says to myself, sez I:

"'Pete,' I sez, 'we don't allow nothin' like that to spoil our cruise
an' keep the skipper ashore.' Now, Mignon isn't very big, an' I knew
he would git you in a day or two if you didn't go back into the forest
and hide. But I cal'lated you wouldn't want to do that, an' so I
figgered the only way to beat that lawyer was to fool him before he
got fair started on his search.

"I knowed you was in Castalia, an' so I thought your mother better get
you some clothes an' bring 'em there. I found out that Nat Burns had
taken the feller to Mis' Shannon's boardin'-house, an', knowin' that
Jimmie was livin' there, I got an idee. Jimmie's told about that
already. The feller bit, an' that was the end of him.

"But that wasn't the wust of it. I knew we had to get out the same
evenin' if we was to git out at all, so what did I do but get Bill
Rockwell here to hitch up his big double buckboard an' go out after
the five men that weren't on the job.

"He had to drive clear to Great Harbor for one, but he got back with
all hands about seven o'clock. Everybody in town was at supper, an'
didn't see us when we clumb aboard the _Lass_. When it was pitch-black
we cast off the lines, an' she drifted out on the ebb tide, which just
there runs easy a knot an' a half. Then we got up our headsails so as
to get steerage-way on her, and bless my soul if the blocks made a
creak! Might have been pullin' silk thread through a fur mitten, for
all the noise.

"I was afraid fer a minute that the flash of Swallowtail Light would
catch her topm'sts, but it didn't, and after an hour we were outside
and layin' in sixteen fathom off Big Duck. The tide there runs three
knot, and, with our headsails an' the light air o' wind, we just
managed to hold her even.

"Of course, you fellers know the rest. As soon as Jimmie landed his
passenger on Long Island he came out an' straight south to where we
was. I had told Jimmie to tell Code in the afternoon where to meet us;
and so, when it was black enough, the skipper got into his motor-dory
and came out, too.

"When they climbed aboard we got up sail and laid a southwest course
to round Nova Scoshy; an' here we are, nearin' Cape Race already, and
dummed proud of ourselves, if I do say it."

"Proud of you, Pete, you old fox," said Schofield, getting up from the
table with a sigh of immense relief. "Come on; let the second half
in."

"All right, skipper," said Pete, rising to his great he