“Oh! do you think, then, I’ll surely need it, Jack?” asked the fat boy, trembling with joyous anticipations; for from the tenor of Jack’s words he expected that they all believed he had caught the biggest of sharks, one that would make that little porpoise of Jimmy’s look like a baby.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if you did,” Jack replied, with a reassuring nod.
Accordingly, after he had cleaned off his pannikin, and not a second sooner, Nick hunted up the rope and blocks with which they had hauled the Comfort out on skids at the time of her accident.
By a skillful use of such an apparatus, one man’s strength is made equal to that of several; and the boys had learned this fact through actual experience.
“Let us know when you expect to get busy,” called out Herb, as Nick went off with the falls.
“Yes, because we want to enjoy it all, you know, Nick,” sang out George.
Perhaps half an hour passed, with the fat boy busily engaged getting his apparatus ready. Then they heard him give a call.
“Hi! hello, there! fellers; suppose somebody starts a fire agoing for me here; that’s allowable, ain’t it, Jack?” he demanded.
“Why, of course, since it hasn’t anything to do with getting the shark ashore,” the one addressed responded, as all of them jumped up.
“I’m ready to begin yanking him in now; but it’s so pesky gloomy I ain’t able to see just right,” Nick continued. “It’d be a shame now if I lost this dandy chap just because I didn’t see how to work him.”