“So I’ve got to beat ’em all now, have I?” he asked grimly, his jaw setting with an ugly click. “Schofield and Mallaby, and––yes––while I’m about it, Tanner, too. The old man never liked me, the girl hates me, and I wouldn’t mind giving ’em a dig along with the rest. Just to show ’em that I’m not so easy an’ peaceful as I look! But how?”
For a considerable space of time he sat there, his head low on his breast, and his eyes half closed as his brain went over scheme after scheme. The detective that Nat had brought from St. Andrew’s stuck his head down the cabin and remarked:
“Look here, captain, I want to arrest my man and get back. Why don’t you hunt up that ship and let me finish?”
“I’ve got something a lot better on hand, Durkee,” remarked Nat with a grin, rising from his chair, a plan having leaped full blown into his mind. “Just stick along with me and you’ll get your man, all right.”
He went outside and called the men in with a revolver-shot and a trawl tub run to the masthead. It was about noon when they came in, and, after eating, three o’clock passed before they had finished dressing down.
“Any of you boys run across a dory from the Night Hawk?” asked Nat as the men came inboard with their shower of fish.
“Yes,” said a youth, “I f’und one of ’em an’ he told me the Hawk’s luck was Jonahed this trip.”
“Where’s the packet lyin’?”
“About twelve mile sou’east near the edge of the Bank.”