He found a flat piece of wood among the jetsam gathered by Roger for a fire. He sat down on a rock and pulled out a big knife. Chips of wood flew in all directions.
“What are you doing?” said Roger.
“Giving them something to catch,” said Captain Flint.
He chopped away with the knife and presently the flat piece of wood had a narrow place at one end and a big forked tail beyond it. The rest of it was shaped like a melon, only flat, with a square piece sticking up from the edge of it, like a fin.
“It’s a fish,” said Roger.
“Didn’t they say they were going to catch something?” said Captain Flint.
He carved the head of the fish, giving it big gill covers and a wide mouth and a large, round, staring eye.
“It’s a very good fish,” said Roger.
“They won’t think so when they catch it,” said Captain Flint. “Now,” he said, pulling a bit of string from his pocket, “we’ll tie their pipe to the fish’s tail, and we’ll bury them both under the stones where they hid my box. Then when they come on the lake pretending to be fishing, and land here to dig up their loot they’ll dig up the fish and find the pipe they lost; and if they put two and two together, as I expect they will, they will think that somebody was close at hand all the time and heard what they said and knows who they are and all about them, and I should think they’ll go off in a hurry, wishing they’d stayed at home.”
He hove up his box and put the fish and the pipe in the hole where the box had lain.