“It must have been a strange meeting between you.”
“It was.”
“Tell me all about it, Roland, my lad. What did you say to him? What did he say to you when you first met? How did he account for having two characters and two names, eh? Tell me all about it, lad.”
“I cannot. Believe me, I cannot. Oh, my old captain! My dear old captain! It wrings my heart to refuse you! I would do anything to please you, but I cannot do this which you ask.”
“I don’t understand! I don’t understand! I don’t believe I shall ever understand!” exclaimed the perplexed captain, shaking his gray head.
“Perhaps you never will in this world, but I hope that you will in the world to come, when the secrets of all hearts shall be revealed. In the meantime—oh, judge me as charitably as you can!” pleaded Roland.
“Heaven knows that I wish to do so, my dear lad! Perhaps you may answer me one more question—a last one: Why did you drop your lawful name of ‘Roland Bayard,’ and take another by which you are now known—‘Craven Cloud?’ You need not answer if you do not choose?”
“I will tell you. The life of a blockade runner——”
“Blockade runner be blowed!” angrily exclaimed the old skipper. “Pirate, you mean! You can’t blind me with—blockade runner! Not after her taking the Kitty, you can’t! Pirate, lad—pirate!”
“Just as you please! The life, I say, on such a ship is uncertain; death often tragic. I did not wish to carry an honest name through such a life, or to such a death. In a word—if those who loved me were destined to hear one Craven Cloud—blockade runner, pirate, slaver, as you please—had been taken and hanged, I did not wish them to know that I was the man. I took an alias, and I made it Craven Cloud because the name suited the case. There! that is all.”