human
So I called this--this dream brother of mine--'Am'zon.' These Cardhaven folks warn't likely to know whether I had a brother or not. And I made up he went to sea when he was twelve--like I told ye, my dear. Ye-as. I did hate to lie to ye, an' you just new-come here. But I'd laid my plans for a long while back just to walk out, as it were, an' let these fellers 'round here have a taste o' Cap'n Am'zon Silt that they'd begun to doubt was ever comin' to Cardhaven. An' hi-mighty! exploded Cap'n Abe, with a great laugh,
gpt
I _have_ give 'em a taste of him, I vum!
human
Oh, you have, Uncle Abram! You have! agreed Louise, and burst, into laughter herself.
gpt
It is wonderful how you did it! It is marvelous! How _could_ you?
human
Nothin' easier, when you come to think on't, replied Cap'n Abe.
gpt
I'd talked so much 'bout Cap'n Am'zon that he was a fixed idea in people's minds. I said when he come I'd go off on a v'y'ge. I'd fixed ev'rything proper for the exchange when you lit down on me, Niece Louise. Hi-mighty! grinned Cap'n Abe,
human
Oh, dear! she cried, clapping her hands together.
gpt
It's too funny for anything! How you startled Betty! Why, even Lawford Tapp was amazed at your appearance. You--you do look like an old pirate, Uncle Abram.
human
Don't I?
gpt
That awful scar along your jaw--and you so brown, said the girl.
human
How did you get that scar, Uncle Abram?
gpt
Fallin' down the cellar steps when I was a kid, said the storekeeper.
human
But these fellers think I must ha' got it through a cutlass stroke, or somethin'. Oh, I guess I've showed 'em what a real Silt should look like. Yes, sir! I cal'late I look the part of a feller that's roved the sea for sixty year or so, Niece Louise.
gpt
You do, indeed. That red bandana--and the earrings--and the mustache--and stain. Why, uncle! even to that tattooing----
human
Ye-as. That time I went away ten year ago and left Joab to run the store (and a proper mess he made of things!) I found a feller down in the South End of Boston and he fixed me up with this tattoo work for twenty-five dollars. Course, I didn't dare show it none here--kep' my sleeves down an' my throat-latch buttoned all winds and weathers. But now------
gpt
Niece Louise, I wonder if you can have any idea what this here dead-and-alive life all these years has meant to me? Lashed hard and fast to this here store, and to a stay-ashore life, when my heart an' soul was longin' to set a course for 'way across't the world? Sargasso--that's it. This was my Sargasso Sea--and I was smothered in it!
human
I think I understand, Cap'n Abe,
gpt
An' now, Louise, that I've got a taste of romance, I don't want to come back to humdrum things--no, sir! I want to keep right on bein' Cap'n Am'zon, and havin' even them old hardshells like Cap'n Joab and Washy Gallup look on me as a feller-salt.
human
But how------?