. Whether he was related to Captain Kidd, I mean."
"You can find out tomorrer," said our skipper, "now we're headin' for Pingree's Beach to see if we can get a mess of clams of old man Haskell. Then we'll have dinner, and we can run over to the inlet at Little Duck in an hour, any time this afternoon."
The breeze was still light, and the "Hoppergrass" made only fair progress. Soon we were out of the river, and entering Broad Bay. The sun was high by this time, the air cool and pleasant. Everything seemed so clear and fresh, that it made us think the land a poor place in comparison with the water. How hot and dusty the streets of the town must be at this same minute! We felt sorry for the people who had to stay there. We had only the clean white hull of the boat between us and the sparkling water of the bay. Toward the sky the great white sail of our boat soared up, like the wing of a giant sea gull, and we went forward as easily and smoothly as one of the gulls who were gliding through the air, and dipping to the water a few hundred yards ahead of us. The grass covered river-banks were far astern now, and the only land ahead was some low sand-dunes and beaches, hardly to be seen in the distance.
"Here goes the chocolate," said Mr. Daddles, tossing it overboard, "once it might have saved my life, but I don't care for it now. Chocolate flavored with salt-water is pretty poor stuff."
Then he commenced turning over his clothes, which were spread out in the sun on top of the cabin.
"What made yer say p'r'aps this feller named Kidd was a relation of the pirate?" asked Captain Bannister. "You'd heard 'bout Fishback Island, hadn't yer?"
"No, I never heard the name, even."
"What about Fishback Island, Captain?" asked Ed Mason.
"You never heard all them yarns, an' all that diggin' that went on over there?"
"No, I never heard of it," Ed replied, "are there pirates there?"
"Of course not," said Jimmy Toppan scornfully, "there aren't any pirates anywhere, now."
"Aren't there?" the Captain inquired. He slacked the sheet a little, and made it fast with great deliberation. "You better not be too sure of that, cos' I know where there's plenty of 'em."
"Around here?" I inquired.
Captain Bannister chuckled.
"No, not very near this place. In the China Sea."
"Have you ever seen any of them?"
"A whole junk full of 'em."
"What did they do?"
All four of us spoke at once. Mr. Daddles seemed to be as much interested as the rest of us.
"Well, they tried to ketch us. But they couldn't. That was all there was to it, then. But I see six of 'em 'bout a month later in Hong Kong."
"In Hong Kong! What were they doing there?"
"They was havin' their heads cut off, by a feller with a long sword. Anyway, I guess they was some of the same crew that chased us in the junk, cos' they was took by a man-of-war in 'bout the same place."
"How did they like having their heads cut off?" asked Mr. Daddles.
"Well, yer can't tell 'bout a Chinaman. They didn't seem to mind it much. They get used to it, yer see."
"Somehow," said Mr. Daddles, "a Chinese pirate doesn't seem like the real thing to me."
"That's so," I agreed. I came and sat down with the Captain and Ed Mason in the cock-pit. "I always think of a pirate as a man with a black beard, and--"
"A red sash around his waist," put in Ed Mason.
"All stuck full of pistols and things," added Jimmy.
"Guess that kind has all died off," said the Captain.
"All except Black Pedro," remarked Mr. Daddles.
"Never heard of HIM."
"Never HEARD of him?" This in a tone of great surprise. "You never heard of him either?" said Mr. Daddles, turning to each of us boys, one after the other. "What have your parents been doing to let you grow up in ignorance? I'll have to tell you about him,-- he's the very last of the pirates."
"Where does he hang out?" asked the Captain.
"On Rum Island or Alligator Key,--I'm not sure which. The accounts vary."
The Captain looked at Mr. Daddles in a quizzical fashion. "I guess you've got a yarn," said