"What ho! Jean Lafitte," said I at length, rousing myself from the old
habit of reverie, of which I had chiefest dread; "and you, Henri
L'Olonnois, scourges of the main, both of you, listen! I have a plan
to put before you, my hearties."
"Say on, Sirrah!" rejoined the younger pirate, so promptly and so
gravely that again I had much to do to refrain from sudden mirth.
"Why then, look ye," I continued. "The sun is sinking beneath the
wave, and the good ship rides steady at her anchor. Meantime men must
eat! and yonder castle amid the forest offers booty. What say ye if we
pass within the wood, and see what we may find of worth to souls bold
as ours?"
"'Tis well!" answered L'Olonnois; and I could see assent in Lafitte's
eyes. In truth I could discover no great preparations for a long
voyage in the open hold of the Sea Rover, and doubted not that both
captain and crew by this time were hungry. Odd crumbs of crackers and
an empty sardine can might be all very well at the edge of the
village of Pausaukee (I judged they could have come no greater
distance, some twelve or fifteen miles); but they do not serve for so
long a journey as lies between Pausaukee and the Spanish Main.
They rose as I did, and we passed beyond the clump of tall birches,
along the edge of my mowing meadow, and through the gate which closes
my woodland path--to me the loveliest of all wood-trails, so gentle
and so silent is it always, and so fringed, seasonably, with ferns and
flowers. Thus, presently, we saw the blue smoke rising above my lodge,
betokening to me that my Japanese factotum, Hiroshimi, now had my
dinner under way.
To me, it was my customary abode, my home these three years; but they
beside me saw not the rambling expanse of my leisurely log mansion.
They noted not the overhanging gables, the lattices of native wood. To
them, yonder lay a castle in a foreign land. Here was moat and wall,
then a portcullis, and gratings warded these narrow portals against
fire of musketoon. My pet swallows' nest, demure above my door, to
them offered the aspect of a culverin's mouth; and, as now, I made my
customary approach-call, by which I heralded my return from any
excursion on the stream of an evening, I could swear these invaders
looked for naught less than a swarm of archers springing to the
walls, and the hoarse answer of my men-at-arms back of each guarded
portal. Such is the power of youthful dreaming, such the residuary
heritage of days of high emprise, when life was full of blood and wine
and love, and savored not so wholly of dull commonplace!