"Same here. I'm worried about some o' the fleet, Bill."
"Some of 'em's gone, all right. I don't want to see another day like yesterday in a hurry, Tom."
"Nor me, Bill. A good breeze o' wind I call it, Bill."
"A damn good breeze o' wind I call it," said Bill.
"I guess by this time there's no argument 'bout it bein' a pretty good little blow," said Shorty.
We left Bill Jackson. The middle of the morning it was, a fine day, and, still hoping for fish, the Esther's lookouts were aloft. One called out something—not Fish-O!—and pointed. We looked. It was part of a drifting mast, the lower part, broken off raggedly from a foot or two above the saddle. It drifted on by.
"A white-painted saddle," said Tom Haile, looking at Shorty and me.
"The Henriette's saddles was painted white," said Shorty. "But she ain't the only vessel with white-painted saddles."
"That's right," said the Esther's crew, "she ain't."
A few minutes later a floating gasolene barrel drifted by, and soon another. Tom Haile reached out with a boat-hook and gaffed in that second barrel. There was a hole in the head of it—made by an axe. That didn't mean anything—it could have washed off the Henriette's deck, off anybody's deck. The surprise would be in a barrel staying on her deck in the shoal water she was in when we left her. Yes, that could be, agreed the Esther's crew.