41 Lure O Gold 1904

"
"
My
Burden Grows Heavier
I pulled out my
watch for the fiftieth time,
and my
impatience was vast and all afire when I saw that it
was eleven o clock and the Captain had not yet hove in
sight. The passengers rearranged their baggage,
tightening the straps and cords, and walked up and
down the sand, and the crowd of beach idlers came
and went. While my one-eyed inquisitor
and his
friend were talking together and still standing near me,
the master of the lighter broke through the crowd and
appeared with a long, stout hempen
line to one end of
which was attached a white buoy about as large as my
head.
"Hitch this to yer box, son," he said, in a milder
tone than I had yet heard him use, and with a friendly
gleam in his eye which showed that he was not a bad
fellow after all.
"That s a good remarked the idea," poet, before I
had time to say a word.
"Nobody spoke to you," gruffed the lighterman.
What s it for ?
I asked, referring to the buoy.
"To
mark where yer box falls overboard."
"Overboard?"
"Yes, I mean if she should happen to go splash off
the boat," the lighterman explained.
"Better let me
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