"Tell you what!" exclaimed Jim as he looked at his compass and headed the Barracouta westward through the fog for home, "we'll put the trawl in the house for a few days, and fit up for swordfishing. There's a good ground fifteen miles south of the island. I've been down there with Uncle Tom. If we could get some fair-sized fish, it'd be worth our while to take 'em into Rockland."
That afternoon they mustered their swordfish gear. In the house were three or four of the wrecked coaster's mast-hoops. One of these Jim lashed to the sloop's jibstay, about waist-high above the end of the bowsprit.
"That'll do for the pulpit!"
Near the jaws of the gaff he nailed a little board seat, rigged like a bracket on a roof for shingling. On this the lookout could sit, his arm round the mast, watching for fins.
"Now for a harpoon!"
Across the rafters inside the house lay a hard-pine pole eighteen feet long, ending in a tapering two-foot iron. Strung on a fish-line hanging from a spike were a half-dozen swordfish darts. These were sharp, stubby metal arrows, all head and tail and no body, with a socket cast on one side to admit the top of the pole-iron. Back of the arrow-head was a hole, through which was fastened the buoy-line.
"Righto!" exclaimed Jim. "Now when the fog clears we'll be ready to do business."
That very night the mists scaled away before a brisk north wind. Morning showed the sea clear for miles, though a fleecy haze still blurred the southern and eastern horizon.
"We'll take this chance," decided Jim. "May not get a better. Remember it's dog-days!"
At five o'clock they started south. Before eight they were on the swordfish-grounds. The wind, blowing against the long ocean swell, raised a fairly heavy sea. Though the day was clear, they could still feel the fog in the air.