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t, and as Dickie Lang had said and he was beginning to find out, boats were very much like people. For some time Bronson instructed him in the proper operation of the craft. Then he slowed down and threw up the hood, disclosing two complete multi-cylindered motors. "Everything's double," he explained. "You can cut it all in or halve it as you please. And if anything goes wrong with one motor you're never hung up. You can always limp in at least." As they settled down to a good running speed, the talk gradually drifted to Mascola. "The way things are going now," Bronson observed, "it won't be long before we're building a new boat for Mascola." "What do you mean by that? Has he seen this one?" The boatman shook his head. "You needn't be afraid of that," he answered. "What I meant was that Mascola is hammering the _Fuor d'Italia_ to pieces with his trips to Diablo in that rough water." "Does Mascola go often to Diablo?" Gregory questioned quickly. Bronson shrugged his shoulders non-committally. "Can't say," he answered. "Don't know how often he goes out there. But I do know that he brags that his boat can make it in two hours and a half. Diablo's a bad place for the _Fuor d'Italia_. She's built too light to stand the gaff." The ride to Port Angeles proved all too short. Bronson was communicative in the extreme and regaled him of many evidences of Mascola's prosperity, chief among which was the Italian's recent order to a firm of Norwegian boat-builders at Port Angeles of twenty large fishing launches of the most improved pattern. These boats, according to Bronson, were of sufficient tonnage and fuel capacity to enable them to cruise far down into Mexican waters. As they rounded the light-house point and made for the breakwater, the wind increased, driving a choppy sea before it. Then it was that the _Richard_ rose to the occasion and demonstrated her natural ability to cope with a head-on sea. Arriving at the municipal docks, Gregory promised to call for the boat on the day following and hurried away to attend to his business. He had a real boat all right. Just what he wanted. Now all that remained to be done was to see the jobbers and get a few orders which he could convert into cash to pay for the _Richard_. With elastic step he set out for the wholesale district imbued with a spirit of rosy optimism. The Western was first on his list. The chances were he would have to go no farther. A sh
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