"I have not," said Mr. Martin. "I signed aboard of her at Rio this trip, to get up into the Christian world again. I've been deckhand and seaman and mate on more vessels than I can count--in every part of the uncivilized world. I skippered one ship, even--pestilential tub that she was."
He fell silent after this speech, longer than any he had made so far.
"Then I'll get home," Kirk said. "Home. Can't we let 'em know, or anything? I suppose they've been worrying."
"I think it likely that they have," said the mate. "No, this ship's got no wireless. I'll send 'em a telegram when we dock to-morrow."
"Thank you," said Kirk. Then, after a long pause: "Oh, if you knew how awful it was out there."
"I know," said Mr. Martin.
The Celestine was bowling into Bedford Harbor with a fair wind. Kirk, in a reefer any number of sizes too large for him, sat on a hatch-coaming and drank in the flying wonder of the schooner's way. He was sailing on a great ship! How surprised Ken would be--and envious, too, for Ken had always longed to sail in a ship. The wind soughed in the sails and sang in the rigging, and the water flew past the Celestine and bubbled away behind her in a seething curve of foam. Mr. Martin stood looking up at the smooth, rounded shape of the main topsail, and whistling the song about the hat which he had lost and so miraculously found. He looked more than usually thoughtful and melancholy.
A fussy tug took the Celestine the last stage of her journey, and early afternoon found her warped in to the wharf where Ken had seen her on the eve of her departure. Then, she had been waking to action at the beginning of a long cruise; now, a battered gull with gray, folded wings, she lay at the dock, pointing her bowsprit stiffly up to the dingy street where horses tramped endlessly over the cobblestones. The crew was jubilant. Some were leaving for other ships; some were going on shore leave, with months' pay unspent.
"I'm attending to this salvage, sir," said Mr. Martin, to the captain. "My folks live up Asquam way. I'll take him along with me."
Asquam's languid representative of the telegraph knocked upon the door of Applegate Farm, which was locked. Then he thrust the yellow envelope as far under the door as possible and went his way. An hour later, a tall man and a radiant small boy pushed open the gate on Winterbottom Road and walked across the yellow grass. Kirk broke away and ran toward the house, hands outflung.