s, lay
round more nets and run more men off the beach with his seine? Why
should he pay you six dollars when he can load up with a gang that'll do
what he says for three? Is that business?"

She paused and her lips compressed in a straight line as she went on:
"You can answer those questions just as well as I can. You know what
Mascola's game is. He thinks he's going to put me out of business. He's
trying to crowd me off the sea. What do you suppose will become of you
if he makes good? How long will you get that six dollars a day with the
Lang fleet out of commission? You've been fighting his men for a square
deal ever since you came here. And now you're figuring on helping them
run you out of your own town."

Blagg noticed that several of the men were falling back and whispering
among themselves. Scenting signs of a break among his ranks, he felt it
was up to him to say something. Well, he had his trump card yet to play.

"We ain't such fools as you think," he said. "We ain't gone at this
thing without considering pretty careful and gettin' good advice. Last
night some of us had a meetin' and talked things over. Mr. Rock was
there and he give us some mighty good advice. He says to the boys that
it was every feller for himself and----"

"Rock's got a mortgage on your house, hasn't he, Joe?"

Blagg flushed beneath his tan.

"I reckon that ain't got nothing to do with it if he has," he
challenged. "And you understand I ain't even sayin' he has. But he's a
business man."

"And a hypocrite," supplemented Dickie Lang. "Nobody knows that any
better than I. He lied to me and tried to flim-flam me out of my boats
before my dad was buried a week. If I'd fallen for it he would have had
me right where he's got you, Joe. But I didn't. And when he found out I
was going to stick to you boys, he called me a fool and said no white
man could compete against Mascola's men."

As she paused for breath, Gregory saw Tom Howard hobbling through the
crowd, speaking in low tones with the fishermen.

"One minute more and I'm through," the girl concluded. "We're up against
a hard fight here at Legonia. A fight for Americans to fish their own
waters. Sounds foolish, but you know it's the truth. When my father and
Mr. Gregory were drowned off Diablo, Mascola thought he had us beaten.
Rock thought so, too. But I'm telling you we're going to fool them both.
There's something wrong around here, boys, when we can't get a
fifty-fifty break on