“Great mackerel, if that isn’t the _Dolphin_, bitten more off than she can chew!” Grummitt said, scrutinizing the tug carefully. “I’ll hate to butt in here, because Jim Cross is a pal of mine, but I allus told him them hawsers he bought would go back on him when the pinch came.” “Is Jim Cross the skipper of the tug?” “Yes, and he’s part owner, same as I am. He bought three new hawsers this year, thinking he was getting a bargain just because they only cost him half as much as they ought to have done, but I warned him. Now I bet he’s wishing he’d paid double,” the skipper went on grimly, manœuvring his tug around all the time. “There isn’t a tug in these waters with more powerful engines than the _Dolphin_, and now Jim Cross daren’t set ’em going at full speed, because he knows he’d bust the cable. A ship that size is a tough proposition to haul along in calm weather, but when you’ve got both sea and wind running against you it takes a proper cable to stand the strain. He’s playing foxy now, going easy till the wind shifts.” By this time the _Mary Ellen_ was within hailing distance of the _Dolphin_. “Want any help?” Grummitt bawled through a megaphone. “No, thanks.” The words came back faintly, almost drowned in the gale. At the same time the _Dolphin_ began to forge ahead. “We’ll see,” commented Grummitt. For five minutes he kept going, a trifle astern of the tug, until a savage swirl of wind caught the sailing ship simultaneously with a hungry wave. The _Dolphin_ shot forward perceptibly, and Grummitt edged in nearer the Swedish ship. The cable had parted. “Slip down on deck,” Grummitt said sharply to Dave. “This ain’t going to be no picnic.” Steering with consummate skill, Grummitt brought the tug close alongside the Swede, and the boy heard fragments of a conversation between the two captains, from which he gathered that that was the second cable that had broken. A young giant stood by the rail of the _Mary Ellen_, poised ready to hurl a coiled lanyard across. It was a hazardous moment, for the slightest error in steering would have brought about a collision. At exactly the right second the rope flew out. The wind carried it aside, but some one on the sailing ship managed to grab the end. Eager hands drew the end of the _Mary Ellen’s_ finest hawser across, and a moment later the tug was moving ahead. While this operation was in progress the _Mary Ellen_ was plunging wildly, and Dave was almost knocked into the scuppers by a sea while giving a hand. He found Captain Grummitt singing a sailors’ chanty merrily when he returned to the wheel-house. The skipper had a habit of doing that when he had fought a hard battle and won. “I’m sorry for Jimmie Cross,” he said to the boy, “but he shouldn’t try to use rotten gear in a howling gale. It might have cost a pile of lives to-night.” An hour or two later they had rounded the Bluff, chugging along in comparatively smooth water, and the Swedish ship was berthed without further mishap.