Chick, in the rôle of a street laborer, had accompanied Nick Carter to the house on L Street. From a monster elm he had seen Mrs. Mannion emerge from the back door of Craven's house with a small bundle under her arm, which, he rightly judged, contained eatables. Looking neither to right nor left, she hurried to the first corner, turned south, and almost flew along the sidewalk. Chick followed, using all the precautions of an expert shadower. Going through lanes and private grounds, she at last reached the river shore. Chick, by a detour and making lightning time, arrived at a point near the water several hundred yards in advance of his beautiful quarry. Looking up-and down-stream without showing himself to the woman, he saw that there was but one boat between her and the first bridge, and that was not far beyond the point where he stood, and within a short distance of the river approaches to the navy-yard. Intuitively Chick knew that Mannion's wife was looking for a boat, and this one he had no sooner discovered than he made a run for it, using the bushes along the shore as a screen for his body. Reaching it, he saw it was a punt, and that it was half-filled with water. With an old tin can found on the shore he was busily engaged in bailing out the punt, when Mrs. Mannion, flushed and anxious-eyed, came up to him. Chick did not turn his head at her approach, though out of the corner of his eye he saw her coming. She stopped and spoke. "Is this your punt?" "Sure, miss," was the response, in a rough voice, but with a kindly intonation. "I wish to get across the river. I live beyond the point, and some one has stolen my own boat. Can I engage you to paddle me over? I will pay you half a dollar." "That's like finding money, miss," said Chick, looking into her face with a broad smile. "But, as I need some coin of the realm, I'll close with your offer, and thank you kindly for making it. Get right in, and away we'll go." Nick's assistant was no novice at boat-work. He was as much at home on the water as on land. Swiftly and dexterously he paddled across the Potomac's east branch, landing, as directed by his fair employer, a quarter of a mile below the point in the direction of Uniontown. On the way Chick asked a question: "What kind of a boat is the stolen one?" "Something odd for these parts. It's a batteau which my father brought from Vermont." "Isn't that it over there?" pointing to a flat, sharpnosed, square-sterned boat on the shore toward which they were proceeding. She looked, and, without showing any surprise, said: "Yes, that is the one." And now Chick was convinced that Mannion had used the batteau, and that his wife was on the way to find him.