Investigation with a stick showed the gasoline tank to be still rather more than three quarters full, but since, by this time, the proprietor of the station was peering inquiringly down at them, Pud decided to purchase just the same. ‘_Jolly Rodger_, eh?’ said the man as he handed the nozzle of the hose down to them. ‘What are you, pirates?’ Pud laughed evasively, but Harmon assented proudly. ‘Yes, sir, we sure is! We’s bloody pirates, Mister!’ ‘You look it!’ laughed the man. ‘Well, better not let the police see you, that’s all I’ve got to say! How much do you want?’ Pud was very glad that he had yielded to Tim that morning and consented to the removal of the skull-and-cross-bones at the stern! Suppose the police did see them and begin to ask questions! Suppose the man who had owned that chicken had sent word about its disappearance! He was mightily relieved when the gasoline was in and paid for, the cap screwed back on the tank, and the launch was again shoving her nose toward the bridge. His desire now was to leave Livermore behind and once more reach the open spaces. The others seemed not to share his uneasiness. They were craning their heads to see the bridge. Pud, back at the wheel, didn’t have much time for sight-seeing, for the river held much traffic and he was kept busy. When they were directly under the bridge, which seemed an immeasurable height above them, but was probably no more than thirty feet, a trolley car rumbled across and Harmon’s upturned face went two shades lighter. And when, at the same moment, from close by a mill whistle proclaimed five o’clock with a sudden and deafening shriek, poor Harmon nearly turned white! ‘_My golly!_’ he yelled. ‘_What’s ’at?_’ Beyond the bridge and the press of river traffic, Tim returned to a former subject of conversation. ‘Say, Pud, why don’t you go and see your aunt? I should think you’d want to.’ ‘Huh? Oh, gee, she――she’s awful sort of stern, Tim. I would go and see her only she lives quite a ways back.’ ‘I guess she’d be pretty hurt if she found out you’d been here and didn’t call on her,’ said Tim. ‘Well――’ ‘And I guess she’d be likely to ask you to supper, wouldn’t she? I and Harmon wouldn’t mind if you went, Pud.’ ‘Yes, she’d ask me to supper, of course, but――’ ‘I guess you’d have a better supper than you would if you had what we have, eh? Preserves, probably, and cake.’ ‘Yes, she feeds a fellow great,’ acknowledged Pud, a trifle wistfully. ‘But I wouldn’t go and have supper with her and leave you and Harmon――Say!’ Pud was struck by a thought that had occurred to his chum long since. ‘Say, why don’t we all go?’ ‘Oh, well, maybe she wouldn’t like it if I and Harmon were to butt in,’ replied Tim doubtfully. ‘She doesn’t know us.’