Fatal mistake. She went--she never
returned!" In a moment he resumed in a choking voice, "After a
week's weary waiting, I was obliged to put to sea again, bearing a
broken heart and the broken bank of her father. I have never seen
her since."
"And you still love her?" asked the Amazon queen, excitedly.
"Aye, forever!"
"Noble youth. Here take the reward of thy fidelity, for know,
Bromley Chitterlings, that I am Eliza Jane. Wearied with waiting,
I embarked on a Peruvian guano ship--but it's a long story, dear."
"And altogether too thin," said the Boy Avenger, fiercely,
releasing himself from her encircling arms. "Eliza Jane's age, a
year ago, was only thirteen, and you are forty, if a day."
"True," she returned, sadly, "but I have suffered much, and time
passes rapidly, and I've grown. You would scarcely believe that
this is my own hair."
"I know not," he replied, in gloomy abstraction.
"Forgive my deceit," she returned. "If you are affianced to
another, let me at least be--a mother to you."
The Pirate Prodigy started, and tears came to his eyes.
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