He laughed and jumped up.

“Here it is,” he said, fishing it out from a wet trousers’ pocket. 
“I was going to divide it so as to have a piece for each day. 
That’s the way people do when they’re shipwrecked, isn’t it,
Captain?”

“So they say.  Never had to come to that, myself.”

“Well, I was stuck right off.  For how did I know how many days I was going to stay on the island?  The books on shipwrecks don’t say anything about that.  I didn’t know whether to divide the chocolate into five pieces or ten,—­they’d have been pretty small, if I’d had to have made it last for ten days.  Do you think it would have kept me alive for ten days, Captain?”

“I dunno,” replied the Captain, “but I guess yer wouldn’t have stayed there so long as that.  There’ll be six foot of water on that bar before noon, so yer wouldn’t have found the settin’ quite so comfortable.  Besides, some of them sharks of yours might have et yer.”

“Well, then,” the young man returned, “it was lucky you came when you did.  The water was crowding me rather close.  And now, what shall I do?  Will you give me a lift as far as Little Duck Island?  Or if you haven’t got room enough, and I’ll be in the way, why, I’ll get in Mr. Skeels’ canoe again, and give you an exhibition of wabbling.”

He looked dismally toward the canoe, which we now had in tow behind the tender.  We all told the castaway that we would be glad to have him stay with us.

“Plenty of sleepin’ room on board,” said Captain Bannister, “an’ you said you was goin’ to Big Duck, didn’t yer?  You stay with us, and we’ll get yer there all right, tomorrer.”

“Do you know many people on Duck Island, Mr. Daddles?” asked Ed Mason.

The young man turned around.

“Where did you get that name?” he asked.

“It’s on that card on your bag.”

The owner of the bag examined the label.

“I know who put that on there,” he remarked to himself, “well, I ... why ... no, I am going to the island, I suppose, to see a Mr. Kidd.  Relation of the pirate, I hope.  He didn’t say anything about it in his letter.  Whether he was related to Captain Kidd, I mean.”

“You can find out tomorrer,” said our skipper, “now we’re headin’ for Pingree’s Beach to see if we can get a mess of clams of old man Haskell.  Then we’ll have dinner, and we can run over to the inlet at Little Duck in an hour, any time this afternoon.”

The breeze was still light, and the “Hoppergrass” made only fair progress.  Soon we were out of the river, and entering Broad Bay.  The sun was high by this time, the air cool and pleasant.  Everything seemed so clear and fresh, that it made us think the land a poor place in comparison with the water.  How hot and dusty the streets of the town must be at this same minute!  We felt sorry for the people who had to stay there.  We had only the clean white hull of the boat between us and the