“Yes, but he isn’t there now.  My aunt was there for a while, but she went away, about two weeks ago.  The house is closed, I suppose.”

Jimmy, who had been looking toward the shore, turned to the Captain.

“This is Pingree’s, isn’t it, Captain?”

“Yessir; this is Pingree’s Beach.  Two of yer better go ashore an’ see old man Haskell.  That’s his shanty,—­the one with the red door.  Ask him to let yer have a basket of clams.  Tell him I sent yer.”

Pingree’s Beach was a short strip of sand, bordered with eel-grass.  There were two small cottages, set above high-water mark, three dories drawn up on the shore, and a heap of lobster-pots and nets.  Mr. Haskell could be seen moving in and out of his shanty.

Jimmy Toppan and Mr. Daddles went for the clams, after the latter had changed his bathing-suit for a shirt, and a pair of duck trousers.  Captain Bannister sailed the “Hoppergrass” quarter of a mile below the beach, put about, and came back in time to pick them up when they returned in the tender.  Mr. Daddles was interested in the idea of a clam-chowder.  He had already noticed the funny little noise which the clams made, as their shells opened and shut.

“It seems rather hard-hearted to make them into a soup,” he observed, “when they sing all the time like that.”

The Captain was not troubled by the song of the clams, however.

“Here, Jimmy,” he said, “you take the wheel while I shuck them clams.”

“Do what to ’em?” asked Mr. Daddles.

“Shuck ’em,” the Captain replied.

Mr. Daddles still looked puzzled.

“Take ’em out of the shells,” explained Jimmy.

While the Captain worked over the clams, he had an oil-stove lighted down in the cabin, and he tried out some pork.  Ed Mason hunted up a pail of fresh milk and some crackers, while I washed and peeled the potatoes.  In about half an hour the dinner was ready.  The Captain brought up the steaming kettle of chowder, and from it we filled our bowls.  We also had coffee and bread and butter, and some of the mince turnovers which Ed Mason had brought.  Then we remembered the water-melon.

“Don’t think ’twill give yer the stomach-ache, do yer?” asked the Captain, as he prepared to cut the melon.  “You remember how it killed one of them Black Pedros, don’t yer?”

We all voted that it could not possibly give us the stomach-ache.  And it didn’t.  Then we drew lots to see who would have the unpleasant job of washing the dishes.  Ed Mason and I lost, and retired below to do the work.  We could hear them talking on deck.  Jimmy was still at the wheel; the Captain and Mr. Daddles lighted their pipes.

“I thought, when yer begun to talk ’bout pirates,” said Captain Bannister, “that yer meant something ‘bout the diggin’ for treasure on Fishback Island.”

“No; I never heard of it.”

“Why, they’ve been diggin’ an’ blastin’ there for years.  Some folks was doin’ it when my father was a boy.  He had a try at it, an’ so did I, one summer ’bout nine or ten year ago.”