“Reckon it’s all right,” said Dick as he shoved off.  “It’d be an awful risk to trus’ dem nice clo’es in de ole boat, suah.”

Nice clothes, nice boats, a good many other nice things, were as yet beyond the reach of Dick Lee; but he was quite likely to catch as many crabs as his more aristocratic neighbors.

As for Dabney Kinzer and his friend from the city, they were on their way to the water-side, after all, at an hour which indicated either smaller appetites than usual or greater speed at the breakfast-table.

“Plenty of boats, I should say,” remarked Ford, as he surveyed the little “landing” and its vicinity with the air of a man who had a few fleets of his own.  “All sorts.  Any of ’em fast?”

“Not many,” said Dab.  “The row-boats, big and little, have to be built so they will stand pretty rough water.”

“How are the sail-boats?”

“Same thing.  There’s Ham Morris’s yacht.”

“That?  Why, she’s as big as any in the lot.”

“Bigger; but she don’t show it.”

“Can’t we take a cruise in her?” asked Ford.

“Any time.  Ham lets me use her whenever I like.  She’s fast enough, but she’s built so she’ll stand ’most any thing.  Safe as a house if she’s handled right.”

“Handled!”

Ford Foster’s expression of face would have done honor to the Secretary of the Navy, or the Chairman of the Naval Affairs Committee in Congress, or any other perfect seaman, Noah included.  It seemed to say,—­

“As if any boat could be otherwise than well sailed, with me on board!”

Dabney, however, even while he was talking, had been hauling in from its “float and grapnel,” about ten yards out at low water, the very stanch-looking little yawl-boat that called him owner.  She was just such a boat as Mrs. Kinzer would naturally have provided for her boy,—­stout, well-made, and sensible,—­without any bad habits of upsetting or the like.  Not too large for Dabney to manage all alone, “The Jenny,” as he called her, and as her name was painted on the stern, was all the better for having two on board, and had room in her then for more.

“The inlet’s pretty narrow for a long reach through the marsh,” said Dabney, “and as crooked as a ram’s horn.  I’ll steer, and you pull, till we’re out o’ that, and then I’ll take the oars.”

“I might as well row out to the crab-grounds,” said Ford, as he pitched his coat forward, and took his seat at the oars.  “All ready?”

“Ready,” said Dab; and “The Jenny” glided gracefully away from the landing with the starting-push he gave her.

Ford Foster had had oars in his hands before, but his experience had been limited to a class of vessels different in some respects from the one he was in now.

He was short of something, at all events.  It may have been skill, or it may have been legs or discretion; but, whatever was lacking, at the third or fourth stroke the oar-blades went a little too deeply below the smooth surface of the water.  There was a vain tug, a little out of “time;” and then there was a boy on the bottom of the boat, and a pair of well-polished shoes lifted high in the air.