oats waited until we had
disposed of our cargoes before we got really started, though a scattering
of drinks and a meeting of a chance friend sometimes precipitated an
accidental drunk.

In ways, the accidental drunks were the best. Stranger and more exciting
things happened at such times. As, for instance, the Sunday when Nelson
and French Frank and Captain Spink stole the stolen salmon boat from
Whisky Bob and Nicky the Greek. Changes had taken place in the personnel
of the oyster boats. Nelson had got into a fight with Bill Kelley on the
Annie and was carrying a bullet-hole through his left hand. Also, having
quarrelled with Clam and broken partnership, Nelson had sailed the
Reindeer, his arm in a sling, with a crew of two deep-water sailors, and
he had sailed so madly as to frighten them ashore. Such was the tale of
his recklessness they spread, that no one on the water-front would go out
with Nelson. So the Reindeer, crewless, lay across the estuary at the
sandspit. Beside her lay the Razzle Dazzle with a burned mainsail and
Scotty and me on board. Whisky Bob had fallen out with French Frank and
gone on a raid "up river" with Nicky the Greek.

The result of this raid was a brand-new Columbia River salmon boat,
stolen from an Italian fisherman. We oyster pirates were all visited by
the searching Italian, and we were convinced, from what we knew of their
movements, that Whisky Bob and Nicky the Greek were the guilty parties.
But where was the salmon boat? Hundreds of Greek and Italian fishermen,
up river and down bay, had searched every slough and tule patch for it.
When the owner despairingly offered a reward of fifty dollars, our
interest increased and the mystery deepened.

One Sunday morning old Captain Spink paid me a visit. The conversation
was confidential. He had just been fishing in his skiff in the old
Alameda ferry slip. As the tide went down, he had noticed a rope tied to
a pile under water and leading downward. In vain he had tried to heave
up what was fast on the other end. Farther along, to another pile, was a
similar rope, leading downward and unheavable. Without doubt, it was the
missing salmon boat. If we restored it to its rightful owner there was
fifty dollars in it for us. But I had queer ethical notions about honour
amongst thieves, and declined to have anything to do with the affair.

But French Frank had quarrelled with Whisky Bob, and Nelson was also an
enemy. (Poor Whi