you cur, and haul me off."

"If I pull you off, Dan Hicks, will you leave that steamer
alone? You've had your chance and failed to smother it. Now let
me have a hack at her."

"It's a bargain, Jack. I'm not badly snarled; if you haul me out
to deep water I can shake the hawser loose. I'm afraid to try so
close in."

"Comin'," yelled Flaherty.

"Now, ain't that a raw deal?" Scraggs complained. "That junk
thief gets hauled off first."

"The first shall be last an' the last shall be first," Gibney
quoted piously. "Don't be a crab, Scraggs. Pray that the fog
don't lift."

Out of the fog there rose a great hubbub of engine room gongs,
the banging of the _Bodega's_ Lyle gun, and much profanity.
Presently this ceased, so Scraggs and Gibney knew Dan Hicks was
being hauled off at last. While they waited for further
developments, Scraggs sucked at his old pipe and Mr. Gibney
munched a French carrot. "If you hadn't canned McGuffey," the
latter opined, "we might have been able to back off under our own
power as soon as the tide is at flood. This delay is worryin'
me."

Following some fifteen minutes of kicking and struggling out in