The sale of crabs, claws, and oysters—the work of stormy days—had brought them in another hundred dollars in cash.
Adding to this the two-hundred dollar check they had just received brought the total up to five hundred and seventy-five dollars.
Deducting the two hundred dollars they owed for groceries and nets, left them the comfortable balance of three hundred and seventy-five dollars.
"That's not half bad," Charley observed, "but I think now is the time for us to quit. It will not be long now before Hunter returns and I want to be away from here before he gets back. If he succeeded in working a few more of his sly tricks on us he might put us in the hole again."
His companions were loath to leave such profitable work but they could clearly see the wisdom of his plan. So, after some discussion, they decided that the next day should see their last trip to the reef. Then they would take their departure for the East Coast and seek whatever work they could find.
This settled, they retired to dream happily of new scenes and new adventures.
Their sleep would have been less sound, perhaps, had they known that Hunter had already returned. Their dreams would have been less pleasant, if they had seen the silently propelled row boat creep into their little dock, a slinking figure groping around in the "Dixie," and, after a few minutes, the ghostly row boat departed as silently as it had come.
But they were happily unconscious of these things and slept soundly on to waken only at their accustomed hour at break of day.
Sunrise found them on the reef fishing busily. But for some reason or other they did not meet with their accustomed success. Bites came only at long and irregular intervals. They shifted frequently to fresh places but with no better result.