.

After resting a while, and rubbing his limbs, the sufferer was able,
with the assistance of Dock, to walk home. He went to bed, and his wife
bathed his limbs, and dressed the bruises on his legs and arms.

"Shall I go for the doctor, Squire Fairfield?" asked Dock, when he had
assisted the patient into his bed.

"The doctor? No; he charges a dollar a visit," replied the old man,
fearfully; for the idea of paying a physician's bill filled him with
horror. "You say there ain't no bones broke; so I don't need no
doctor."

"He don't need no doctor," added Mrs. Fairfield.

"I don't think you do myself. I've had worse cases than this aboard my
vessel, and I got along without any doctors. You'll be all right in a
week or two, Squire Fairfield."

"It's jest my luck," sighed the miser. "Everything's goin' wrong with
me. I shouldn't be a grain surprised if the house burned down over my
head afore I got out agin. I shan't ketch no dog-fish to-day, that's
sartain. There's ten dollars out o' my pocket, as sure's you live!"

Dock was a rough comforter; but he spoke such words of consolation as
the occasion required and his vocabulary contained.

"It's jest my luck," repeated the miser. "Every other man in town might
have walked over that plank, and it wouldn't gin away. I walked over
that plank last night, and airly this morning. I see, when I stepped on
to it, that somebody had been a movin' on it; but I didn't know the
'tother eend was only just ketched on to the rock."

"Who moved it?" asked Dock, rather disturbed by this suggestion of a
suspicion.

"I don't know nothin' about it; but somebody's been a movin' on it, or
it wouldn't a gin away under me, and let me down."

"But who could have moved the plank?" persisted Dock.

"I donno; the eend I stepped on was kinder hauled up."

"You say the plank was all right in the morning, when you went down?"

"Sartin it was. I went over it, and fixed the dory, ready to go arter
dog-fish, arter breakfast."

"Well, the question is, Who has been down to the P'int since you went?"

"I donno; but I believe somebody's tryin' to kill me--that's what I
believe."

"O, nonsense! who should want to kill you?"

"I donno," replied Mr. Fairfield, hastily, and in a tone which implied
that he knew very well who intended to kill him, but he did not wish to
name the person. "If I hadn't been as tough as an old black-fish, it
would have killed me, as sure as fate; that's the whole truth