expected to lose
my life, and I lived each day as though it would be my last. I was chief
rogue in a shipful of rogues, chief sinner in a hell of sinners, and yet
I had no remorse and no regret. I had done all with an honest purpose,
with the good of the sailors in my mind; and so I lived in daily touch
with death, honour, and dishonour. Yet I never saw a sailor in the
shrouds, or heard the night watch call 'All's well!' in the midst of
night and mutiny, that I did not long for a word from you that would
take away the sting of death. Those days at sea for ten long weeks were
never free from anxiety, not anxiety for myself, only for the men who
had put me where I was, had given me captain's rank, had--"

Suddenly he stopped, and took from his pocket the letter he was writing
on the very day she landed in Jamaica. He opened it and studied it for a
moment with a dark look in his face.

"This I wrote even as you were landing in Jamaica, and I knew naught of
your coming. It was an outbreak of my soul. It was the truth written to
you and for you, and yet with the feeling that you would never see it.
I was still writing it when Michael Clones came up the drive to tell me
you and your mother were here. Now, I know not what Christopher Dogan
would say of it, but I say it is amazing that in the hour you were first
come to this land I should be moved to tell you the story of my
life since I left prison; since, on receiving your letter in London,
forwarded from Dublin, I joined the navy. But here it is with all the
truth and terror in it.--Aye, there was terror, for it gave the soul of
my life to one I never thought to see again; and, if seeing, should be
compelled to do what I have done--tell her the whole truth at once and
so have it over.

"But do not think that in telling it now I repent of my secrecy. I
repent of nothing; I would not alter anything. What was to be is, and
what is has its place in the book of destiny. No, I repent nothing, yet
here now I give you this to read while still my story of the days of
which you know is in your ears. Here it is. It will tell the whole
story; for when you have read it and do understand, then we part to meet
no more as friends. You will go back to Virginia, and I will stay here.
You will forgive the unwilling wrong I have done you, but you will make
your place in life without thought of me. You will marry some one--not
worthy of you, for that could not be; but you will take to yoursel