under way.
Then you can pay up to seventy-five cents and I'll allow you five cents
a fish commission. I don't believe he'll dare pay more than that before
late in July. If he does, why, we'll see what we can do."

MacRae went back to Squitty. He could make money with the _Blanco_ on a
five-cent commission,--if he could get the salmon within the price
limit. So for the next trip or two he contented himself with meeting
Gower's price and taking what fish came to him. The Folly Bay mustard
pots--three of them great and small--scurried here and there among the
trollers, dividing the catch with the _Bluebird_ and the _Blanco_. There
was always a mustard-pot collector in sight. The weather was getting
hot. Salmon would not keep in a troller's hold. Part of the old guard
stuck tight to MacRae. But there were new men fishing; there were
Japanese and illiterate Greeks. It was not to be expected that these men
should indulge in far-sighted calculations. But it was a trifle
disappointing to see how readily any troller would unload his catch into
a mustard pot if neither of MacRae's carriers happened to be at hand.

"Why don't you tie up your boats, Jack?" Vin asked angrily. "You know
what would happen. Gower would drop the price with a bang. You'd think
these damned idiots would know that. Yet they're feeding him fish by the
thousand. They don't appear to care a hoot whether you get any or not. I
used to think fishermen had some sense. These fellows can't see an inch
past their cursed noses. Pull off your boats for a couple of weeks and
let them get their bumps."

"What do you expect?" MacRae said lightly. "It's a scramble, and they
are acting precisely as they might be expected to act. I don't blame
them. They're under the same necessity as the rest of us--to get it
while they can. Did you think they'd sell me fish for sixty if somebody
else offered sixty-five? You know how big a nickel looks to a man who
earns it as hard as these fellows do."

"No, but they don't seem to care who gets their salmon," Vin growled.
"Even when you're paying the same, they act like they'd just as soon
Gower got 'em as you. You paid more than Folly Bay all last season. You
put all kinds of money in their pockets that you didn't have to."

"And when the pinch comes, they'll remember that," MacRae said. "You
watch, Vin. The season is young yet. Gower may beat me at this game, but
he won't make any money at it."

MacRae kept abreast of Folly Bay f