Epilogue

One last thing I wanted to say.

I got to read the police report on the Fratellis, and this is what happened, according to Mama.

After we jumped ship she woke up Jake and Francis and took 'em to the captain's cabin, to gloat over their find. And the first thing Mama grabbed for was the gold on the scales in front of Willy. Willy's gold.

Well, it turned out that that tipped the scales, and the side of the balance that dropped was attached to a string that pulled a clasp that set off the whole booby trap that hoisted Willy up to the wheel and knocked away the support beams in the cavern that started the cave-in that was their downfall.

So what I wanted to say was, if you try to take stuff that belongs to someone else, you don't get what you thought you were getting, you get what you ought to have got.

But if you take what someone's trying to give you while you were askin' for what you thought you wanted, you end up gettin' a lot more than you knew was there in the first place.

Willy taught me that.