“Well, if you don’t know, I can tell you in a few minutes; and then you can pass it on to some of the other boys. Go and ask the yeoman to give you a plumb line and half-circle, and then bring it here to me.”
Dick ran off very much interested and found the yeoman writing a letter on the berth deck.
“Say, Bob,” said Dick, “what’s a half-circle and plumb line? Have you got one?”
“Sure,” answered Bob, “what do you want it for?”
“The old man has just sent me down to get it. Hurry up there, quick.”
Bob Brackett, as yeoman of the ship, besides being always responsible for carrying the mail, had charge of the stationery, postage stamps, games, and instruction material; and now he dove down into one corner of his yeoman’s locker and pulled out a board shaped like a half-circle with a straight edge or diameter of eight inches.
“There’s the board,” said he, and tossed it on the table; “the plumb line seems to have gone adrift.”
Then, after rummaging a little longer, he called out:
“Here it is,” and handed Dick a leaden sinker fastened to a string.
“Now wait a minute,” said Bob, “and I’ll tack the string on for you. You see it’s got to be fastened just in the right place,—at the center of the straight edge.”