"To hold the mussels as we get 'em out. Let the meat and juice drop in here. Then we'll examine the whole thing several times for results. And don't forget, both Toby and Bandy-legs made us promise to have a mess of these same fresh-water clams cooked for supper."
So, taking the vessel and the much-used oyster knife, Max squatted on the ground tailor fashion alongside the pile of shellfish.
Both of them set to work, Max calmly, as was his wont, but Steve showing the greatest nervousness.
Finding that his method of trying to open the stubborn bivalves was awkward, as they could not be handled like oysters, Max took a second knife. Placing the mussel in an upright position he would drive the blade down between the two shells by giving it several sharp taps with a piece of wood. When the stubborn mussel finally yielded to this treatment Max was able to turn back one shell, and then scrape out the entire contents of the other.
A dozen had been opened presently, and so far as they could see, there was not a sign of a pearl, large or small.
Steve's disappointment made itself manifest in the look that gradually crept over his face.
"Guess we've drawn a blank this time, Max," he remarked, when the seventeenth bivalve failed to yield up any gleaming little milk-white prize.
"Oh! that isn't a dead sure thing," replied the other, never ready to yield his hopeful spirit, "this is a lottery, you know. The pearls are to be found. We know that, Steve, by our first success. If not in this lot, perhaps in what our chums bring later. There are other days to follow; and we're bound to put in a week trying our luck."
That was the sort of talk to buoy up Steve's spirits. He was always an impulsive chap, and had often been called "Touch-and-Go Steve," because of his quick temper. It had many times carried him into serious trouble, though, as is usually the case with these impetuous fellows, Steve always quickly repented of his wrath, and was apt to apologize.
"Here goes for the eighteenth," he remarked, picking up another mussel, and setting to work industriously.