sudden, and now that I'm in I'm willing to give up a little time and
effort to start 'em off. I haven't much of anything else to do just
now," he added, bitterly.

"Come into my back office," invited Mr. Rowley.

"Much obleeged--we'll do so," said Captain Candage. "You're a bright
man, Rowley, and I knowed you'd see the p'int when it was put up to you
right and polite."

The business in the back office was soon settled satisfactorily, and
a busy day followed on the heels of that momentous morning. When night
fell the men, women, and children whom a benevolent state--through its
"straight-business" agent--had turned loose upon the world to shift for
themselves, were located in a single colony in the spacious fish-house.

A few second-hand stoves, hired from Rowley, served to cook the food
bought from Rowley, and the families grouped themselves in rooms and
behind partitions and arranged the poor belongings they had salvaged
from their homes. Even the citizen who had at first resolved to go
floating on the bosom of the deep joined the colony.

"It's more sociable," he explained, "and my wife don't like to give up
her neighbors. Furthermore, I know the whole bunch, root and branch,
whims, notions, and all, and they can't fool me. I'll help boss 'em!" He
became a lieutenant of value.

This community life under a better roof than had ever sheltered them
before in their lives seemed to delight the refugees. Old and young,
they enjoyed the new surroundings with the zest of children. They had
never taken thought of the morrow in their existence on Hue and Cry.
Given food and shelter in this new abode, they did not worry about
the problems of the future. They roamed about their domain with the
satisfaction of princes in a palace. They did not show any curiosity
regarding what was to be done with them. They did not ask Captain Mayo
and his associates any questions. They surveyed him with a dumb and
sort of canine thankfulness when he moved among them. He himself tried
questions on a few of the more intelligent men, hoping that they would
show some initiative. They told him with bland serenity that they would
leave it all to him.

"But what are you going to do for yourselves?"

"Just what you say. You're the boss. Show us the job!"

It was borne in upon him that he had taken a larger contract than he had
planned on. Rowley and the taxpayers on the main looked to him on one
side, and his dependents on the other.

"It se