Books: Scapegoat, Will-o'-the-Wisp?

CAPTAIN KIDD & HIS SKELETON ISLAND —Harold T. Wilkins—Liveright ($3).

Give a dog an ill name, says the proverb, and he'll soon be hanged. Hang a man for piracy and he'll be known as a bloody pirate to all posterity. Captain Kidd, who ended his career in a gibbet on Execution Dock, has become the legendary archetype of brutal buccaneer. Says Biographer Wilkins: poor Captain Kidd was a much-maligned man. In a 411-page examination of the contemporary documents in Kidd's case, Sleuth Wilkins sniffs the cold, obscured trail like an eager beagle. His beaglish...