"He'll be glad to help," Scotty said. "Help how?" Steve asked. "By providing cover?" Rick nodded. "Exactly. Scotty and I will suit up, so our skins won't show at night, and have our Scuba equipment on. Harris could come by and take the runabout in tow with us in it. We would drop off near the creek entrance and push the runabout into the channel where it would be hidden. Then we would swim into the cove and recover the object. With two of us, it would be a cinch to find the fish line." "If the thing is too heavy to swim with," Scotty went on, "we'll hand it into Orvil's boat. Of course we'll pull up the sapling and hand that to Orvil. If the gadget is light, we'll swim back to the runabout with it, push the runabout away from the cove into the river, and then get aboard and come home." Rick concluded, "With Orvil's motor going, no one would hear our bubbles." Steve had followed the plan carefully. "Fair enough," he agreed. "It's a good plan. No one will see you enter the cove, and no one will see you leave. There will be only Orvil Harris catching crabs as usual." Scotty spoke up. "We could make one change, Steve. You could be with us, either in the water or in the runabout." Steve shook his head. "No thanks, Scotty. I have some business of my own later tonight. You carry out your plan and I'll carry out mine." "Is your business connected with ours?" Rick asked. "Yes, but I'm going to follow a different line of investigation. If it brings results, we'll compare notes at breakfast." "We could postpone recovery and help you tonight," Scotty suggested. Steve smiled warmly. "Thanks, but no thanks. What I have to do is for a lone hand. Rick, you phone Orvil Harris and make arrangements." Rick consulted the telephone directory and turned to Steve. "Any chance the line may be bugged?" "I doubt it. You might ask Orvil if he's on a party line, though. If he is, be careful. If not, go ahead and talk." Orvil Harris had a private line, so Rick described their adventure in the cove and asked for the crabber's help. Harris responded at once, as the boys had known he would. "I'll come by at half past three. You hook on and I'll tow you to the mouth of the creek, then you cut loose. We'll fix up the details when I see you." Rick thanked him and hung up. "All set," he reported. "But we'll get little sleep tonight." "It's only about eight," Steve pointed out. "You could go to bed right away." He managed to say it with a straight face. "We could," Scotty agreed. "But we won't. How about a little television tonight?" Steve waved a hand. "Take your pick. Medical drama, crime drama, western drama." "The purpose of television drama," Rick declared, "is to provide an escape from the real world into the world of fantasy. So no crime drama for us because that's the real world. We will watch a medical-type show." "Western," Scotty said. "Trot-trot, bang-bang."