“Afraid we’ve come in just at the end of the job,” said Joe sadly. “Likely it’s as Sam said, they’ve been melting and barreling up all this rosin, and sending it down to Mobile as soon as they had a load. We’re too late.”
Sam groaned loudly at this decision.
“Let’s have another look aboard,” Bob suggested. “Isn’t there a hold or something underneath the deck?”
They went over to the houseboat again very carefully without making any fresh discoveries beyond two rosin-caked shovels, doubtless used in clearing out the “mine.” If there was a space underneath the deck they could not find any way of getting into it; and, in fact, Joe knew that these houseboats seldom have any storage space in the hull.
Giving up hope at last, they paused on the stern deck, where they had finished their search.
“Might as well give it up, I reckon,” said Joe. “But how we’ll get home without our canoe is more than I know.”
“S’posin we turn dis boat loose,” Sam proposed. “We could float right down to Dixie Landin’, an’ dese few barrels of rosin is shorely worth somethin’.”
“No, we don’t want to steal their boat, even if they did steal our canoe,” returned Joe. “And these four barrels of rosin aren’t worth the trouble of—”
He stopped short as a distant sound struck his ear. They had all heard it at once—a dip and splash of paddles from far up the bayou above them.
“Hear dat? Dat’s Blue Bob a-comin’, Mr. Joe!” said Sam in a loud, scared whisper. “Cut dis boat loose, quick!”