get your checks."

As she finished speaking, Big Jack got slowly under way. Elbowing a path
through the crowd he shuffled closer, hitching at the straining
suspender to which was entrusted the task of holding in place his two
pairs of baggy canvas trousers. Shifting from one bowed knee to the
other, he contemplated his great bare toes in silence while he drew in a
deep breath which filled his huge lungs to the bursting point and caused
the muscles of his neck to stand out in purpled knots.

Dickie waited, knowing full well that it was Big Jack's invariable
preface for speech. When the big fisherman had secured enough
compression to proceed, he boomed forth in a fog-horn voice:

"Me and my fellers has decided to stick. Youse fellers can count on us
if you shoot square. We's willin' to take a chanct."

[Illustration: "Me and my fellers has decided to stick"]

His sentences were interpolated with great gusts of surplus breath. As
he finished speaking he lumbered away to rejoin his companions.

"That's the stuff, boys. It's the way I like to hear men talk. It shows
you've got the sand. Take it from me, you'll never be sorry you stuck."

She walked forward and passed familiarly among them while the Blagg
faction melted slowly away and straggled down the dock in the direction
of the town.

Gregory stood with McCoy while the excitement quieted down and Dickie
despatched the fishing-boats on their accustomed morning cruise.

"Well, I'll say you've done wonders," McCoy was saying. "Who would ever
have thought that Dick would have given in?"

Gregory nodded weakly. "I was rather surprised myself," he admitted.

McCoy looked at his watch. "I must go," he said. "It's almost time to
blow the whistle. Coming up soon?"

Gregory promised to be on hand as soon as he got his breakfast and McCoy
hurried off. When the last of her remaining men had left the dock,
Gregory noticed the girl coming toward him. Now he would learn the
reason for her sudden change of mind. He listened eagerly for the
explanation.

Dickie Lang passed a slim brown hand slowly over her forehead and
replaced a tousled lock of red-brown hair.

"Now," she said calmly, "when can you get me my men?"

CHAPTER XIV

THE MOTHER OF INVENTION

Everything was coming his way. Kenneth Gregory glanced again at his
first balance-sheet. The cannery had been in operation but a single
month and already the business was exceeding his fondest expectations.
He