“Well, folks, that day passed somehow or nuther, us takin’ spells at the hatch to put in the time. Blood he found a spare ca’tridge of Ginnell’s, and the thought came to him to scrape a hole at the foot of the hatch cover and use the ca’tridge for a blastin’ charge. The corkscrew came in handy for this, and toward night he’d got the thing fixed. ‘Now,’ says he, ‘you’ll see somethin’!’ And he up with the revolver and hit the ca’tridge a belt with the butt end, and the durned thing backfires and near blew his head off.
“After that we lit the cabin lamp and had supper and went asleep, and early next mornin’ I was woke by the noise of a boat comin’ alongside. I sat up and shook Blood, and we listened.
“Then we began to shout and bang on the hatch, and all at once the fastening went, and all at once the sun blazed on us, and next minit I was on deck, with Blood after me. Now what d’you think had let us out? I’ll give you twenty shots and lay you a dollar you don’t hit the bull’s-eye. A girl! That’s what had let us out. Dressed in white, she were, with a panama on her head and a gold watch on her wrist and white shoes on her feet and a smile on her face like the sun dazzle on water. And pretty! Well, I guess I’m no beauty-show judge, and my eyes had lit on nothin’ prettier than Ginnell since leavin’ Frisco, so I may have been out of my reckonin’ on points of beauty, but she were pretty. Lord love me, I never want to see nothin’ prettier! I let out an oath, I was that shook up at the sight of her, and Blood he hit me a drive in the back that nigh sent me into her arms, and then we settled down and explained matters.
“She was out from Avalon in a motor boat, and she’d run short of spirit and sailed up to us, thinkin’ we were at anchor. Providence! I should think so! Providence and the kelp beds, for only for them we’d have been twenty miles to the s’uth’ard, driftin’ to Hades like hutched badgers on a mill stream. We told her how Ginnell had fixed us, and she told us how the gasoline had fixed her. ‘And now,’ says she, ‘will you give me a biskit, for I’m hungry and I wants to get back to Avalon, where my poppa is waitin’ for me, and he’ll be gettin’ narvous,’ she says.
“‘Lord love you,’ says I, ‘and how do you propose to get back?’