Just before dawn, the mournful sound of a conch shell, blown by the capacious lunged Jerry, aroused Bob, Tom and Mac, and the camp boys tumbled out just in time to give a welcome to the Three Sisters pushing the spray aside and headed for the cove.

When the schooner’s freight had been “toted” ashore, a rousing fire was made to limber up the stiffened cruisers, and then, the dew still sparkling on the waxen palmetto scrub, all hands turned in to prepare breakfast. This over, and it was yet hardly full sun up, hasty preparations were made for the first day’s program—an excursion out on the gulf for deep sea fish—tarpon, if luck ran with them.

Hal alone remained behind. With a box of food and a pot of cold coffee, the remainder of the party was off for the home of the grande écaille, or the silver king of all game fishes.

As a result of their recent good fortune, each boy had new and special tackle, split bamboo rods about eight feet long, with large multiplying[214] click reels that would hold two hundred yards of stout linen line. For a half hour before starting, Jerry had been busy catching mullet with a hand line, and his efforts gave the fishermen a bucket of bait.

Sailing southward to the “wash” between Greater Anclote and its Keys, Captain Joe headed for the outer Keys. Just beyond these, in anchorage, the sails were dropped, and, the Three Sisters sleepily riding the gentle gulf swell, the eager fishermen began operations.

Baiting their hooks with mullets, Mac on one side of the boat and Tom on the other, the young sportsmen cast their bait as far out as possible, let it sink to the bottom, and then began the long wait.

“I reckon they bite accordin’ to their size,” remarked Bob, after a quarter of an hour’s unfruitful interval.

“Never you mind,” retorted Tom. “Real Tarpon fishermen wait a week sometimes.”

“An’ then don’t get nothin’,” added Mac.

“I could get a bucket of perch up on Lake Michigan in this time,” yawned Bob.

The two fishermen sneered in disdain.

“Just you wait,” exclaimed Tom. “If we do[215] have any luck, this old boat’ll be the busiest place you evah saw fo’ a few hours.”

“A few hours?” shouted Bob. “And we’ve got to sit here suckin’ our thumbs all that time? Not on your life. I’ll take a snooze.”

Jerry followed his example. Twice, while the two idle boys slept, curled up in the vacant cockpit with a loose sail stretched to ward off the sun, Captain Joe hoisted anchor, and, with the jib, changed the position of the schooner searching for a possible school. Suddenly, about eleven o’clock, Tom had a strike.

For an instant, he was in doubt. Then the unmistakable leap, with its shower of silvery spray, left no question. As his line disappeared and Tom’s reel began to hum, there was swift action on deck. Captain Joe sprang to the main sail and yelled for Jerry. Mac reeled in his line with speed and then tumbled aft to the wheel.

In the excitement, Bob and Jerry appeared. All sail was made, and the chase of the silver king was on.

“Haul in on him—haul in,” shouted Bob.

“Go suck your thumb,” said Tom.

“Shoot him,” yelled Bob. “He’ll jump off the hook. Lemme help.”
 
“Go on, finish your snooze,” laughed Tom. “Keep away. This is my fish.”

“They’re bitin’, Mac,” continued Bob, growing more and more excited. “Where’s your pole? Lemme have it? I can get one, I’ll bet.”

Mac, laughing, explained that the etiquette of tarpon fishing demanded that when a fish is hooked, boats and other fishermen near by shall up anchor and keep out of the way. Bob, charged with excitement, forgot all about “sucking his thumb” or snoozing. As Captain Joe and Mac manoeuvred the boat in pursuit of the darting, struggling fish, and Jerry stood near the perspiring Tom with a gaff handy, Bob hung over the rail or ran back and forth, eager to assist and finding nothing to do. It was Tom’s first “silver scale,” but all his angling skill on Perdido waters led up to this supreme combat. Despite his thumb stall, the sizzling wet line soon wore through the skin of his thumb, but he gave no heed. At one point, after a moment’s quiet, the desperate fish made a sudden dash and leap. Tom’s reel went off like an explosion. The handle caught the boy’s thumb with a glancing blow, and, like a knife, snipped the skin off his knuckle.
 
