the Lower Bay, taking Nicholas with him, and Charley and I were
left to our own resources. This meant that the Sunday fishing
would be left to itself, too, until such time as Charley's idea
happened along. I puzzled my head a good deal to find out some way
of checkmating the Greeks, as also did Charley, and we broached a
thousand expedients which on discussion proved worthless.

The fishermen, on the other hand, were in high feather, and their
boasts went up and down the river to add to our discomfiture.
Among all classes of them we became aware of a growing
insubordination. We were beaten, and they were losing respect for
us. With the loss of respect, contempt began to arise. Charley
began to be spoken of as the "olda woman," and I received my rating
as the "pee-wee kid." The situation was fast becoming unbearable,
and we knew that we should have to deliver a stunning stroke at the
Greeks in order to regain the old-time respect in which we had
stood.

Then one morning the idea came. We were down on Steamboat Wharf,
where the river steamers made their landings, and where we found a
group of amused long-shoremen and loafers listening to the hard-
luck tale of a sleepy-eyed young fellow in long sea-boots. He was
a sort of amateur fisherman, he said, fishing for the local market
of Berkeley. Now Berkeley was on the Lower Bay, thirty miles away.
On the previous night, he said, he had set his net and dozed off to
sleep in the bottom of the boat.

The next he knew it was morning, and he opened his eyes to find his
boat rubbing softly against the piles of Steamboat Wharf at
Benicia. Also he saw the river steamer Apache lying ahead of him,