“You’re right, Biff.”
“Why would he want to do that?” Li asked.
“Well, if his man could cut our line, and we were still asleep, we’d drift. Even in the slight current that runs in these waters, we’d drift half a mile or more in a very short time. Once we were out of the way, he could easily sink his own line onto the Sea Islander and establish his rights of salvage.”
The swimmer was now only ten feet from the yawl. Biff reached down and pulled out a boathook, a long pole with a hook on one end, used to grab a mooring when coming into an anchorage.
“I’m going to hook me a human fish,” he whispered.
Biff raised the boathook. He rested its hooked end on the gunnel. The swimmer was now within hooking distance. Biff shot the boathook out. It grazed the swimmer’s head. Feeling it, the swimmer dived. Biff prodded forward with the boathook. He felt it catch. The pole bent just like a fishing pole as the swimmer tried to get away.
“Got him, Dad. Got him!” Biff shouted happily.
“You sure have, Biff. You got him right by the seat of his swimming trunks. Here, let me give you a hand.”
Biff pulled the pole, with his human catch on the other end, partly into the boat. He and his father put their weight onto the in-boat end. The pole became a lever, lifting their catch out of the water.
A funnier catch Biff, his father, and Li had never seen. It was Li who started laughing first.