"Where's Sammy now?" asked his grandmother, suspiciously. "'Tain't safe to leave him alone a minute. He's always pryin' into things."
"He and Michael are trying to pull a board off the dock for firewood."
That was one convenient thing about the wharf. You could live on it and use it for firewood, too, provided you were careful not to take portions on which one needed to walk. To anyone but the long-practiced Duvals, however, most of the dock presented a most uninviting surface--a dangerous one, in fact. If you stepped on the end of a plank, it was quite apt to go down like a trap-door, dropping you into the lake below. If you stepped in the middle, just as likely as not your foot would go through the decayed board. But only the long portion running east and west was really dangerous. The section between the Duvals and dry land, owing to the accumulation of cinders and soil, bound together with roots of growing plants, was fairly safe.
"Of course," said Jeanne, who sometimes wished for Patsy's sake that there were fewer holes in the wharf, "if it were a _good_ dock, we wouldn't be allowed to live on it. And if people _could_ walk on it, people _would_; and that would spoil it for us. As it is, it's just the loveliest spot in the whole world."
Mrs. Shannon had been right about Mr. Duval. He _was_ saving money. Also, it was for Jeanne; or, at least, for a purpose that closely concerned that little maiden.
What Mrs. Shannon had not guessed was the fact that Old Captain and Mr. Duval had discovered--or, rather, had been discovered by--two places willing to pay good prices for their excellent whitefish and trout. The _chef_ of a certain hotel noted for planked whitefish gave a standing order for fish of a certain size. And a certain dining-car steward, having once tasted that delicious planked fish, discovered where it was to be obtained in a raw state and, thereafter, twice a week, ordered a supply for his car.
The townspeople, moreover, liked to buy fish from Old Captain's queer shop in the end of his freight car. The third partner, Barney Turcott, whose old sailboat had been equipped with a gasoline motor, had been fortunate in his catches. Altogether, the season was proving a satisfactory one.