“And perhaps it might carry him out to sea, and lose him there!” suggested the cautious Josh.
“Well, even if he tired the fish out, it wouldn’t weigh more than a hundred pounds; so I think he’d better cut loose,” was Jack’s dictum.
Accordingly he made a megaphone out of his hands, and shouted:
“Better let him go free, Jimmy; he’ll upset you, and perhaps bite you after he gets you in the water!”
“Faith, what shall I be afther doing, then?” came back faintly.
“Cut loose! you’ve got a knife, haven’t you?” called George.
“But I’ll lose me line that way, and the hook in the bargain!” remonstrated the reluctant Irish boy.
“Well, better that than your life, or my boat,” George told him.
So poor Jimmy found himself compelled to creep forward, when the chance offered, and push the blade of the knife against the taut line. Of course it parted instantly; and he came near capsizing when the little dinky sprang up again, freed from the drag of the big fish.