(So, then, my reputation was advancing!)
“Wasn’t you never a pirate before, honest?” queried Lafitte at this juncture. “Because, you seem like a real pirate to us. We been, lots of times, over on the lake.”
“It may be because my father was always called a pirate,” I replied. “You see, in these days, there are not so many pirates who really scuttle ships and cut throats.”
“But you would?”
“Certainly. ’Tis in my blood, my bold shipmate.”
“We knew it,” concluded L’Olonnois calmly. “So, after now, we’ll call you Black Bart. You can let your whiskers grow, you know.”
“True,” said I. “Well, we will at least take the whiskers under advisement, as the court would say.”
“We must be an awful long ways from home,” ventured L’Olonnois, after a time.
“Hundreds of miles our good ship has ploughed the deep, and as yet has raised no sail above the horizon,” I admitted.
“Do you—now—do you—well, anyhow, do you have any idea of where we are going?” demanded Lafitte, shamefacedly.