"I don't want it! I don't want it!" cried Harvey. "I can't find the bu-buckle."
"Quick, Harve! He's on your line!"
Harvey sat up to unfasten the belt, facing the head that had no face under its streaming hair. "He's fast still," he whispered to Dan, who slipped out his knife and cut the line, as Harvey flung the belt far overside. The body shot down with a plop, and Dan cautiously rose to his knees, whiter than the fog.
"He come for it. He come for it. I've seen a stale one hauled up on a trawl and I didn't much care, but he come to us special."
"I wish—I wish I hadn't taken the knife. Then he'd have come on your line."
"Dunno as thet would ha' made any differ. We're both scared out o' ten years' growth. Oh, Harve, did ye see his head?"
"Did I? I'll never forget it. But look at here, Dan; it couldn't have been meant. It was only the tide."
"Tide! He come for it, Harve. Why, they sunk him six miles to south'ard o' the Fleet, an' we're two miles from where she's lyin' now. They told me he was weighted with a fathom an' a half o' chain-cable."
"Wonder what he did with the knife—up on the French coast?"
"Something bad. 'Guess he's bound to take it with him to the Judgment, an' so— What are you doin' with the fish?"