“Little that would matter to a couple of well seasoned old tars like me’n Jack!” declared Josh grandly.
Going into the tent Jack speedily reappeared bearing the wonderful little bag which they had so cleverly forced the thieves to drop on the preceding night, when that lively fracas occurred on the floating raft out upon the river.
Josh was already aboard the Tramp, and grinning for all he was worth, such was his satisfaction over having been chosen by the Commodore as his companion in this very important mission.
“Do we take the Marlin along with us, Jack?” he demanded.
“What for? Better leave it here for the boys to use if anything comes along,” was the reply he received, as Jack clambered aboard.
“Oh! just as you say,” remarked Josh, half reluctantly, as he handed the gun over to Andy. “Only I thought, you see, that we might happen to run across them precious rascals again, and if they tried to board us, we’d want something along to stand ’em off with.”
George laughed mockingly.
“Listen to Josh, would you?” he cried. “He’s sure going to dream of those two bad men for a whole month of Sundays. Why, they turned out to be kind of chicken-hearted after all. They gave up the bag as easy as you please, when Jack told ’em he’d send the second charge around their legs.”
“And swim!” echoed Andy. “I niver saw annything to equal the loikes in all me loife. They was crazy to ra’ch the shore, so they was.”