es out West, if you're
caught. Like everything else, now and then it has its funny side. Once a
lobsterman lost his watch, chain and all; for a day or two he was asking
everybody he met if they'd seen it. A neighbor of his went out to pull
his own traps. In one of them he found the first man's watch, hanging by
its chain to the door, just where it had been caught and twitched out of
its owner's pocket when he had slid the trap overboard, after stealing
the lobsters in it. It was a long time before he heard the last of
that."

"Did he get his watch back?" asked Percy.

"Don't know!" replied Jim. "But if he didn't it served him right."

On the _Barracouta's_ next trip to Matinicus she brought back the
balance of Throppy's wireless outfit. It did not take him long to get
his plant in working order. Almost every evening thereafter he spent a
short time picking up messages from passing steamers and the neighboring
islands, and sending others in return. The wireless came to fill an
important place in the life of the boys on Tarpaulin, furnishing a bond
of connection between them and the outside world.

VIII

SALT-WATER GIPSIES

A few mornings after the first call of the _Calista_ Budge and Percy
were out pulling traps. Percy had told Jim plainly that he did not care
to do any more trawling. Jim had smiled and made no reply; but after
that either Throppy or Budge went out with him after hake. What the
others said in private about Percy he neither knew nor cared.

On this particular forenoon the lobster-catchers had half circled the
island. As they nosed along the northern shore Percy spied some
strange-looking floats ahead.

"There's a red buoy!" he exclaimed. "Somebody else must be fishing
here!"

Incredulously Budge glanced forward. What he saw left him sober.

"You're right! This'll be unpleasant news for Jim."

They ran up to the strange float. It was a battered wedge, painted a
faded brick color. Percy gaffed it aboard.

"What's the brand?" queried Budge.

"Hasn't any."

Lane examined it and found that Percy was correct. The wood bore no
marks to reveal its owner.

"Better haul the trap?" asked Percy.

He began heaving in on the warp.

"Stop that!" ordered Budge, sharply. "Throw it over. We don't want to
get into any scrape. We'll have to put it up to Jim this noon. He'll
know what to do."

They counted nine more of the red buoys before they reached the
northeast point of the island.

"L