land, hung another smudge, gradually pushing its way like a writhing,
black serpent, lakewards. Thus I was rudely jerked back to face the
problem with which we had left the island that morning.

I snatched the neglected glasses from the deck and hurried aft to join my
client on the overhang, but a pipe was all they revealed above the bleak
hillocks of sand. My client turned to me with a face that was white
under the tan.

"Crocker," he cried, in a tragic voice, "it's a blessed police boat, or I
never picked a winner."

"Nonsense," I said; "other boats smoke beside police boats. The lake is
full of tugs."

I was a little nettled at having been scared for a molehill.

"But I know it, sure as hell," he insisted.

"You know nothing about it, and won't for an hour. What's a pipe and a
trail of smoke?"

He laid a hand on my shoulder, and I felt it tremble.

"Why do you suppose I came out?" he demanded solemnly.

"You were probably losing," I said.

"I was winning."