Entered the channel, with Trinity cliffs astern. Pilot Lawson is at the wheel, looking very wise. Everybody’s watching him.
An indignation meeting has been called on the two-for-a-quarter deck by excited passengers who promised their wives, sweethearts, and parents [99] ]to keep out of Wall Street. They demand that the vessel be put back. The Pilot remarked, grimly, that it is harder to get out of Wall Street than into it. He advises all hands to hang on and wait for a rise.
A little before 3 P. M. the lookout shouted, “Maelstrom dead ahead!” A panic resulted, and the cry went up that Lawson was a bum pilot. Strong and willing hands tore him from the wheel, and, pursued by the infuriated passengers and crew, he ran down the deck and dove over the taffrail, yawping: “I will have something to say next month!”
[100] ]“We are lost!” the Captain shouted, as he staggered down the stairs. Putting three chips on the red, he spun the wheel to starboard. Round and round in the clutches of the maelstrom spun the good ship Lithia. “Whee!” cried Hennessy Martel, “this is like old times. First good whirl my head’s had since the Lambs’ Club gambol.”
2.56 P. M.—The Lithia seems hopelessly lost. The passengers, with blanched faces, are swapping farewells and keepsakes.