the
situation--"it then depends on what you do, each of you, and how quick
you do it."

The Cap'n walked out of the room, his hand on his breast pocket.
Colonel Ward followed, closing and unclosing his long fingers as if
his hands itched to get at that pocket.

At the first peep of dawn Cap'n Aaron Sproul was posted at the
cutter's fore windlass, eyes straight ahead on the nick in the low,
blue line of coast that marked the harbor's entrance. His air was
that of a man whose anxiety could not tolerate any post except the
forepeak. And to him there came Hiram Look with tremulous eagerness
in his voice and the weight of a secret in his soul.

"I heard him and Butts talkin' last night, Cap'n Aaron," he announced.
"It was Butts that thought of it first. The telefoam. 'Run into the
first place and grab a telefoam,' says Butts. 'Telefoam 'em at the
bank to stop payment. It will take him ten minutes to run up from
the wharf. Let him think you're right behind him. He's got to go to
the bank,' says Butts. 'He can't telefoam 'em to pay the check.'"

The Cap'n's hand dropped dispiritedly from his clutch at his pocket.

"I knowed something would stop me," he mourned. "The whole plot is
a hoodoo. There I was fired back twice onto Cod Lead! Here he is,
landin' the same time as I do! And when he stops that check it throws
it into law--and I've got the laborin'-oar."

"It ain't throwed into law yet, and you ain't got no laborin'-oar,"
cried Hiram, with a chuckle that astonished the despondent Cap'n.
"He can't telefoam!"

"Can't what?"

"Why, stayin' out in that rain-storm has give him the most jeeroosly
cold there's been sence Aunt Jerushy recommended thoroughwort tea!
It's right in his thro't, and he ain't got so much voice left as wind
blowing acrost a bottle. Can't make a sound! The bank folks ain't
goin' to take any one's say-so for him. Not against a man like you
that's got thutty thousand dollars in the same bank, and a man that
they know! By the time he got it explained to any one so that they'd
mix in, you can be at the bank and have it all done."

"Well, he ain't got cold in his legs, has he?" demanded the Cap'n,
failing to warm to Hiram's enthusiasm. "It stands jest where it has
been standin'. There ain't no reason why he can't get to that bank
as quick as I can. Yes, quicker! I ain't built up like an ostrich,
the way he is."

"Well," remarked Hiram, after a time, "a fair show and an even start
is more'n most fol