Very hurriedly did the boys dress, and they would have hastened out of the house on the instant if Mrs. Mansfield had not insisted on their partaking of the breakfast which had been kept so long waiting.
"William took care of the lobsters last night, so there's no reason why you should be in such a hurry," she said when Sam attempted to explain why they should be on the pier as soon as possible. "Captain Doak won't be brought before 'Squire Kelly till nine o'clock, an' there's nothing you can do till then."
"Cap'en Doak!" Sam repeated in amazement. "Why is he to come up before the 'Squire?"
"Because he burned Uncle Ben's house, of course," the good woman replied sharply. "Do you suppose the people of the Port are going to allow him to carry on at such a rate? He will have a trial and be punished for what he has done, so William says."
This was most pleasing news to Tom, who did not hesitate to say he "hoped the old heathen" would be sent to prison for a long time; but Sam, although believing the culprit should be punished, felt sad because the man was to answer for his misdeeds.
"Oh," he said, as if trying to find some excuse for the man who had abused him so long, "he ain't anywhere near so bad when he's sober."
"Then it's time he was put where he can't be anything else," Mrs. Mansfield replied sharply. "I've been longing to have him brought up to answer for his tricks ever since your mother died. She, poor woman, the same as had the life worried out of her by that miserable creature!"
Mrs. Mansfield was not the only person in town who believed the time had come when Captain Doak should be put where he could not give way to his appetite and his temper, as the boys learned when they went out on the street after having eaten what Tom declared was "the breakfast of their lives."
The townspeople were determined that Uncle Ben's family should not longer be exposed to the vicious whims of Eliakim Doak, and the testimony of Sam and Tom, who saw him pulling away from the island shortly after the shanty had been set on fire, was sufficient to convict.
The result of the fire was that the former owner of the "Sally D." received a sentence of ninety days in the county jail, in addition to paying a fine of two hundred dollars; but it was understood that if he left town at once the sentence would not be carried into effect until he showed himself again in the state.