Dorothy on a House Boat. Raymond Evelyn
find out how much or little you know about that engine.”
Jim laughed. Nobody could be offended with happy Dorothy that day, and he was soon deep in exploration of his new charge; his pride in his ability to handle such a perfect bit of machinery increasing every moment.
When they returned from the tender to the main saloon they found it empty and in order. Everything was as shipshape as possible, the young Blanks having proudly demonstrated their father’s skill in arrangement, and then quietly departing. Gerald’s whispered announcement to his sister had secured her prompt help in breaking up their tea-party, and she now felt as ashamed of the affair as he had been.
At last, even Jim was willing to leave the Water Lily, reminded by hunger that he’d eaten nothing since his early breakfast; and returning the grateful Elsa to her father’s care, he and Dorothy walked swiftly down the pier to the car line beyond, to take the first car which came. It was full of workmen returning from the factories beyond and for a time Dorothy found no seat, while Jim went far forward and Ephraim remained on the rear platform, whence, by peering through the back window, he could still keep a watchful eye over his beloved “li’l miss.”
Somebody left the car and he saw the girl pushed into a vacant place beside a rough, seafaring man with crutches, and poorly clad. He resented the “old codger’s” nearness to his dainty darling and his talking to her. Next he saw that the talk was mostly on Dorothy’s side and that when the cripple presently left the car it was with a cordial handshake of his little lady, and a smiling good-bye from her. Then the “codger” limped to the street and Ephraim looked after him curiously. Little did he guess how much he would yet owe that vagrant.
CHAPTER III
THE DIFFICULTIES OF GETTING UNDER WAY
How that week flew! How busy was everybody concerned in the cruise of the wonderful Water Lily!
Early on the morning after his arrival, Jim Barlow repaired to Halcyon Point, taking an expert engineer with him, as Aunt Betty had insisted, and from that time till the Water Lily sailed he spent every moment of his waking hours in studying his engine and its management. At the end he felt fully competent to handle it safely and was as impatient as Dorothy herself to be off; and, at last, here they all were waiting on the little pier for the word of command or, as it appeared, for one tardy arrival.
From her own comfortable steamer-chair, Aunt Betty watched the gathering of the company and wondered if anybody except Dolly could have collected such a peculiar lot of contrasts. But the girl was already “calling the roll” and she listened for the responses as they came.
“Mrs. Elisabeth Cecil Somerset Calvert?”
“Present!”
“Mrs. Charlotte Bruce?”
“Here.”
“Mabel Bruce?”
“Present!”
“Elsa Carruthers?”
“Oh! I – don’t know – I guess – .” But a firm voice, her father’s, answered for the hesitating girl, whose timidity made her shrink from all these strangers.
“Aurora Blank? Gerald Blank?”
“Oh, we’re both right on hand, don’t you know? Pop’s pride rather stood in the way, but – Present!”
“Mr. Ephraim Brown-Calvert?”
The old man bowed profoundly and answered:
“Yeah ’m I, li’l miss!”
“That ends the passengers. Now for the crew. Captain Jack Hurry?”
Nobody responded. Whoever owned the rapid name was slow to claim it. But Dorothy smiled and proceeded. “Cap’n Jack” was a surprise of her own. He would keep for a time.
“Engineer James Barlow?”
“At his post!”
“Master Engineer, John Stinson?”
“Present!” called that person, laughing. He was Jim’s instructor and would see them down the bay and into the quiet river where they would make their first stop.
“Mrs. Chloe Brown, assistant chef and dishwasher?”
“Yeah ’m I?” returned the only one of Aunt Betty’s household-women who dared to trust herself on board a boat “to lib.” She was Methuselah’s mother and as his imposing name was read, answered for him; while the “cabin boy and general utility man” ducked his woolly head beneath her skirts, for once embarrassed by the attention he received.
“Miss Calvert, did you know that you make the thirteenth person?” asked Aurora Blank, who had kept tally on her white-gloved fingers.
“I hope I do – there’s ‘luck in odd numbers’ one hears. But I’m not – I’m not! Auntie, Jim, look yonder – quick! It’s Melvin! It surely is!”
With a cry of delight Dorothy now rushed down the pier to where a street-car had just stopped and a lad alighted. She clasped his hands and fairly pumped them up and down in her eagerness, but she didn’t offer to kiss him though she wanted to do so. She remembered in time that the young Nova Scotian was even shyer than James Barlow and mustn’t be embarrassed. But her questions came swiftly enough, though his answers were disappointing.
However, she led him straight to Mrs. Calvert, his one-time hostess at Deerhurst, and there was now no awkward shyness in his respectful greeting of her, and the acknowledgment he made to the general introductions which followed.
Seating himself on a rail close to Mrs. Betty’s chair he explained his presence.
“The Judge sent me to Baltimore on some errands of his own, and after they were done I was to call upon you, Madam, and say why her father couldn’t spare Miss Molly so soon again. He missed her so much, I fancy, while she was at San Leon ranch, don’t you know, and she is to go away to school after a time – that’s why. But – ”
The lad paused, colored, and was seized by a fit of his old bashfulness. He had improved wonderfully during the year since he had been a member of “Dorothy’s House Party” and had almost conquered that fault. No boy could be associated for so long a time with such a man as Judge Breckenridge and fail to learn much; but it wasn’t easy to offer himself as a substitute for merry Molly, which he had really arrived to do.
However, Dolly was quick to understand and caught his hands again, exclaiming:
“You’re to have your vacation on our Water Lily! I see, I see! Goody! Aunt Betty, isn’t that fine? Next to Molly darling I’d rather have you.”
Everybody laughed at this frank statement, even Dolly herself; yet promptly adding the name of Melvin Cook to her list of passengers. Then as he walked forward over the plank to where Jim Barlow smilingly awaited him, carrying his small suit-case – his only luggage, she called after him:
“I hope you brought your bugle! Then we can have ‘bells’ for time, as on the steamer!”
He nodded over his shoulder and Dorothy strained her eyes toward the next car approaching over the street line, while Mrs. Calvert asked:
“For whom are we still waiting, child? Why don’t we go aboard and start?”
“For dear old Cap’n Jack! He’s coming now, this minute.”
All eyes followed hers and beheld an old man approaching. Even at that distance his wrinkled face was so shining with happiness and good nature that they smiled too. He wore a very faded blue uniform made dazzlingly bright by scores of very new brass buttons. His white hair and beard had been closely trimmed, and the discarded cap of a street-car conductor crowned his proudly held head. The cap was adorned in rather shaky letters of gilt: “Water Lily. Skipper.”
Though he limped upon crutches he gave these supports an airy flourish between steps, as if he scarcely needed them but carried them for ornaments. Nobody knew him, except Dorothy; not even Ephraim recognizing in this almost dapper stranger the ragged vagrant he had once seen on a street car.
But