The boat landed on a wide, shelving, sandy beach, over which rose a line of bluffs. Hal piled ashore, followed by Sam, but Ned stayed in the stern and offered to “pay out” the net.
One end of the seine was passed to Sam, on shore; and then Joe slowly pulled away in a great circle, the seine dropping, fold after fold, into the water behind. Ned held himself ready to loosen any tangle; but there were no tangles. The net had been coiled just right, and he was not needed.
It did not take long to lay the thousand foot net, and Joe managed so well that when the circle, marked by its slender line of round corks, was complete, the boat was at the shore just below its former landing place. Weighted by lead at the bottom, and buoyed by corks at the top, the net now hung straight down from the surface, and formed a meshy wall.
Sam and Joe began to haul in, evenly and swiftly, from one end. Yard after yard the wet weave piled on the beach, and the circle gradually, but none the less surely, lessened.
“Looks like a water-haul,” commented Joe to Sam, scanning the water inside the circle for signs of prisoners.
“Humph!” replied Sam.
The line of corks was now short and near, and still there had been not a single struggle to pass them. The surface stayed placid and smiling.
“Humph!” again said Sam.
The boys did not give up, but continued to gaze hopefully. It did not seem possible that there was nothing in the net.
However, such was the case.