"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 he,—"why don't yer let us have it?"
Mr. Daddles was perched on the cabin, swinging his bare legs over the cock-pit. The Captain was at the wheel, as usual, with his eyes fixed on the water ahead of us, part of the time, but now and then raised to look at Mr. Daddles. The latter had a serious, almost mournful expression on his face, as he told the story of the last of the pirates.
CHAPTER III
THE LAST OF THE PIRATES
"You know that a great many of the most famous pirates were really rather small potatoes. Take Captain Kidd, for instance. Why, they are still disputing whether he was a pirate or not. If he was one, he didn't take to it until late in life, and he'd been a perfectly respectable sailor up to that time. They sent him out to catch pirates, and according to one story he turned pirate himself."