Page:Raymond Spears--Diamond Tolls.djvu/191

 Gost was querulous and weak, but he did not forget and raise his voice so that other river men would hear him. His voice was hardly more than a whisper, but it was distinct, and his meaning seemed plain. He stumbled up the gang-plank and along the bank crest, leaving Urleigh who turned to getting a meal—breakfast, luncheon—he did not know what to call it. He had forgotten to wind his watch, and he did not know the time.

Already some of the shantyboats were working out into the eddy, preparing to trip on down the river. It was clear that the shantyboat town was breaking up. The merrymakers of the previous days were now going forth to make up for their play, each after his own mind. Only the lazy sports and those who need not wonder where their next meals would be found lazied there for the day after.

A motorboat steered up the eddy about an hour after Gost's departure with Gost and Macrado in it. The boat was the one in which Macrado had run into the eddy, and when the two men entered the shantyboat, Gost exclaimed in short, breathless sentences:

"Mac' here'll swap boats. He's sick of a motorboat. He don't like it. He says he'll trade cheap. I told 'im you owned this boat, and he 'lowed it'd suit him. Gasolene costs money, it does. What d'ye say? Trade? Just a hundred to boot's, all."