Next morning found them all up early and in great spirits. Breakfast was eaten with lively chat on indifferent topics. Gerald was successfully diverted from dwelling on yesterday’s mystery. George was dispatched early to the down-town waiting-rooms, and came back with the news that the messages Philip had telegraphed had been duly asked for by a gentleman who waited about for a long time after he received them. Philip and Mr. Hilliard exchanged glances. So the unknown sharper had indeed expected his victims, and finally retired to parts unknown! “Good-bye to him,” laughed Mr. Hilliard.
Ten o’clock came and the carriage. Philip had several errands to do around busy Union Square. The tickets were already attended to; but somehow time was lost. When they hurried down-town and swung around the corner of the Bowling Green they discovered that they were scarcely five minutes from the sailing of the Old Province.
As they rolled out upon the pier the black hull of the Halifax boat, built for worthy ocean service, rose before them.
“They’ve rung the ‘all-ashore bell’ long ago, gentlemen! Be lively!” called out one of the employees. They sprang out of the carriage and hurried forward. “Halloa, there, wait a minute!” was shouted to the deck-hands who were preparing to cast off the plank.
“Quick! That trunk there is for Halifax!” Mr. Hilliard called to the baggage-men. The trunk was caught up and hustled off. “A minute in time’s as good as an hour—good-bye, good-bye!” he gasped, helping them up. “I wanted to give you some points about the custom-house fellows and speak a good word to the captain for you, but I can’t. I’ll telegraph Marcy that I saw you off nicely. I’m going West myself to-morrow, you know. Good-bye, and do take care of yourselves!” With which Mr. Hilliard was fairly dragged down the plank by the impatient ship’s people, talking to the very bottom of it, and unconsciously quite a center of observation.
A moment later Philip and Gerald were waving their hands to him as the Old Province slipped along from the pier. Shall it be confessed that even Philip felt something like loneliness steal into his breast as he finally said, “Come, Gerald, let’s go and take a look at our state-room.”
They made themselves comfortable outside for the afternoon. There did not appear to be any considerable number of passengers. In fact, they heard one of the officers remarking that “it was the shortest list they had had during the season.” A dozen not very interesting commercial travelers going back to the Provinces; as many New Yorkers bound north on special errands; some quiet Nova Scotia people—these, with four or five humble household groups that the boys soon classed as emigrants, were all the travelers on the Old Province for that trip. They soon ceased to pay any attention to them, and they passed the long hazy afternoon quite by themselves. The Old Province steamed onward well out at sea, with the coast a pale bluish line in the distance.
But as the afternoon closed they began to meet the tides that roll in brusquely upon the New England inlets. A gray fog swept about the Old Province, and what with a strong swell and a bluff wind that drove the mist thicker around them, the steamer took to rolling quite too much for comfort. Darkness came on. The saloon twinkled with its lights in pleasant contrast to the gloom outside. Gerald, before supper, found out that he was—for the first time in his life—a particularly bad sailor.
“I—I think I’d better go and lie down,” he said, a good deal ashamed of his uneasiness. “I never was sick on our yacht, and I don’t believe I shall be now; but my head feels pretty topsy-turvy.”