“Will you show me how, when we get back?”

“We can practise all we choose.  I’ve two pair of gloves.”

“Hurrah for that!  Ease her, Dick.  It’s blowing pretty fresh.  We’ll have a tough time tacking home against such a breeze as this.  Maybe it’ll change before night.”

“Capt’in Dab,” calmly remarked Dick, “we’s on’y a mile to run.”

“Well, what of it?”

“Is you goin’ fo’ de inlet?”

“Of course.  What else can we do?  That’s what we started for.”

“Looks kind o’ dirty, dat’s all.”

So far as Ford could see, both the sky and the water looked clean enough; but Dick was entirely right about the weather.  In fact, if Captain Dabney Kinzer had been a more experienced and prudent seaman, he would have kept “The Swallow” inside the bar that day, at any risk of Ford Foster’s good opinion.  As it was, even Dick Lee’s keen eyes hardly comprehended how threatening was the foggy haze that was lying low on the water, miles and miles away to seaward.

It was magnificently exciting fun, at all events; and “The Swallow” fully merited all that had been said in her favor.  The “mile to run” was a very short one, and it seemed to Ford Foster that the end of it would bring them up high and dry on the sandy beach of the island.

The narrow “strait” of the inlet between the bay and the ocean was hardly visible at any considerable distance.  It opened to view, however, as they drew near; and Dab Kinzer rose higher than ever in his friend’s good opinion, as the swift little vessel he was steering shot unerringly into the contracted channel.

“Ain’t we pretty near where you said we were to try for some fish?” he asked.

“Just outside there.  Get the grapnel ready, Dick.  Sharp, now!”

Sharp it was, and Ford himself lent a hand; and, in another moment, the white sails went down, jib and main; “The Swallow” was drifting along under bare poles, and Dick Lee and Ford were waiting the captain’s orders to let go the neat little anchor.

“Heave!”

Over went the iron, the hawser followed briskly.

“That’ll do, Dick:  hold her!”

Dick gave the rope a skilful turn around its “pin,” and Dab shouted,—­

“Now for some weak-fish!  It’s about three fathoms, and the tide’s near the turn.”

Alas for the uncertainty of human calculations!  The grapnel caught on the bottom, surely and firmly; but, the moment there came any strain on the seemingly stout hawser that held it, the latter parted like a thread, and “The Swallow” was all adrift!

“Somebody’s done gone cut dat rope!” shouted Dick, as he frantically pulled in the treacherous bit of hemp.

There was an anxious look on Dab Kinzer’s face for a moment.  Then he shouted,—­

“Sharp, now, boys, or we’ll be rolling in the surf in three minutes!  Haul away, Dick!  Haul with him, Ford!  Up with her!  There, that’ll give us headway.”