this shanty so," he explained, "the oar thinks it's
out on the waves again, I guess. I don't like to spoil it with nails
or strings."

"It looks very artistic," Cora declared; "but how curious that an oar
should be painted red."

"Yes, there was only one pair of them, that I know of. One went with
the wreck, and this one Len Lewis held on to. Now I'll tell you about
it."

Again he seated himself and this time started off briskly with the
tale.

"It was a raw January night--in fact, it seemed as if it had been
night all day for all the chance the sun had to get out. A howling
wind whistled and fairly shrieked at everything that didn't fly fast
enough to suit it. Len and me had been puttin' in a lot of time
together at his house, just chinnin'--there wasn't much else to do but
to keep warm. Well, along about five o'clock, we heard a rocket! The
wind died away for a minute or so, and we dashed out to the beach to
get the lay of that distress signal. Talk about big city fires!" he
digressed. "A fire on land ain't what it is on sea. It always seems
like as if death has a double power with the fire and the deep and
nothing but the sky above to fan the flame.

"We soon saw the smoke. It was from a point just over the turn, where
the clouds dip down and touch the waves. A little tail of smoke
crawled up and hung black and dirty, not gettin' any bigger nor
spreadin' much. When we sighted her, we went to work in the way men of
the sea have of working together and never sayin' a word. Up the beach
we chased, and dragged out the boat we called our 'Lifer.' It was a
good, strong fishin' boat, and we kept her ready in the rough weather.

"'Wait!' yelled Len to me, just as I was pushin' off. 'I've got a
lucky pair of oars. They're bigger and heavier than ours, and I'll
toss 'em in. We might need 'em.'

"Little I thought of the need we would have! And I always laughed at
Len's idea of luck--and me an Irishman, too."

"Mother always said grandfather was queer about such things," Freda
remarked. "I remember we had an old jug that he found on one of his
birthdays. He would never allow that jug to be thrown out; he said it
meant a jug full of good luck."

"And it, of course, was an empty jug," Cora said, with a smile.
"Perhaps that is, after all, the luckiest kind."

Denny chuckled over that remark, and added he had not much use for
jugs of any kind.

"But I'm gettin' away from my yarn," he said, presently. "We took the
bi