“Hey, Ikey! what you think?” called Frenchy.  “Channel bass are running.  Whistler and Torry are going out in the Sue Bridger.  What d’you know about that?  Bridger’s let ’em have his cat for the day.  Never was known to do such a thing before,” and Frenchy chuckled.  “Oh, boy! aren’t we having things soft just now?  Want to go fishing, Ikey?” Ikey favored his friend with a sly wink, but only said crisply: 

“I don’t know about it.  I was going to wash the store windows.  Where are Whistler and Torry going?”

“As far as Blue Reef.  They say the bass are schoolin’ out there.”

“They’d better be on the lookout for subs, as far out as the Reef,” Ikey said solemnly.  “I don’t believe they’ve got this coast half patrolled.  We don’t often see one of those chasers in the cove here.”

“Mebbe we’ll catch a submarine instead of bass,” remarked Frenchy.

“You petter go along mit your friends in dot catboat, Ikey,” said Mr. Rosenmeyer, who was listening with both ears and his eyes wide open.  “If there iss one of them German submarines in dese waters idt shouldt be known yet.  Ain’t that right?”

“Yes.  We’d have to report it, Papa, to the naval authorities,” admitted Ikey seriously.

“Vell, you go right along den,” urged his father.  “Nefer mindt yet de winders.  I can get a winder washer easy.”

“Well, if you don’t mind, Papa,” said Ikey, with commendable hesitancy.

“Come along, Ikey,” urged Frenchy under his breath.  “And be sure you bring along your submarine tackle—­I mean your bass rod,” and he rolled out of the store, chuckling to himself.

“Undt take a lunch, Ikey!” cried Mr. Rosenmeyer after his son.  “Ham, undt bologna, undt cheese, undt there’s some fine dill pickles——­”

“Oh, my!” groaned his son.  “No dill pickles.”

He joined Frenchy in a few minutes with a basket crammed with things to eat, as well as his fishing tackle.  It was not far to Bridger’s float, off which the twenty-four-foot catboat, Sue Bridger, was moored.

Ikey remarked:  “Sometimes I almost faint when I see the change in papa.  He never wanted me to have a bit of fun before.  He didn’t have no fun when he was a boy.  He always worked.  That is the German way, he says.

“But he don’t have any use for anything German now—­not even the way they bring up children.”

“Ain’t it a fact?” chuckled Frenchy.  “Me mother makes the kids git up and give me the best chair when I come into the sitting room.

‘Git up out o’ that,
Ye impident brat! 
An’ let Mr. M’Ginnis sit down.’

That’s the way she treats me.  Me head’s gettin’ that swelled I couldn’t draw a watch cap down over me ears.”

The exhaust of the auxiliary engine of the catboat was spitting when Frenchy hailed their mates.  Whistler was loosening the points of the big sail while Torry worked at the engine.