Instantly, the blood welled out over his hand, mixed with the salt water running down his bared arm and then reddened his shirt.

Bob sprang forward with his handkerchief.

“Keep away from me,” shouted Tom. “This is my fish, and I’m goin’ to land him.”

“Yo’ all’s bleedin’ to def,” panted Jerry. Mac and Captain Joe smiled. They knew that only death itself could come between a real tarpon fisher and his prize.

“Keep those kids off me, Mac,” savagely exclaimed Tom. “Put ’em in the hold.”

At a quarter to one o’clock, the battle was over. The sails were dropped again, and Captain Joe, not Jerry, sank the gaff into the conquered fish. As Tom’s rod and reel dropped on the deck and the exhausted boy fell backwards, four willing pairs of arms pulled his victim into the boat. It was six feet, seven inches long, and weighed one hundred and fifty-three pounds.

A shot in the spinal column, and the monster fish was dead. With its last flop, the panting Tom crawled to its side and pulled off one of its largest and most brilliant scales.

“Help yourselves, boys,” he said, his face[218] aglow with the pride of conquest. “Get a few souvenirs, and then throw him overboard.”

“Not much,” protested Mac. “That fish is goin’ in to Tarpon Springs to be weighed and registered. He’s a record fish.”

“Throw him overboard?” almost shrieked Bob. “What do you mean? Aren’t we goin’ to keep him?”

“Why keep him?” laughed Tom. “He ain’t fit to eat. Take a couple of scales. That’s all you can do with a tarpon, except to lick him.”

But Mac’s proposal was carried out. The schooner was headed shoreward. The chase had carried the boat five or six miles seaward, and the Keys were just in sight.

Hal, in the camp, had a long day of it. Awake by midday, he immediately began the work assigned him in carrying out the brilliant idea conceived by Bob the evening before, one of the reasons he had remained ashore. Securing a piece of light colored wrapping paper, he charred the edges of it until it was about a foot square. Then, after prolonged search, he found a red pasteboard box which he soaked in water until he had some carmine fluid. With this and a stick, he laboriously inscribed something on the charred sheet.
 
This done, he took a small wooden box, placed a lemon in it, and then carried the box to Oak Tree Point. Here, he stepped off a certain number of paces in line with the trees and digging a hole in the sand about three feet deep, deposited in it the box and the lemon.

It was six o’clock when the Three Sisters reached the cove again. The tale of the battle with the tarpon came first, and then the evening meal. It was well after eight o’clock when Bob, lighting a candle, asked Jerry to follow him into the tent.

“Jerry,” began Bob, solemnly, “I suppose you know the time’s up.”

“Yo’ mean dat ole colored pirate’s papah?” asked Jerry, nervously.

“I certainly do,” said Bob positively. “But I know you didn’t find it. Jerry, you lied to me. You told me you wrote what the Black Pirate said on regular paper. You didn’t!”

“No, sah. Ah tole de truff. It was reg’lah papah—writin’ papah.”

“And you lost it?”

“Mistah Bob, Ah been sarchin’ ever’whar. Ah cain’t fin’ hide nur hair o’ dat writin’.”

“We’ll take you over to the mainland in the morning and leave you,” said Bob decisively.[220] “You’ll have to get home the best way you can—walk, I reckon.”

Jerry’s mouth curved, and he began to whimper.

“That is,” went on Bob, “unless you confess you were telling a story.”

“No, sah, Mistah Bob, no sah. Dat ole colored pirate he shore ’peared to me prezackly like I tole you. Ah ain’t tell no lie.”

“Well,” announced Bob, “we won’t believe it unless you show the paper. Off you go in the morning—no airship for you, and no more camp.”

Jerry’s whimper turned into a sob. But at that moment, Tom and Hal, who had been listening, rushed into the tent.

“What’s this mean?” began Hal holding out the charred paper. “Here’s a paper with something on it in blood.” Jerry’s sobs stop............