Tish made her usual preparations for our new rôle. She at once sent to Bar Harbor for a pair of field glasses, and oiled and loaded her revolver.
“Not that I mean to shoot them,” she said, “but a well-placed shot or two can wreck their engine. In that case all we shall have to do is to tow them in.”
She procured also a good towing rope for this purpose, and spent her odd time the next day or two shooting at a floating target in the water. Unfortunately, the fact that a bullet will travel over the water like a skipping stone escaped her, and our next-door neighbor, who was just hauling in the largest halibut of the season, had the misfortune to have his line cut in half and of seeing the halibut escape.
On the other hand, her resolution was strengthened by a letter from Charlie Sands, her nephew, which showed the moral deterioration being fostered by these wretched liquor smugglers.
“Dear Aunt Tish,” he wrote. “It has just occurred to me that you are near the Canadian border. Scotch ought to be good and also cheap there. Why not fill a hot-water bag or two for me? Even a bottle or two would not come amiss, and if you are nervous on the train I suggest the space outside your ventilator in the drawing-room.”
Tish’s indignation was intense. She wrote him a very sharp letter, informing him that she was now in the government service. “If the worst comes,” she said, “I shall not hesitate to arrest my own family. No Carberry has been jailed yet for breaking the nation’s laws, but it is not too late to begin.”
It may have been pure coincidence, but Lily May ordered a hot-water bag from the mainland soon after that. She said her feet got cold at night.
I must confess Lily May puzzled us at that time. She would not go fishing, but stayed at home and insulted poor Christopher. She claimed that he spent most of his time at the woodpile smoking cigarettes, and so she would go out and watch him. Hannah said that her manner to him was really overbearing, and that she believed she said quite insulting things to him under her breath.
She counted the wood he cut too. Once Hannah heard her say, “Twice two fifty is five hundred. You’ve still five hundred to go.”
And he groaned and said, “It’s the h—— of a long way yet.”