Rockman's Wharf was the center of the fishing activities of the town. To it, each day, the small fishermen came in their dories with their day's catch. From it motor boats chugged off to the bigger boats moored in the bay, some schooner was always tied to the gray piles waiting to be overhauled or to be chartered for deep sea fishing. There was always something to watch on Rockman's, or someone to talk to. The fishing folk spent their leisure hours loafing in the shadow of the long shed, smoking and talking; often the artists boldly pitched their easels and stools in everyone's way and painted a gray hull and a pink-gray sail, checkered with white patches, or a dark-skinned Portuguese bending to the task of spiking shiny cod from the bottom of a dory and throwing them to the wharf to be measured and weighed. Sidney never failed to thrill to the changing scenes that Rockman's offered. She had become, like Mart and Lavender and a score of other youngsters, a familiar figure on the old wharf. With the ease of a Cape Coder born she talked to the Portuguese fishermen and to the men who worked in the shed and to Captain Hawkes, who when he was not on the _Mabel T_ sat on a leaning pile smoking and waiting for tourists to engage him. She knew the fishermen and their boats by name and was as interested in how much old Amos Martin got for his beautiful catch as Amos himself. Rockman's knew her as "that summer gal of Achsa Green's." "She beats all for askin' questions," it agreed, smilingly. "Ain't anything misses _that_ gal!" Sidney certainly did not intend anything should. She had to make up for all the years she had not lived in Provincetown and if she watched and listened closely she might some day catch up with Mart and Lavender. She sat on the wharf late one afternoon, dangling her bare legs over its edge, and watched the sails and the circling seagulls and everything within sight and waited for Mart and Lavender to join her as they had agreed. Lavender was running an errand for Cap'n Hawkes and Mart had gone to Commercial Street for some candy. It was too early in the day for the fishermen to come in. Sidney knew that. For that reason a dory approaching Rockman's caught her eye. In it were two men, in oilskins and rubber boots. As it came near to the wharf a thickset fellow stepped out from the shed. Sidney had never noticed him before. And her eyes grew round as she observed that in place of one hand he wore an iron hook. Like a flash there came to her a confused memory of stories she had read of high piracy and buccaneers. She looked at the ugly hook and at the man and then at the approaching dory and every pulse quickened and tingled. Without moving a muscle she leapt to attention.