third of Captain Blake's vessel--a good part of her little
fortune's in the Duncan--and if anything happens to the seine
one-third of it, of course, comes out of her. And it cost a good many
hundred dollars. So you must be careful.' 'Oh, that's it?' says I.
'Then it'll be shortened sail and extra careful watches on the Lucy
till I meet Maurice, for I mustn't lose any property of Miss
Foster's.'"

We rowed away from the Lucy Foster, and I supposed that was the end of
it. But that night going on deck to take a last look at the stars
before turning in, there was the skipper and Clancy walking the break
and talking.

"And did you know, Tommie, that Miss Foster owned any of this one?"
the skipper was saying.

"No," said Tommie, "I didn't know, but----"

"But you suspected. Well, I didn't even suspect. And there's that
seine we lost last night--cost all of eight hundred dollars."

"That's what it did--a fine seine."

A few minutes later the skipper went below, and Clancy, seeing me,
said, "Hold on, Joey. Did you hear what the skipper said?"

"About Miss Foster owning a share of the vessel?"

"Well, not that so much, but about the loss of the seine?"

"Yes--why?"

"Why? Joe, but sometimes a man would think you were about ten year
old. I tell you, Joe, I'm not too sure it's going to be Withrow. And
if you don't see some driving on this one when next we get among the
fish, then--" But he didn't finish it, only clucked his tongue and
went below.

Clancy was right again. During the night the weather moderated, and in
the morning the first of the fleet to go out past the Breakwater was
the Johnnie Duncan. It looked to us as if the skipper thought the
mackerel would be all gone out of the sea before we got back to the
spot where we had struck them two days before.

XIV

A PROSPECT OF NIGHT-SEINING

We might have stayed in harbor another twenty-four hours and lost
nothing by it. It was dawn when we put out from the Delaware
Breakwater, and by dark of the same day we were back to where we had
met the big school and lost the seine two days before. And there we
hung about for another night and day waiting for the sea to flatten
out. Mackerel rarely show in rough weather, even if you could put out
a seine-boat and go after them. But I suppose that it did us no harm
to be on the ground and ready.

On the evening of the next day there was something doing. There was
still some sea on, but not enough to hurt. Al