“Tallow,” says Mark, “swim over and git that b-b-boat Plunk saw stranded. We kin m-manage to git him out of the hole!” Tallow went crashing off, and we let down the bough of a tree and pulled the man out. He was a sight. Honest, he was the muddiest, bedraggledest thing you ever saw, and he was tame. I never saw a grown man quite as tame as he was. He hadn’t any fight left in him, and all he wanted to do was to rest and get dry. We built him a fire to dry by, and by that time Tallow came back. Mark motioned to us and we sneaked off as unsuspicious as we could, taking George along. We all five went quick to the boat and got in and rowed off. “What’s the idee?” says I to Mark. “What we maroonin’ him for?” “I won’t f-feel safe till George’s sister has signed this p-paper, too,” says he, “and if he got ashore he might change his mind and spoil things somehow.” “Going to leave him there forever?” says I. “We kin git him to-night,” says he. So we rowed ashore and went into town. George was a little afraid, especially when we saw the sheriff on the street, but the sheriff just nodded to George and said, “Howdy?” so _that_ was all right. We headed straight for Miss Piggins’s, and, what with her deafness and her ambition to give George a licking with a broom for all the trouble he’d made her, we had quite a time to get her to sign the option; but she did. Then we started for the mill. None of us was very easy in our minds, and we wanted to know what had happened since we left. When we got there there wasn’t a sign of life. The mill was as shut down as if there never was and never would be any work done in it. “Now what?” says I. “Goodness knows!” says Mark. “But we’ll find out q-q-quick.” Which we did. CHAPTER XVIII Silas Doolittle Bugg was sitting on a log outside the mill, looking as if somebody had just told him the executioner was coming along to cut off both his legs with a meat-ax. He was about the most woebegone and sorrowful and downhearted-looking man I ever set eyes on. He drooped all over like a geranium that has been touched by frost. Yes, sir, he looked like all his leaves was going to fall off. “M-mornin, Silas!” says Mark. Silas just looked up and nodded and then looked down again. I was afraid he might start in to cry. “S-somethin’ wrong?” says Mark. “Everythin’,” says Silas. “For instance?” says Mark. “It hain’t no use,” says Silas. “We’re done for. We’re jest naturally up and done for.” “Maybe,” says Mark, “but what m-makes you think so?” “Men’s all quit,” says Silas. “Git more.” “Wiggamore hires ’em away as fast as I can.” “We’ll see about that. Is that all?” “All! Why, it hain’t even a start.” “What else?”